Personally I think that the rails either side of the Captain's chair seem a little out of place, but obviously you're client wanted them. That aside, looks awesome. Certainly can see this as being the bridge of a small cruiser in that era.
Also, thinking about it, there's precedent for the "Captains rail", as Defiant in "The Search" had similar features. So this design certainly fits in as a precursor to the Defiant as a small and functional bridge, without the comforts of a larger starship.
You know, a viewer like that could fit well if you wanted to do the USS Jenolan's "Ops Center," which is basically the ship's bridge plus transporter booth and a few other things. It was called that in the novelization of TNG's "Relics" as well as the shooting script.
@richiewilch: Yeah, the rails around the Captain's chair on the Hack are mostly to warn people to walk around the step, rather than to serve as handrails as they are on more traditional bridge designs, they aren't really needed given there's no drop or anything; indeed like you mentioned, a similar thing to how they originally were on Defiant.
@Rusty0918: That's a great point I hadn't considered, and I didn't know it was referenced as an Ops Center! Guess it makes some more sense with the transporter there.
sigh... Well, the Lafayette bridge is almost completely done, but I'm waiting for approval on several items before sharing. Unfortunately I haven't heard from my client for weeks now... I have some more commissions going (plus my increasing non-Trek work) but honestly this year is reaching a frustrating point with how many times I've had to stop on my tracks when a commission is almost done, just as with Orion and Ranger now.
The wind is kinda off my sails, so once again I'm shifting to a quick personal project for a few days. As stated a few times before, I've been meaning to have a ship I use as a TMP-era playground for ideas, kinda like how I use the Potemkin for the TNG-era. Once again using a canon starship, I've decided to take on the Constellation-Class USS Victory NCC-9754. While the ship appeared in TNG, given that registry number we can safely assume it's been around since the late-TMP era.
As with the two Constellation-Class bridges seen in canon (Stargazer and Hathaway) I've used the TNG battle bridge as a base, more specifically the modified version I did for the USS Merced bridge. I went with the color scheme from the Enterprise-B as base, as well as its Captain's chair.
In an effort to differentiate this bridge from others I've already made, I did some stuff that I don't particularly like on Trek bridges, such as placing a central aft door directly behind the Captain's chair; as well as having mostly standing consoles rather than seated ones.
Anyway, after a few hours of work (this is mostly stuff I already had, after all), here's how it's looking. Most of the LCARS will need work or replacing (I'm thinking big MSDs flanking the viewscreen), and there are currently two stations labeled 'Tactical', I'll be replacing the side one with 'Engineering'. What do you think of it so far? Is it too dark? I was thinking of increasing the lights levels. Comments and suggestions very much welcome on this one, being a personal project.
Post edited by Rekkert on
For all my finished Trek fan art, please visit my portfolio
I really like your TMP era projects. Great work on this one!
Regarding the turbolift: I always have difficulties with the fact that the lifts on several bridges of the same class are located in different positions. I know the bridge modules are interchangeable but at least the turbo shaft should always be in the same place for a ship class. In case of the Constellation class, it should be analogous to the Stargazer. And yes, I also have problems with the Hathaway Bridge...I generally like the door arranged in the middle but - at least for me - it better suits for a Miranda class starship.
@solaremes: well, if the whole bridge module's interchangeable, that's not just deck 01, but also decks 2 and 3 at the very least. That means that the turboshaft can easily be in the same location at the deck where the module connects to the ship, but then be in different locations inside the module, depending on how its lower decks are arranged.
Glad you're all liking it so far, I made the lights a bit brighter, I think it's better while still being rather moody.
I've tweaked some of the fabric materials, and began changing up the LCARS and stations at the back. As you can see, the aft 'Tactical' station got replaced by 'Science', while 'Comms' at the other side got replaced with 'Engineering' (Tactical can handle comms, just like Worf does on TNG).
I've also started the MSD next to the viewscreen. The other side will probably have a front view, next to a little starchart.
Post edited by Rekkert on
For all my finished Trek fan art, please visit my portfolio
@rekkert: Good reason and of course it gives you a lot more freedom and creativity to design the bridges... but it's still against my impulse for order and uniformity ;-)
The brighter lighting looks great! I'm looking forward to the finished renders.
@BolianAdmiral: Haha, true! Blame Doug Drexler for that, it's the size the side-door labels have on the Enterprise-B.
Finished the aforementioned MSD and viewscreen area. I still have to change/update a few LCARS around the bridge (including the helm which you can see is rather empty right now), but now I think everything's already into place other than that. What do you think, am I missing something?
For all my finished Trek fan art, please visit my portfolio
Really like this design. The way the struts (legs? stands?) are for the standing consoles, I find myself curious if the Helm/Nav console set up from your Belknap bridge might go well with this design.
That being said, having had a closer look at that bridge, I wonder if those consoles might take up too much space on this small bridge.
@richiewilch: Yeah, the Belknap helm is a bit wider, and I wanted to have the canon console for this one. The stands for the rest of the consoles are based on a canon design as well, seen on the Enterprise-A transporter room and engineering from TFF.
@Rusty0918: I've thought about that myself, I would imagine the shape is the same, but with the usual TNG conn/ops and standing consoles; plus the Sutherland style Captain's chair; battle bridge buttresses; TNG doors and red labels; etc. A rather standard "bridge of the week".
@Warp Propulsion Laboratory: Haha, it was the only useful place where I could've placed it, but I quite like how that area turned out myself.
Been experimenting with some red alert indicators for the bridge. I want it to have clear red bars instead of just changing the overhead lighting, so I decided to add them to the empty space above the console keyboards. I'll add a similar indicator to the top of the helm console once I finish the LCARS for that element.
Post edited by Rekkert on
For all my finished Trek fan art, please visit my portfolio
@richiewilch: Yeah, the Belknap helm is a bit wider, and I wanted to have the canon console for this one. The stands for the rest of the consoles are based on a canon design as well, seen on the Enterprise-A transporter room and engineering from TFF.
Oh absolutely, you do whatever you want in your project. The stands, which do appear the same as the canon ones, just reminded of the Belknap Helm. I'd certainly like to see that used elsewhere in the future.
Finished the LCARS for the helm console, which is a custom layout to better match the standing consoles rather than going for a 1:1 copy of what was in any of the movies. I've also heavily reworked the top view Constellation graphic placed below the helm, and did the necessary modifications for the tactical and engineering consoles.
I've tweaked the lighting as well, adding Enterprise-B style sconces to the side walls (not the same I used on the Merced, those were inaccurate as they were just reuses of the 24th Century style ones) and changing the color temperature of most sources to better match the Ent-B warmer lights. The light in front of the helm; the one above the turbolift door; the spotlights by the ceiling; and the large overhead light are all still cold light, again just as on the Ent-B.
Finally, the red alert lighting is also finished (I think), with not only the helm console but also the little overhead spotlight at the center of the bridge going red. I tried a few different effects such as changing more of the lighting or adding alert indicators on the little screens above the viewscreen, but I didn't like how those alternatives looked like.
I think I'm ready to call this one done, unless I'm missing something. What do you think?
For all my finished Trek fan art, please visit my portfolio
Here's the finished Victory bridge. I ended up doing a couple more modifications, though very minor. First, I added a subtle ribbed texture to the black risers on the platforms for the Captain's chair and helm, and on the continued vertical black trim all along the edge of the top level. This is to mimic how the area around the pit looks like on the Enterprise-B.
Second, for the first time I exported the LCARS textures into 8k files rather than 4k as I did up to this point. This was due to noticed pixelation whenever I placed the camera too close to the consoles, and it was detrimental to the immersion on the images. This WIP render was what prompted this, as the Captain's chair buttons were heavily pixelated. Overall the new 8k images helped get brighter and sharper graphics all over, particularly whenever there were diagonal lines (such as on the Constellation top view graphic on the helm), that didn't have that big a resolution at 4k. So this had a far greater impact than I anticipated, and all for just a couple extra Mb for each exported image.
Post edited by Rekkert on
For all my finished Trek fan art, please visit my portfolio
Posts
Also, thinking about it, there's precedent for the "Captains rail", as Defiant in "The Search" had similar features. So this design certainly fits in as a precursor to the Defiant as a small and functional bridge, without the comforts of a larger starship.
@richiewilch: Yeah, the rails around the Captain's chair on the Hack are mostly to warn people to walk around the step, rather than to serve as handrails as they are on more traditional bridge designs, they aren't really needed given there's no drop or anything; indeed like you mentioned, a similar thing to how they originally were on Defiant.
@Rusty0918: That's a great point I hadn't considered, and I didn't know it was referenced as an Ops Center! Guess it makes some more sense with the transporter there.
sigh... Well, the Lafayette bridge is almost completely done, but I'm waiting for approval on several items before sharing. Unfortunately I haven't heard from my client for weeks now... I have some more commissions going (plus my increasing non-Trek work) but honestly this year is reaching a frustrating point with how many times I've had to stop on my tracks when a commission is almost done, just as with Orion and Ranger now.
The wind is kinda off my sails, so once again I'm shifting to a quick personal project for a few days. As stated a few times before, I've been meaning to have a ship I use as a TMP-era playground for ideas, kinda like how I use the Potemkin for the TNG-era. Once again using a canon starship, I've decided to take on the Constellation-Class USS Victory NCC-9754. While the ship appeared in TNG, given that registry number we can safely assume it's been around since the late-TMP era.
As with the two Constellation-Class bridges seen in canon (Stargazer and Hathaway) I've used the TNG battle bridge as a base, more specifically the modified version I did for the USS Merced bridge. I went with the color scheme from the Enterprise-B as base, as well as its Captain's chair.
In an effort to differentiate this bridge from others I've already made, I did some stuff that I don't particularly like on Trek bridges, such as placing a central aft door directly behind the Captain's chair; as well as having mostly standing consoles rather than seated ones.
Anyway, after a few hours of work (this is mostly stuff I already had, after all), here's how it's looking. Most of the LCARS will need work or replacing (I'm thinking big MSDs flanking the viewscreen), and there are currently two stations labeled 'Tactical', I'll be replacing the side one with 'Engineering'. What do you think of it so far? Is it too dark? I was thinking of increasing the lights levels. Comments and suggestions very much welcome on this one, being a personal project.
Regarding the turbolift: I always have difficulties with the fact that the lifts on several bridges of the same class are located in different positions. I know the bridge modules are interchangeable but at least the turbo shaft should always be in the same place for a ship class. In case of the Constellation class, it should be analogous to the Stargazer. And yes, I also have problems with the Hathaway Bridge...I generally like the door arranged in the middle but - at least for me - it better suits for a Miranda class starship.
Glad you're all liking it so far, I made the lights a bit brighter, I think it's better while still being rather moody.
I've tweaked some of the fabric materials, and began changing up the LCARS and stations at the back. As you can see, the aft 'Tactical' station got replaced by 'Science', while 'Comms' at the other side got replaced with 'Engineering' (Tactical can handle comms, just like Worf does on TNG).
I've also started the MSD next to the viewscreen. The other side will probably have a front view, next to a little starchart.
The brighter lighting looks great! I'm looking forward to the finished renders.
@BolianAdmiral: Haha, true! Blame Doug Drexler for that, it's the size the side-door labels have on the Enterprise-B.
Finished the aforementioned MSD and viewscreen area. I still have to change/update a few LCARS around the bridge (including the helm which you can see is rather empty right now), but now I think everything's already into place other than that.
That being said, having had a closer look at that bridge, I wonder if those consoles might take up too much space on this small bridge.
Awesome work as always.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqRhLEHgwgTKxsalM5YznYQ
Formerly furswift
@richiewilch: Yeah, the Belknap helm is a bit wider, and I wanted to have the canon console for this one. The stands for the rest of the consoles are based on a canon design as well, seen on the Enterprise-A transporter room and engineering from TFF.
@Rusty0918: I've thought about that myself, I would imagine the shape is the same, but with the usual TNG conn/ops and standing consoles; plus the Sutherland style Captain's chair; battle bridge buttresses; TNG doors and red labels; etc. A rather standard "bridge of the week".
@Vortex5972: Thanks!
@Warp Propulsion Laboratory: Haha, it was the only useful place where I could've placed it, but I quite like how that area turned out myself.
Been experimenting with some red alert indicators for the bridge. I want it to have clear red bars instead of just changing the overhead lighting, so I decided to add them to the empty space above the console keyboards. I'll add a similar indicator to the top of the helm console once I finish the LCARS for that element.
Oh absolutely, you do whatever you want in your project. The stands, which do appear the same as the canon ones, just reminded of the Belknap Helm. I'd certainly like to see that used elsewhere in the future.
I've tweaked the lighting as well, adding Enterprise-B style sconces to the side walls (not the same I used on the Merced, those were inaccurate as they were just reuses of the 24th Century style ones) and changing the color temperature of most sources to better match the Ent-B warmer lights. The light in front of the helm; the one above the turbolift door; the spotlights by the ceiling; and the large overhead light are all still cold light, again just as on the Ent-B.
Finally, the red alert lighting is also finished (I think), with not only the helm console but also the little overhead spotlight at the center of the bridge going red. I tried a few different effects such as changing more of the lighting or adding alert indicators on the little screens above the viewscreen, but I didn't like how those alternatives looked like.
I think I'm ready to call this one done, unless I'm missing something. What do you think?
Second, for the first time I exported the LCARS textures into 8k files rather than 4k as I did up to this point. This was due to noticed pixelation whenever I placed the camera too close to the consoles, and it was detrimental to the immersion on the images. This WIP render was what prompted this, as the Captain's chair buttons were heavily pixelated. Overall the new 8k images helped get brighter and sharper graphics all over, particularly whenever there were diagonal lines (such as on the Constellation top view graphic on the helm), that didn't have that big a resolution at 4k. So this had a far greater impact than I anticipated, and all for just a couple extra Mb for each exported image.