Last night I had a play with trying to reconstruct the ship from the Christies auction photo's using photogrammetry. The results were.....not great, but it did give me a little bit. I guess I ended up with some reference for the neck and spine shape.
Now according to that my neck/saucer is a bit high. I moved it to match but it looked way off so I'm guessing the z axis is a bit squashed owing to lack of information. It was a fun excersise though! I've wound back to pre-subd freeze (again!) but am ready to move on.
About halfway there with the saucer top aztecs so far. This part is really tedious but it's got to be done, which is partly why I'm doing some of it now, as opposed to waiting to the end to do all the texturing.
Main chunk of the aztecs done for the saucer top, obviously I need to do the stripes all around the bridge module. Comparison below of 2 pallettes, a 'model accurate' one and a more subdued one. The accurate one is imo a bit too 'chessboardy', I understand that these things are painted quite vibrant so as to resolve on camera under studio lights but in a render it's a bit too much I think.
The subdued one definitely looks better in the render. How does it look in a space environment? With minimal lights etc?
The lines to the sides of the bulge will be covered with the cargo elevators right?
I have to get mine painted up like that soon. I was thinking about axtecs, but I am sure a more shuttle paint job is needed because of the size.
In universe, the Aztecs are either a whimsical paint job on the part of the ship's designer and construction crew. Or they are a visual effect of laying plates of metal down to form a skin for the ship's outer hull.
So making it subtle adds some sense of believability with the scale of the ship. But close up detailing would be a different beast.
I think I'm close to nailing the look. I re-worked the pallette completely as well as changing up the roughness map a bit. Lightin makes all the difference here too so the below shots are with a less 'harsh' light setup. Next step is to get some windows and escape pods on I think, to give some better context.
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Now according to that my neck/saucer is a bit high. I moved it to match but it looked way off so I'm guessing the z axis is a bit squashed owing to lack of information. It was a fun excersise though! I've wound back to pre-subd freeze (again!) but am ready to move on.
Edit: Talking about this image. Not sure why my post appeared so far away from it.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqRhLEHgwgTKxsalM5YznYQ
Formerly furswift
Also started drawing up the saucer aztecs;
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqRhLEHgwgTKxsalM5YznYQ
Formerly furswift
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That is lovely 😳
The lines to the sides of the bulge will be covered with the cargo elevators right?
I have to get mine painted up like that soon. I was thinking about axtecs, but I am sure a more shuttle paint job is needed because of the size.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqRhLEHgwgTKxsalM5YznYQ
Formerly furswift
So making it subtle adds some sense of believability with the scale of the ship. But close up detailing would be a different beast.
Enterprise NX-01 hull example
Love the look on those escape pod hatches!
I figured everyone does the enterprise so why not be a bit different, it's not hard to change anyway.