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Original post starts here:
So, it’s that time again, time to play around with the TOS Enterprise design. But, rather than just model the ship, (I have one of those) I’m doing a redesign. I’ve done this sort of thing before, but it’s been years and I don’t have those models anymore. Initially, this was going to be a ship in the Kelvin timeline, but as I was working on it, it became more my style than anything else. But, there are some Kelvin inspired bits, such as the saucer section. And, there will be more familiar bits that pop in as I go, since I’m drawing inspiration from a number of sources.
Anyway, everything is pretty preliminary so far, and is subject to change. The main bulk of the saucer, secondary hull and nacelles probably won’t get redone. And, I’ve done the warp pylons twice and am pretty happy with them, so they’re not likely to change. Everything else may get redone, though.
Posts
The improvement to the Engine Pylons (Excellent)
The new bridge (really good)
The neck (I'm going to say excellent - its the one area there isn't a clear shot of)
How you are handling the main hull around the front deflector (really good)
Suggestion:
The ridge on the saucer needs a balance. It may be in an odd place. You might want to do like the movie Enterprise and put a larger scoring line a little back from the edge of the saucer to go with it.
I will greatly enjoy following your progress on this.
Just a quick update before I go to work. I’ve redone the whole bridge area. I wasn’t happy with the look I had previously, so I redid the bridge to one inspired by the Phase II model that was being built 42 years ago. I also redid the B deck structure beneath and added a swoopy spoony thing (technical term) that goes back to the impulse area.
The neck is going to be redone. I'm not happy with it at all, so it's basically a placeholder at present. As I said in my original post, the ridge on the saucer is based on the Kelvin Timeline ships. True story: it's actually the same size as the top part of the TOS Enterprise saucer that curves up. The only difference is that it's raised slightly off of the hull, rather than going flush with it. There will be more details added later that should balance it out more.
The secondary hull is two pieces, I'll show that later.
LOVE the new bridge. I thought the last one was really good but I agree this is better.
Also, here's one for Brandenberg, who asked how the secondary hull was put together:
Thanks. I really like doing the necks on my ships that way.
Either way it looks great
Yes, it did. The torpedo launcher has a smooth transition into the spine of the secondary hull. Mine is just a longer arc.
Anyway the neck is great. I am also really loving the clean looking impulse drive. Another thing that I like is the slight flairing of the engine pylons where they meet the engine and hull.
Good start! And I like that angle ^ ^
I also changed the vent style on my impulse engines, I like this much better. It's based on the Phase II ship's impulse engines. And, I added some vents to the top of the saucer, to the port and starboard of the impulse reactors. I figure those would be good should it be necessary to purge the deuterium tanks. Of course, if that happened, the ship would be stuck with only warp drive and thrusters, but one would assume it would be an emergency measure and not something you’d do under normal circumstances, much like a warp core ejection.
For the phasers, I decided to make them turrets, rather than just nubs with holes in them. I think this looks more realistic and less refined than the later era phasers. I could have cut the access panels into the hull, but there would have been little benefit as you won’t be able to tell in most renders. And, of course, the text won’t be visible most of the time either. **shrugs**
For the RCS thrusters, I went with a vent look.
However, I Feel like the registry feels a little cramped. I’s spread it out a little more over the whole saucer. A little like this:
Yeah, I thought about that too. I may do one on the underside.