Thanks guys! Dunno what I'll do with the mesh once it's done, I'm not looking forward to the texturing job on this, but I do need to develop my texturing chops, I suppose... I want to do something very realistic, like the excellent job this company did:
Which puts my model at about the 1/8th completed mark...
The way the main thrusters work... the large cylinders behind the bells contain the very hot nuclear rods, which are sheathed in lead, the pilots throttle pushes the rods out and exposes their surface area to the reactant (which could be anything) thus creating wildy expanding plasma gas which pushes the old girl. The further the rods are exposed, the more energetic and voluminous the plasma creation, and the faster she goes.
The small cylinders contain the reactant, the main connection umbilicals and a reactor station will be on the forward end of the main thruster assembly, which seals into the aft pod module structure and is accessible by the flight crew from a transport module's aft hatch, as in the original.
The main engines on this ship are similar to the impulse engines on Starfleet ships, which can propel a mass to near light-speed; relativistic velocities.
The Eagles travel at sublight speeds, of course, but for long distances and over time, can get very close to the speed of light.
The lifting and RCS thrusters are more conventional chemical reaction rockets.
There may be some anti-grav technology, but not for moving the ship around, but more for crew comfort, and maybe shaves off the ship's practical mass by a degree... so it doesnt have such a large gravitational profile when it's near a massive body of matter, such as a planet. So it appears lighter than it really is in a gravity well.
For the higher speeds, I imagine the ship reversing itself for deceleration, using the main thrusters for braking... I may make a thruster block specifically for high velocity, with forward facing retro bells, for a more dignified arrival... but, who knows?
Conduits and components, wont really be visible, only glimplsed. I may have a few pinlights inside that look like functioning things going on in there, in addition to self illumination and formation lights.
They may be tedious, but it's the best way to make a model sing when it's being rendered. All those lovely little details to catch the light. :-)
Excellent work.
Thanks guys. I always imagined the pads retracted on the original, too. The recess in the pod is a perfect fit for the pads, I do recall an illustration in a comic book depicting just that.
When I do get around to modelling the original, it will certainly have retracting pads when I animate it.
Speaking of Space:1999, I just made a model of those famous lamps, for my TurboSquid store, here's hoping someone bites... sales have been low lately. Check it out:
I just put Eagle Spacecraft into google images. It's was about 3 pages in. There was a cardboard cut out version on the site that featured the image I posted as well, which looks almost an accurate. :-)
Here's the URL Space 1999 Eagle Mammoth Model, Para-Jet and Others
When I saw it I just had to post it.
You could always model a tiny version of that to hang of a control panel on the command module of yours.
My God, this thing just gets more beautiful with every update! When it's done, you may just have the most perfect "updated/rebooted/whatever" ship design I've ever seen. Please tell me you'll be releasing this here when it's finished. It would break my heart not to get a chance to play with this model. More updates soon, please!
Man that is shaping up real nice. It is also thought out well as to function and practical design far surpassing the original in that aspect.
Hey when they changed the website why did they take away the thumbnail previews? What a pain to pick what you want to look at now, its like trying to figure out what donut you want without having a donut case upfront and believe me I have been in bakery like that before. Oh the chip on my shoulder. :flippy:
Thanks guys! I'll have more soon. Texturing, to me, is the real chore, I might hand this over to someone who is good at that part.
I'm looking for textures like this:
This model is in C4d v11 format, so far, no hypernurbs, it's all plain geometry. I will likely rig up the kinematics last.
About this project, I am thinking about putting together a dvd video guide to this bird, featuring a section where the camera pov is a pilot trainee and a pilot character walks you through the features of the ship and piloting ops. I've been thinking about this alot, it would be a huge project for one guy, but I think it would sell well as a fan based product.
I dunno about the thumbnail thing, btw... all I see is the icon to drop a pic in the post, so I uploaded pics to a hosting service and dropped in the url...
You'd think there would be a php thumbnail script in place to handle this. Not difficult to put in place.
Hi Jeffery,
the job you've done is simply amazing ! Can't wait to see it finished.
...it also reminds me to spend some time with the "Aero-Eagle" i started weeks ago :-X
Thanks guys, I really appreciate the encouragement, it helps me feel like maybe I'm not modeling in a vacuum... so to speak!
Underside... yeah, I want to finish the cm, then either tackle the vertical thrusters under the pod mudules, or start chunking up the transport module... at least get the exterior on the move before the massive task of doing the interior...
I think having the truss in place would help give the model a more finished overall look. Right now we can all see you are still working on things here and there, because that last major part is still to come. It's a pity we use different software. I'd love to play with your newest toy in a some animations. Or help out with the textures, but I'm a Lightwaver. :-P
I'm running out of descriptions for my enthusiasm over this project. The details are coming along nicely. The ship looks wider and definitely sleeker than the original, but everything about it screams Moonbase Alpha Eagle Transport. It looks so different yet you know exactly what it is as soon as you see it.
I'm using instanced geometry, which means there is really just one pod, just one half of the cm upper shell, etc... maybe I can export it to obj or something later, but it would have to be really tweaked once imported... I have an old, old copy of LW around here somewhere, maybe I'll install it and play with it again, to me it was a very counter-intuitive program, but I did manage to model a few things... about 5 years ago.
Posts
Eagle Transporter
Which puts my model at about the 1/8th completed mark...
The way the main thrusters work... the large cylinders behind the bells contain the very hot nuclear rods, which are sheathed in lead, the pilots throttle pushes the rods out and exposes their surface area to the reactant (which could be anything) thus creating wildy expanding plasma gas which pushes the old girl. The further the rods are exposed, the more energetic and voluminous the plasma creation, and the faster she goes.
The small cylinders contain the reactant, the main connection umbilicals and a reactor station will be on the forward end of the main thruster assembly, which seals into the aft pod module structure and is accessible by the flight crew from a transport module's aft hatch, as in the original.
The main engines on this ship are similar to the impulse engines on Starfleet ships, which can propel a mass to near light-speed; relativistic velocities.
The Eagles travel at sublight speeds, of course, but for long distances and over time, can get very close to the speed of light.
The lifting and RCS thrusters are more conventional chemical reaction rockets.
There may be some anti-grav technology, but not for moving the ship around, but more for crew comfort, and maybe shaves off the ship's practical mass by a degree... so it doesnt have such a large gravitational profile when it's near a massive body of matter, such as a planet. So it appears lighter than it really is in a gravity well.
For the higher speeds, I imagine the ship reversing itself for deceleration, using the main thrusters for braking... I may make a thruster block specifically for high velocity, with forward facing retro bells, for a more dignified arrival... but, who knows?
To power the RCS and vertical lift thrusters.
Excellent work.
When I do get around to modelling the original, it will certainly have retracting pads when I animate it.
Speaking of Space:1999, I just made a model of those famous lamps, for my TurboSquid store, here's hoping someone bites... sales have been low lately. Check it out:
Sorella Lamp
I might do the whole line of Moonbase Alpha furniture, just for the 70's chic of it.
Check this collection out:
Sorellarium 13
Here's the URL Space 1999 Eagle Mammoth Model, Para-Jet and Others
When I saw it I just had to post it.
You could always model a tiny version of that to hang of a control panel on the command module of yours.
Space 1999 Mattel Eagle Models
SPACE 1999 TOYS AND COLLECTABLES, Calendar Toy Action Figure Poster Picture Game Standup UK Cheapest
Just that front section alone looks nice. The Eagle now looks related to the old Starbird.
StarBird? Did someone mention the StarBird?
Scifi-Meshes.com - Buckaroohawk's Album: Buckaroohawk's 3D Gallery - Picture
By the way, what do you mean by "old"?
Sorry. This isn't meant to be a hijack of this thread. Just couldn't help myself.
I'll be back on this model soon, I just posted a summary of this project on my blog:
Blog entry Re-Imagined Eagle Transporter
Hey when they changed the website why did they take away the thumbnail previews? What a pain to pick what you want to look at now, its like trying to figure out what donut you want without having a donut case upfront and believe me I have been in bakery like that before. Oh the chip on my shoulder. :flippy:
Great Work!!!
I'm looking for textures like this:
This model is in C4d v11 format, so far, no hypernurbs, it's all plain geometry. I will likely rig up the kinematics last.
About this project, I am thinking about putting together a dvd video guide to this bird, featuring a section where the camera pov is a pilot trainee and a pilot character walks you through the features of the ship and piloting ops. I've been thinking about this alot, it would be a huge project for one guy, but I think it would sell well as a fan based product.
You'd think there would be a php thumbnail script in place to handle this. Not difficult to put in place.
the job you've done is simply amazing ! Can't wait to see it finished.
...it also reminds me to spend some time with the "Aero-Eagle" i started weeks ago :-X
Ceep on with your great work !
Cheers, Stephan
Underside... yeah, I want to finish the cm, then either tackle the vertical thrusters under the pod mudules, or start chunking up the transport module... at least get the exterior on the move before the massive task of doing the interior...
I should finish the connecting truss soon, too...
Thanks again for the enthusiasm guys!