Mustang13Camaro68

Getting sick of the seaQuest. I'll put it aside for awhile.
I've ALWAYS wanted a physical model of the Roger Young from Starship Troopers, so for this project I'm going to model for 3d printing, not rendering. Which means clean, closed, watertight meshes - no cheating.
There's a few models available on the Internet, but they're not very accurate or the mesh isn't 3d printable. So, like Thanos, I'll just have to do it myself.
I've roughed in the major shapes by modeling over an existing 3d model (digitawn's). Now to start examining all the photo ref I have and adjust my model forms to be screen accurate.
Then I'll figure out how best to break it up for 3D printing and assembly.
Then I'll get into the finer details and greebles.
Then print.
Then paint.
Then rig lighting.
Considering I'm a noob to the last 2 steps, I'll probably finish this project by the year the movie actually takes place...

Work In Progress Cutaway. Trying to imagine the different layers of hull and structure needed to make seaQuest work:






Updated with new interior bridge render:


Wanted to get to this for a long time. I had made a workable Master Systems Display a while back and now I'm using it to try and make a 3d deck layout for the ship.


Here's some very WIP renders of my progress:

Modeling the Mars Attacks! flying saucer to take a break from my seaQuest project & job hunting.
I intend to model the landing legs & ramp, and also make the non-legged flying version with the ray gun sticking out.
The cuts in the hull are too wide, going to fix that. It might be a little vertically squashed too, gotta keep looking at my reference.
This is just a temp matcap texture. Probably going to put it in Unreal for rendering, to work on my skills there.

Continuing to flesh out the "Head" with panel details. Maybe 50 percent done with those.

Minor Update:

Lost some modelling I did to the side and back due to some 3ds Max file shenanigans OR me opening and saving over the wrong file. Not too terrible. Life goes on.

Started adding tabs and slots that will make all the 3d printed parts eventually fit together like Legos. Not sure if this will be a curse to add lighting wires inside once its printed. I'm figure that I can cut through areas where necessary once its printed.



Not sure if this is the best approach, or if I should figure out how to add some sort of "spine" inside the whole thing to give it strength. Like a piece of PVC pipe or something.

Began detailing the front most part of the ship.

So, with some time on my hands, I've made an animated preview of the seaQuest being constructed as the camera moves through it.

Everything about this is VERY Work-In-Progress, but I wanted to get the idea out of my head to see if it could work visually. I think the ultimate look should be a time lapse construction.

I'm ok with the camera move, but I was thinking of having it go up and around the bridge as the bridge assembles and then back outside to end in the same way. The bridge is the most seen place in the show, I probably should show it off more.

Feedback is welcome. What do you think could make this cool? Is something not reading well to you? Is the camera moving too fast or slow?

Even though I have plenty of other projects I should be finishing, I was sketching last night and thought up a re-imagining of the seaQuest. Maybe what it'd look like if the aliens from season 2 were friendly and shared their technology or something.

Not quite happy with the triple "neck" area. Might make that solid somehow.
I think the head fins have to go. Not happy with the head overall, but I was trying not to copy the original too much.

Anyway, its just some 2d and 3d sketching.

More lighting/texturing updates. Seems a lot closer to the reference.
Next step is to figure out how to IK rig the legs and animate them coming out as the saucer lands.

Head panels finished. Not sure if I'm gonna model greebles in the horizontal channels or do it in the real world somehow.
Next up, the paneling on the terraced "Chin".
Starting a new job this week, so progress will likely slow down.
On the other hand, money is good. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

A small update. Playing around with 3DS Max's viewport draw modes. Still trying to fit stuff inside the hull while also trying to maintain "plausibility". Also trying to move stuff into Unreal Engine for faster rendering and to force myself to learn more Unreal Engine. I would kill to have just Unreal Engine's rendering inside of 3DS Max so I didn't have to deal with Unreal Engine itself