Category Archives: Starships
Developing Chris Madden’s Enterprise F Concept
Apologies for my absence – as you can see by my previous post I have been happily busy with some news my wife and I had 
I have also been busy in the background with the development of Chris Madden’s “Dedication class” Enterprise F concept (pictured above) for the Star Trek: Online competition which was held a while back. I have been posting on the scifi-meshes forum here:
http://www.scifi-meshes.com/forums/showthread.php?77955-Chris-Madden-s-Dedication-Class
The amount of time I can devote to this is a little sporadic, but I would encourage you to check back there for updates. I also haven’t forgotten about the fact that the Eaves Class still needs finishing off.
I’ll continue to post anything worthwhile up here.
Starships for download
I’ve added some other starship models for download tonight – the Hawking and Ascension Class starships. The Ascension is probably most famous for being the main ship of Star Trek: Phoenix, but now you can make it your own!
All are either in 3DS Max 2010 or .Obj format. I’ve also added a better .obj version of the Insignia Class mesh.
Let me know if you have any problems with them….
Hawking Class Starship.zip (3D Studio Max 2010)
Hawking Class Starship Obj.zip (.obj format)
Ascension Class Starship.zip (3D Studio Max 2010)
Ascension Class Starship Obj.zip (.obj format)
Insignia Class Master Systems Display
Alexander Richardson has done an amazing job rendering my Insignia Class as a LCARs system display. I supplied him some high resolution profile views of my 3D mesh which he worked from. He was generous enough to give me first sight of the 10000×4039 pixel masterpiece here.
There are lots of little nuggets in the detail. It seems that the Weyland Yutani corporation had a hand in the construction. Not sure how I feel about that… 
Alex’s blog, which includes lots of other displays from Star Trek and beyond, is here.
Remote Control Starships
I’ve been extremely busy lately with work, and haven’t had much time to devote to personal projects lately. In the meantime, here is a great video sent to me by Omar El Reyes. He’s made a remote control model of my Insignia Class starship! I would love to see her in action.
Eaves class, with further improvements
After last week’s comments I’ve added some improvements to the mesh, namely:
- Better hull detailing
- Thrusters!
- Thickened the phaser strips – they were there all along but I had made them a little too thin for people to recognise easily.
- Redone the bussard collectors so you can see “inside” them.
- Added some detailing around the deflector, although I haven’t added to the deflector as I simply liked the effect.
- Added bridge detailing.
Thoughts?
P.S. The “Falcon” namesake is – what else? – a Star Wars reference
Eaves Class, pretty much done…
Some renders of the finished* ship:
What do people think?
* Things like this are never finished…
Started (but not finished) texturing the Eaves
I’ve found time to start texturing John Eaves’ starship now, but it’s not quite ready for the world yet – hence it’s a little shrouded in darkness here. The nacelle detail isn’t quite right and I’m scratching my head a little about the panelling effect on the surface, but here it is for you to see it take shape.
If you have any suggestions for the texturing, let me know!
Eaves Class Colour Tests
I’ve pretty much finished the actual modelling stage of John Eaves’ ship now, so I’ve started to turn my mind to painting it…I wanted it to look a little different to my previous ships. Here’s my first attempt and putting some basic colours on it. For those interested, I’ve used mental ray materials to create the glossy effects. If anyone has any tips on mental ray (it’s my first time!), please let me know.
I’m undecided on the colour of elements like the deflector still, so any suggestions would be appreciated.
Oh, and I’m aware that some of you have sent emails that I am meaning to reply to. I shall drop you a line shortly! I also haven’t forgotten about some of the tutorials I’ve promised. Finally, when I’m done with the eaves class, I will definitely put it up for download.
Eaves Class: A little bit more progress…
I haven’t had much time to devote to this lately, but I managed to steal a few hours tonight to work on it; the model now has some escape pods and a few more lights.
I also spent a fair bit of time re-modelling the front saucer’s deflector to better reflect John’s sketches.
Not too far to go and I’ll be texturing it…
Eaves Class with detachable saucer….
A little progress today, not much – I added just a few more windows and rounded off the front deflector…
