Okay, I thought about designing an own ship class for some time now. And tonight I decided to finally give it a shot. So please be kind to me — this is my first such endeavour. Anyway, here it is: The Apex class. (And yeah, before someone asks, I named it in honor of electronic music artist Aphex Twin who I just love.) Basically the idea is to play with the Daedalus design and create something new out of it. I love the spherical design of that ship and always wished they'd have done something more with it. I imagine the Apex as a relatively small ship — maybe a crew of circa 150 or something like that. Maybe it's the 23rd century version of a scout ship (so the dimensions are much smaller than those of a Constitution class ship). I also want it to look sleek, elegant and fast. Here are some of my first sketches: Relatively fast I decided to go for a wide configuration (for lack of a better word) of the nacelles. It reminded me of a plane or something like that. I also tried to melt the sphere with the secondary hull in a new fashion. And here is what I finally settled on. I think I go with a rather unusual nacelle design. I'm not really sure though about the joint of spehre and secondary hull. Maybe I'll realize some more elaborate pictures in Flash. We'll see. Anyway, I'm looking forward to your thoughts and suggestions.
Thanks for the kind words guys. I'm still thinking about how I should go on with it. Maybe I'll do a cutaway drawing. But I'm not sure if I have the artistic ability to do that.
Your concept reminds me of the Mystery Ship seen in the newly remastered "Is There In Truth No Beauty?" that aired in the last couple of weeks. Nice.
Thats really good...it looks simlar to a peice of fanart that was posted years ago on one of these sites of what someone thought NX-1 should of looked like ill go try and fine the picture bear with me
As you develop the Apex further, I have an idea: I notice the nacelles extend outward from the aft-hull on opposite sides. This reminds me of the Phoenix from "First Contact". Maybe you could rotate the nacelles so the aft caps oppose each other, just like the Phoenix.
Wow. Love the sketching, reminds me of those M.J. development drawings. The 3D view is really nice. I like that "shelf" that circles the dome and projects into the Eng.hull.
Yeah, I also belonged to those who wished for the NX-01 to be some kind of Daedalus class derivative. Very good idea. First, that will integrate the Apex more into the Trek continuity and second, it will look really cool! The next sketches will included this notion. Yeah, I like that, too. Thanks for you appreciation.
It's already in the planning stage. Thank you! I love, LOVE the Daedalus design! I think it has something to do with the heaviness conveyed by the big and bulky sphere. I somehow find it very cinvincing as a space ship design.
Okay, finally I found time to continue on my little ship design project. I've done some more design changes and created the usual top and side view in Flash. Furthermore I designed a mission's patch. Nothing extraordinary – just something that could be from the time (the 60s version of the 23rd century that is). Hope I don't bore anyone. Thoughts? Suggestions? Rants?