There are a lot of elements about this design so far that I love. In fact, every thing by itself is awesome, but, my personal opinion, having the engineering hull so far forward makes it look unbalanced. That said, I will admit that my opinion may be premature. I look forward to seeing how it all holds together once it's finished. --Alex
When I was initially designing this of course I tried it with the secondary hull set more rearward in a more familiar configuration. To me it just looked meh. It looked so much like everything else. Also in terms of visual balance you can't have the shape I presently have for the secondary hull if it's set more rearward because it really starts to look weird and not in a good way (in my opinion). One day I just sketched the present idea for the hell of it. My first reaction was, "Well, that looks strange." But the more I looked at it I found something appealing in it. It was counter-intuitive and also gave the design something of an attitude. I kept playing with it in perspective sketches to find shape and proportion that looked integrated. I also made the fantail shape more prominent (something that had been done similarly on the Excelsior design way back in the '80s). With every design there is (or should be) some sort of overall idea or ethic or aesthetic at work. I wanted something that was somewhat unconventional and unusual even while retaining some familiarity. I also wanted it to have a mixture of grace and strength. There are very few truly straight lines on this design. The trailing edge of the dorsal as well as the leading edge of the pylons follow very subtle arcs that mightn't be readily apparent to some. The leading edge of the dorsal as well as the trailing edge of the pylons each follow a more more noticeable curve. Of course, I will be adding more detail as I progress, but I don't want to overdue it. I still like that streamlined look of the future we had back in the '50s, '60s and '70s. I've grown disenchanted with all the greebling and industrializing aesthetic that's become to go-to look for SF hardware including Trek. If I'm looking at far-future tech I want to see something of the exotic with a hint of alien element (alien as in beyond the familiar). I want a shape and finish that conveys highly advanced science and materials as well as a sense of wonder. I'm also trying to address some criticisms I have of previous designs. There is one criticism I have of the TMP refit that I don't think works as well as the TOS design. In profile the new nacelles and swept pylons look very good. But I don't like the slimness of the nacelles as seen from above (it seems less noticeable as seen from lower angles. Also (to me) the visual balance of the nacelles and pylons looks off when viewed from higher three-quarter like angles or lower angles from the rear. Perhaps to has something to do with the pylons narrowing so much where they attach to the secondary hull. It looks flimsy. I think it looks flimsier that the same thing on the TOS E Weird. The other thing about the TMP stardrive section is how the pylons attach to the nacelles. They don't connect at a natural angle, but then they can't really because the nacelles are too slim (as seen from above, below or from the front or rear). It bugs me even though I like so much else about the refit.
Arrgh!!! I just discovered a serious flaw in the support pylon I built. And it's something I can't easily fix. So after spending about a day's worth of work making it I've had to scrap the whole component and start again from scratch. Well, almost from scratch as I have all the essential dimensions as well as the basic pattern. But from that I have to rebuild it all over again. It's not a complete loss because I discovered some small things I didn't care for and now I can modify them more to my liking.
Oh well. Are you going to keep that very broad lower sensor dome? I liked the spare lines you had before you added the more elaborate bridge. In terms of the lower saucer, I remember a bronze looking ENT-D study model with a feed horn in the deflector/sensor dish area, and a very broad, undetailed lower saucer--as if there were this huge passive detector there...
Honestly I'd like to rethink the whole structure atop the saucer. It's okay, but it really doesn't seem to go with the rest of the design. The only part I really like about the current setup was enlargening the trubolift nub into the upper sensor array with the lozenge shaped dome. I want something that looks good not only in profile view, but from different angles as well. I'm trying to think of something different than the usual sensor dome. I actually considered putting a ring of light near the base of the saucer. I'll think of something. The devil really is in the details. I, too, find myself resisting/rethinking choices made almost by reflex. Trek ships have been designed a certain way for so long that it's a challenge to look at it differently even as you want to keep something of the familiar in the exercise. Even the hangar area I kept now has me thinking about how to do it just a little bit differntly while still keeping that half dome shape at the end.
Major components in place (except for the impulse section. Fortunately I was able to rebuild my pylons better and more quickly than I did originally. Before I start detailing I will be reconsidering the superstructure atop the saucer and some small tweaking of the hangar clamshell section.
I've been working on a "jet-age" aesthetic rebuild of the NX, and I've been facing much the same issue. One of my biggest problems was keeping the general configuration without making the design seem either more advanced or something that's not different enough to justify being a predecessor; the latter of which is something that plagues Drexler's NX Refit. All I can say without derailing the thread is that whatever you decide on, make it work for your design first, and throw Trek convention out the window if it interferes.
Great project, always fascinating to see how these things evolve. What surprises me is just how similar the Secondary Hull looks to the TMP (bottom left & right pics, above). The differing lengths are completely hidden! It shows what interesting camera shots could be possible, yet this is something that you could only find out in 3-D modelling. Looking forward to more...
I'm looking forward to when I start adding colour and windows and lights and then shadowing and setting it in space scenes. I'm gratified it looks much as I envisioned it when I did my first perspective sketches. At the moment we can see the pure form of the design without the detailing that can distract our eyes as well as accent the overall shape. The two features that are the most unconventional are the extreme fantail cutout and the secondary hull protruding so far forward of the dorsal. What it does do is centralize a lot of the ships mass. This design grew partly out of an exercise in considering a conjectural refit for the TOS E. I've never really cared for the Phase II version and while I like the TMP refit I still prefer the TOS original as a whole. My conjectural idea was to take the TOS design and do a refit that I felt worked more convincingly as actually being the same ship as well as address some of the criticisms I have of the TMP refit design. From that conjecture came the notion of redesigning the ship from scratch as if making a new up-to-date restart of TOS. The design I'm building came about several years ago and before news of the Abrams films became known. I think there's a hint of alien influence in this design, which makes sense in terms of a ship meant to represent the entire Federation and not just Earth. Other influences besides human could have gone into the design.
Because of the flat top and bottom of the nacelles (which look really good), it looks quite odd how the pylons connect to them when viewed from the side. Especially on the middle-right view the pylons look somehow twisted.
The nacelles are essentially cylinders cut in two and then a narrow section added between the two halves. The pylon joins the nacelle at a correct angle for the cylinder on that side. The centreline of the pylon goes straight to the radial centre of the cylinder on that side. it looks unusual because the cylinder has been cut in half and a narrow centre section placed between the two halves. Yes, it does look unusual. When I was first sletching this out I came up with the design of the nacelles first, Then I looked for a way to connect them to the secondary hull. I toyed with having the pylons connect to the underside of the naclles (which are not truly flat on the top and bottom, but very subtly curved), but it just didn't look right and the angle of the pylons would be too shallw. Also if the pylons connect to the secondary hull too low it also looks wrong. When I envisioned my eventual solution I found the unusual appearance appealling. It should be noted, too, that despite appearances the support pylons of the TOS E do not connect to the nacelles in the expected fashion either. They actually connect lower, more underneath the nacelle, than one would naturally assume.
This wasn't a critique on the modelling-aspect of this mesh. It's just that the angles don't all correspond very well with each other; the shape of the pylons makes it look like they are rotated inwards on the aft edge. They aren't, but the effect occurs because the pylons get so wide, and the nacelles taper in so much were they intersect. The same effect occurs at the sec-hull/pylon intersection; on the Refit-Enterprise this is avoided by a relatively wide pylon-base.
The base of the refit pylons are a lot smaller where they attach to the secondary hull than where they meet the nacelles. The difference between the two attach points is a lot greater than what I've done. In fact that was one of the criticisms of the refit design.
Look at the Refit again. The actual base is quite wide/long, it gets quite a bit smaller above the base before flaring out again. THAT base has a totally different shape than the pylon itself, thus avoiding that rotated look your pylon seems to have at the intersection-point, because the shape of your pylon-base conforms to the shape of the your pylon.
I get you. Firstly, I'm not done yet. And secondly the narrow point of the refit pylons really looks like a weak point. Remember also that these ships aren't exposed to the same gravitational stresses as on object built on a planet surface with a gravity envelope always pulling down.
Maybe so. Your pylon is considerably sturdier. I'm talking about the integration of the various parts you've modelled so far, though, not specific design-weak-points. Yes, that's a point I didn't raise nor care about.
What's different? Besides a bit of detailing what's changed is the entire saucer superstructure and the curvature of thw saucer's upper surface. I felt the curvature of the top of the saucer was off and so I remade the whole thing to be a bit less pronounced. It's hard to see unless you compare it right against the original shape, but I feel the change does look better. The Bridge area has also been redone. It is distinctly lower in profile and more rounded. The Bridge still sits recessed under the upper dome but, of course it doesn't take up nearly as much space as there is under that dome. There could be about half to almost a full deck of space between the ceiling of the Bridge and the topmost outer surface of the dome. The pill shape aft of the dome is the extensive upper space and planetary sensor array. You can see a strip of white on the top that will be lighted in place of the usual familiar lighted dome. I'm thinking of something similar on the saucer's lower sensor array. There is a bit of detailing on the support pylons that may look like windows, but they're actually additional external sensors, possibly monitoring the warp field. Although they're sensors I mimicked the three dark rectangles on the outboard sides of the TOS E's support pylons. The detail protrudes very slightly from the surface of the pylon rather than being flush like a window would have been. Besides, although there are access ways through the pylons to reach the nacelles they are not meant to be accessible while the main engines are powered. So for all intents and purposes those pylons are uninhabitable parts of the ship unless the nacelles are completely powered down or under rare and extreme circumstances. Eventually I am going to try to add a small radius where the dorsal attached to the secondary hull so that it will look more like a smooth integration of the two components. I did the same with the domes of the saucer structure to merge them smoothly into the top of the saucer. My idea was that this detail might suggest different and advanced construction techniques. And for anyone who is curious, yes, I did make the nacelles maybe ten percent larger than they were originally drawn.
The project is evolving very well. My suggestion is to move the neck and saucer a bit more to the front, and to increase the naceles size a little too. It will give her proportions similar to their old sisters, as to have a better appearance when rendered in some views.
When viewed in perspective the nacelles will look larger. This similar to when you see elevation drawings of a car and the wheels might look smaller than they do when seen in perspective. When I originally designed this I moved that dorsal and secondary hull back and forth until I hit had a spot I thought worked better than the others. Any semblance to previous designs I leave after a point considering this is a different continuity and also to reflect a degree of alien influence.