To Rick Sternbach: A Non-Trek "USS Voyager"?

[FalTorPan]

Rick,

In this thread I asked Andrew Probert what he might do today if he were asked to make a non-Trek ship like the Enterprise-D. I thought I'd ask you something similar.

If today, a TV producer wanted to make a non-Trek sci-fi show about a ship of 150 on a decades-long mission that might take it to the farthest corner of our galaxy and back, and said producer were to hire you to design the ship, then what might you do that was similar to what you did with Voyager? What might you do differently?

I'm not talking form so much as functions and features.

Thanks!

 

[Rick Sternbach]

Rick,

In this thread I asked Andrew Probert what he might do today if he were asked to make a non-Trek ship like the Enterprise-D. I thought I'd ask you something similar.

If today, a TV producer wanted to make a non-Trek sci-fi show about a ship of 150 on a decades-long mission that might take it to the farthest corner of our galaxy and back, and said producer were to hire you to design the ship, then what might you do that was similar to what you did with Voyager? What might you do differently?

I'm not talking form so much as functions and features.

Thanks!

Well, to me, functions dictate the forms, especially in contemporary (real) spacecraft design. With fictional stuff, we do get to add some styling. Maybe a lot of styling. A ship to go out into deep interstellar space will likely require far more than 150 crew, more like 3000, which gets you ships like the Enzmann fusion ship, the Bussard ramscoop, etc., but with the addition of an FTL component. For those sorts of vehicles to actually get where they need to go and stay relatively intact, they'd need some beefing up in structure, fuel supplies, other consumables, defenses. If I were to follow my own design sensabilities for a fictional show, to keep a new vehicle distinct from Trek, I'd likely keep it fairly cylindrical or hex in cross-section, aligned mainly along its central axis, and keep the hab:engineering structure ratio about 1:10. Big generation ships are going to be lumbering beasts requiring some of the same staples of Trek and other SF shows, like shuttles, so they'd have to have a lot of the same engineering style that goes into the big ship. Of course, I wouldn't know exactly what approach I'd take until I actually got that kind of assignment, but my usual goal is to keep things from looking like everything else out there.

Rick

 

[GodThingFormerly]

Well, to me, functions dictate the forms, especially in contemporary (real) spacecraft design.

Speaking of which, Rick, may I ask if there has been any progress made in getting A Spaceship for Earth published?

TGT

 

[Rick Sternbach]

Well, to me, functions dictate the forms, especially in contemporary (real) spacecraft design.

Speaking of which, Rick, may I ask if there has been any progress made in getting A Spaceship for Earth published?

TGT

Nope; wish there was, but a) things have been busy here with other matters, and 2) the initial queries to publishers came back fairly less than lukewarm, so it's on the back burner. The model parts continue to be drafted up and masters are being made, however, so maybe that'll come out before any book.

Rick
www.spacemodelsystems.com

 

[DEWLine]

Sorry to read that. I'd pay to read the book(or plans).

 

[Psion]

Sorry to read that. I'd pay to read the book(or plans).

Ditto! Those publishers are asses! Why, right here alone you have three guaranteed sales. That and a couple quarters ought to get you a donut!

Seriously, though, good luck!

 

[Ronald Held]

Maybe too few of us here to convince a publisher?

 

[Dayton3]

I would crawl on my knees for 5K to buy a new book by Rick Sternbach

 

[Dayton3]

Well, to me, functions dictate the forms, especially in contemporary (real) spacecraft design. With fictional stuff, we do get to add some styling. Maybe a lot of styling. A ship to go out into deep interstellar space will likely require far more than 150 crew, more like 3000, which gets you ships like the Enzmann fusion ship, the Bussard ramscoop, etc., but with the a

Rick

That sounds much like the work you did for that 1983 issue of Science Digest. IIRC, you made the Daedelus, Enzmann, Bussard ramscoop, Light Sail, and Orion illustrations for that issue.

Easily one of my all time favorites.

By the way Mr. Sternbach, can you recommend any other publications that have featured your work heavily?

I have the Science Digest issues, Sagan's Cosmos and a couple of others with your work in it.

 

[GodThingFormerly]

There is an interview with Rick in the March, 1980 issue of Future Life Magazine that reproduces several color plates, and he also illustrated G. Harry Stine's The Space Enterprise (ACE Books, 1980) with b/w art of near-future space systems ranging from SSTO space planes and solar power satellites to orbital industrial parks and military bases. I think that Rick also illustrated Stine's The Third Industrial Revolution (ACE Books, 1979), but my copy is currently on the other side of the planet so I can't confirm it.

TGT

 

[Dayton3]

There is an interview with Rick in the March, 1980 issue of Future Life Magazine that reproduces several color plates, and he also illustrated G. Harry Stine's The Space Enterprise (ACE Books, 1980) with b/w art of near-future space systems ranging from SSTO space planes and solar power satellites to orbital industrial parks and military bases. I think that Rick also illustrated Stine's The Third Industrial Revolution (ACE Books, 1979), but my copy is currently on the other side of the planet so I can't confirm it.

TGT

I have those two books by Stine as well.

Whatever happened to those kinds of really great paperback books?

I guess the internet killed them off. Another reason to curse the internet on occasion.

 

[Rick Sternbach]

I think that Rick also illustrated Stine's The Third Industrial Revolution (ACE Books, 1979), but my copy is currently on the other side of the planet so I can't confirm it.

TGT

No, TIR wasn't illustrated by me. Harry did write a note in his copy to me that he hoped I'd work with him on the next book, which turned out to be The Space Enterprise. The last one I did with him was Handbook for Space Colonists, and while it was a lot of fun, it was a graphics nightmare because it came at a time when publishers seemed to be eliminating their ability to deal with production artwork in-house, and I had a number of bits of art that needed special babysitting, and they didn't want to deal with it. Thank Ghu for computers these days; I don't have to bother with cretins who don't even have x-actos at their desks.

Rick
www.spacemodelsystems.com

 

[DEWLine]

The joys of cut'n'paste and file conversion filters, hm?

 

[GodThingFormerly]

Whatever happened to those kinds of really great paperback books

By "those kinds" I assume that you are referring to books on CisLunar industrialization and colonization? It appears that interest in such projects evaporated when the followers of the L5 and related 1970s manned spaceflight movements realized that the STS would be unable to deliver on its promised payload-to-orbit costs. Michael A. G. Michaud's Reaching for the High Frontier: The American Pro-Space Movement, 1972-84 (Praeger Books, 1986) gives an impeccable albeit depressing analysis of what went wrong.

BTW, another volume that features illustrations by Rick Sternbach is George Zebrowski's 1979 LitSF novel, Macrolife, which was in large part based upon the techno-sociological speculations of GE-MSD consulting astronautical engineer Dandridge M. Cole (1921-1965). Be aware of the 2006 PYR Books reprint of Macrolife, however, because although it reproduces Rick's interior b/w illustrations, his original dust jacket art has been replaced by a Photoshopped mess executed by one John Picacio. Buy a copy of the 1979 Harper & Row 1st Edition instead if at all possible.

Harry did write a note in his copy to me that he hoped I'd work with him on the next book, which turned out to be The Space Enterprise. The last one I did with him was Handbook for Space Colonists...

...and I have just snagged a mint copy of HfSC from Abebooks.com for $3.00. Thanks for the pointer, Rick!

TGT

 

[FalTorPan]

There is an interview with Rick in the March, 1980 issue of Future Life Magazine that reproduces several color plates...

Ironically I recently re-purchased this issue, which also features a Sternbach-painted cover called "Cetacean Tomorrow," depicting a Pacific bottlenose dolphin wearing a pressure suit. It's pretty cool.

 

[K'riq Sa]

I just got mine for a buck....


can't wait to read it, thanks rick.





k'riq the unthreadable