AndyP's Trek building thread

[batboy853]

Hi All, so I haven't ever really shared my work over the years, because I haven't had anything worth sharing. 10 years or so ago, I was very active over at Bridge Commander Central, and modeled several ships: Envoy Class, and a Probert inspired tug. Then my mid 20's happened and life was busy. But the pandemic has kept me home, and has kept me in front of the computer, and modeling has been my distraction from the world. I'll be 100% honest, I usually work on my modeling when I am bored with work, I work in IT - End User Support.

Thought I would start posting things that I have been working on. Eventually I am hoping to be able to do some sort of short animation, mostly to prove to myself that it is something that I can do.

Here are some renders that I have done since the world shut down.

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I have more, that I will be sharing over time. There are a few things I have worked on such as the nova class bridge that I am needing to go back and update the lcars to ones I have created rather from sites i've found online. I am not posting images of those so that I do not upset anyone.

This week I am working on a quick and dirty Miranda class ship. I started working on this yesterday, and worked on it some more today. I am not going for 100% screen accuracy, as this ship will likely end up being used in background shots.

Lastly, if you guys have a suggestion for which photosharing service is better suited to posting WIP shots, I posted these to DeviantArt, but I get the feeling that sites like DeviantArt and Artstation are more so geared to sharing final images.

 

[blssdwlf]

Those look great - good detailing and textures too!

 

[batboy853]

Continued working on the Miranda class, worked on lower hull greebles yesterday, and started working on the nacelles today. I feel like I have read this on other people's WIP posts of TMP vessels, but the nacelles so far have been the hardest to model on the ship, it took me a number of different times to get it right. It also gave me a good chance to test out Blender 2.91's new boolean modifier, and color me impressed, once I figured out how to get the best results with it, it really saved me a lot of time and frustration with it.

 

[Professor Moriarty]

Bookmarked!

Re your earlier question: just host your own website with an outfit like 1&1 (which is what I use). It’s not free, but it’s not expensive either, and it’s effortless. Most webhosts have WordPress, making it easy to post images and blog about your progress. The images can be shared anywhere, including here.

 

[Santaman]

Oeh! the Frying pa.. eh Freedom class! I like that one.

 

[publiusr]

They needed you for this
https://titan-comics.com/m/58-star-trek-magazine-78/

The more ships, the better

 

[batboy853]

@Professor Moriarty I'll have to check it out, might also just use google photos or flickr for now too.

@Santaman I've always loved the Wolf 359 fleet, I made this one to be in dry dock in a shot, was considering making more of the Wolf 359 ships, but wanted some variation.

@publiusr who knows maybe I can for the next starships issue! Haha But I am sure they likely used renders made for the Eaglemoss Starships collection.

 

[Santaman]

You did a great job with it, it is a rather nice design considering it being a member of the Wolf 359 kitbash fleet which was of course made on a shoestring budget and probably as fast as possible.

 

[Bernard Guignard]

Very nice keep up the good work.

 

[Arpy]

Hey, wow, really cool! I especially love your Envoy Class — instant head-canon for me!

Though it does do what canon ships do too that I don’t like which is have the impulse exhaust directly into the Bussard Collectors. No biggie though given how well merged E-B/C eras are here. So cool!

Amazing job with your more recent work too!

 

[batboy853]

@Santaman but they all made sense given the era, and the history of all the ships of the TMP era looking similar. My favorite of the Wolf 359 ships are the New Orleans class, and the Springfield class

@Bernard Guignard Thank you!

@Arpy Ya know, I did not think of that at the time. I'd see the maintenance on those vessels would likely be extensive.

Made some more progress on the nacelles, and greebles and got the windows in. At this point have a few more details to model in, such as the nav / running blinky lights and the airlocks, after that will be switching over to texturing.

I should also mention that for now I am sticking with the Lantree version of the class, but down the line might also modify it to the Saratoga.

 

[Santaman]

I like the New Orleans class and some of the other kitbashes, my absolute favorite kitbash is the Sydney class transport.

 

[Starship]

Hi Andy, how you doing?
I remember you from the old Bridge commander forums.

Good work all around. welcome aboard!

 

[batboy853]

@Santaman I love how much use they got out of that studio model, first as the transport vessel in TUC, then as the Jenolan, then they modified it a bit for DS9

@Starship hey not bad! Just been busy with work, and adjusting to life in Chicago.

Got back to the Miranda class here and there today. Work has been busy the past few days for me so have not had much time to work on this, and then by the time I was done with work and some fitness time i've been super beat. I really wanted to start working on texturing, as I am starting to get to the last bits left to model. For the hull lines, I created a displacement map using both photoshop and illustrator, however I think I need to tone down the Aztec pattern in the map a bit. I also added a map that drives both the secularity and roughness maps. Still quite a bit to go.

 

[Santaman]

Coming along great I say.

 

[Bernard Guignard]

Looking really good there

 

[publiusr]

Very nice... how about a Reliant hull in place of the refit saucer—both hills tied to the same two nacelles, Loknar style

 

[batboy853]

Hey all! Had a lot of house work that I needed to get done over the weekend so did not put a lot of time into this. I am kind of kicking myself in the butt for not UV mapping and creating the materials during the modeling process, at the time was focused on getting the modeling done.

In today's update:
I've textured in some more details, most noticeably the ridges on the nacelles. Used another displacement map for this, it's the same generic texture that I used for the Nacelles on the Freedom class, and I created for the SC-4 shuttle seen in my first post. It also works great for doors, I used the map for the doors of the shuttlebay on the Miranda class. I used the same map to drive blender 2.91's PBR emission strength on the material that gives the blue glow on the inner warp engine. The blue glow is a simple gradient.

Things left on the to do list:
More greebles in a few spots, some modeled some textured
Model the RCS thrusters, airlocks
Texture decals such as the ships name / registry.
I am thinking of calling this ship the USS Odiosis, this ship has a long history of nothing notable, which is why it will still be in service in some capacity in 2379.

 

[Santaman]

Cool. nice progress.

 

[batboy853]

Hope everyone had good holidays! I had a good Christmas with my fiancée's family, we all got a long pretty well which I was pretty nervous about. I also was able to get myself a pretty nice Christmas present, I got myself a new GPU! I got the RTX 3080, which I cannot wait for my GPU enclosure to arrive tomorrow so that I can start playing with it. I cannot remember if I have mentioned this already or not, but I am currently doing all my 3d work on my work laptop, it's not the best for rendering, but it has been getting me this far. With the additional of the GPU I do intend to start doing animations with the things that I have been creating.

Updates on the Miranda class.

I did not get that much time to work on it while we were with family, so I started working on it once we got back. I have updated some textures on the ship, added registries and updated the hull lines so that they all align closer to the studio model. I must admit, it has taken a bit longer to get this ship done than I had originally planned on, but as I am working on this a few minutes here, and a few minutes there I am happy with the work that I have put into the ship.

What's left for me to do:
I still have some more greebles to do around the lower impulse dome. Also, I am not fully satisfied with the RCS thrusters on the saucer, which is why I have not put more detail in them. I also need to figure out a better yellow color for the phasers / RCS thrusters, the current color is a bit too bold.