BLSSDWLF's TOS Enterprise WIP

[Robert Comsol]

I'm also an advocate for treating the series and the movies as separate entities in general, especially concerning interpretations of history and especially for that reason I do not treat ENT as canon.

However, ENT's "In A Mirror, Darkly" is set in the mirror universe where a lot of things are different and this is the one exception where I can imagine it co-existing with TOS and leading up to events in "Mirror, Mirror".

Except for the Defiant's aft torpedos I can't see any features of NCC-1764 depicted here that would contradict TOS canon (only some irregularities in the corridor design) and therefore have been grateful to "discover" new spaces in the engineering hull never seen before.

Just to consider such inspiration doesn't automatically imply one accepts the rest of ENT as canon. ENT merely added new visuals to a classic TOS design, nothing more but also nothing less.

As for my project it comes down to a simple question: Would Matt Jefferies have approved the ENT design additions to his Enterprise?

Bob

 

[blssdwlf]

@Bob - We'll just have to agree to disagree.

 

[FalTorPan]

@Bob - We'll just have to agree to disagree.

This thread is about your project, so make it something that suits you!

 

[Albertese]

Speaking of which.... How's this project going?

--Alex

 

[blssdwlf]

@FalTorPan - Yes - exactly

@Albertese - It slowed down alot as I had several work projects all completing in April and some family events to attend to. So my 3D time took a nosedive. I'm dusting off lightwave and will get back to it soon.

 

[Albertese]

Nice! I look forward to it.

--Alex

 

[xvicente]

Much before I saw the first blueprint or techincal drawing of the Enterprise, I tought the tube Scotty liked to go inside was a nacelle pylon. Just because it was angled 45°, of course.
(off-topic, I know, but I thought this thread needed a bump)

 

[Robert Comsol]

Didn't we all think that, when we first saw the original series?

There are really not that much locations on the Enterprise (e.g. neck dorsal) where the angle of the Jefferies Tube seems to be a structural necessity.

Come to think of it, the scene in "The Ultimate Computer" could be a hint for a Jefferies Tube leading up to the nacelles. The basic question remains, of course, why you should have certain control components on one side of the ship exclusively.

Bob

 

[blssdwlf]

When I watched TOS when I was younger I thought, yeah, the angled tubes went up to the nacelles. But upon more viewings, it just seemed to me that the tubes went wherever they needed to go For this project, I imagine the tubes protect the engineer from the much larger and dangerous equipment that the tubes apparently access. When Scotty gives helm some power in "The Naked Time" by placing some jumpers or such on the tube walls, there are giant power cables and pipes and energizer machinery on the other side of the walls, etc.

 

[blssdwlf]

Well it's good to be feeling well again and that brings this morning's update while I had a bit of down time

My Enterprise started from Sinclair's blueprints. The only tricky part is the variances I created when trying to match the positions and lines from the pixels of the blueprint. So now I've started to camera match the model from the series filmed time frame to try and make it more accurate.

The ship is still scaled to 1,084'.

The bluish tint Enterprise is my version overlayed onto the reference photos and screenshots:

I also scoured the internet for higher resolution reference shots and ran across BirdOfTheGalaxy's flickr set:

I'll be perusing the HD shots on TrekCore for more shots to refine against. (Tallguy's TOS Catalog was also immensely helpful in locating shots.)

Afterwards, it'll be adding windows and ports.

 

[Tallguy]

This looks terrific.

You're going to have to teach me how to do this. I've always had zero luck with camera matching. Even worse on the Enterprise because there are no parallel lines on the thing!

I'd heard of Petri Blomqvist getting all of his measurements from matching.

The thing I've really wanted to learn camera matching for is the Klingon cruiser because there are no good blueprints available, including Jeffries.

Help me blssdwlf, you're my only hope.

 

[blssdwlf]

@Tallguy - I'm no expert but I can offer some tips based on my workflow

If you use Lightwave there are 3 options:
1. Eyeballing it and intuition. Photography experience helps.
2. Camera Match plugin in the Worley Taft library can work but the workflow is slow as you must type in the x,y positions.
3. Fi's CMatch plugin which is interactive and the one I'm using currently (and it's free).

The plugins work the same way: You give it a model and match vertices on the model to the reference points (or landmarks) on the photograph.

I have a "Match" layer which has a simplified mesh that has vertices that stand in for visual landmarks on the hull like the nacelle cap holders, the nacelle cap tips, the navigation lights, corners of the hull, tips of the domes. That greatly simplifies which point to grab and align with. In the regular view, I leave it showing Vertices and that gives me feedback on how the alignment is going.

Some pictures are harder to align than others, especially if they were cropped and placed in at a different position since the program expects the center point (and thus perspective) to be at the center. Some other pictures might have lens distortion which also make it challenging.

For the Klingon battlecruiser, I'd recommend building from a base. Pick something that is rectangularish, match to it and then build the mesh outward from it and refine it with reference shots from other angles.

Say does Petri have data for his matching? Or contact info? I'd love to compare notes!

 

[JES]

I'm also an advocate for treating the series and the movies as separate entities in general, especially concerning interpretations of history and especially for that reason I do not treat ENT as canon.

However, ENT's "In A Mirror, Darkly" is set in the mirror universe where a lot of things are different and this is the one exception where I can imagine it co-existing with TOS and leading up to events in "Mirror, Mirror".

Except for the Defiant's aft torpedos I can't see any features of NCC-1764 depicted here that would contradict TOS canon (only some irregularities in the corridor design) and therefore have been grateful to "discover" new spaces in the engineering hull never seen before.

Just to consider such inspiration doesn't automatically imply one accepts the rest of ENT as canon. ENT merely added new visuals to a classic TOS design, nothing more but also nothing less.

As for my project it comes down to a simple question: Would Matt Jefferies have approved the ENT design additions to his Enterprise?

Bob

Interestingly enough, "In A Mirror Darkly" might have been the first on-screen canon depiction of a Constitution class having aft torpedo tubes, but this notion to my knowledge dates back to Franz Joseph's schematic for the Constitution class. It depicts one or a pair (can't quite remember ATM, but I think it was two) mounted in the back of the lower bridge module, around the same area where the astronomical observation telescope is often shown.

I've always thought that the torpedo tubes are mounted above or below the telescope, or the aft section of the bridge module can have it's equipment interchanged at a starbase, depending on the mission (or perhaps the whims of the commanding officer).

Given that the Constitution-class Heavy Cruiser was the intended primary warship at the time of her heyday, I think it makes plenty of sense that she would have a considerable arsenal at her disposal, enough to keep her covered from multiple vectors and angles. That should include the aft.

 

[B.J.]

^But just because the Defiant had aft torpedoes, it doesn't necessarily follow that the Enterprise also had them.

 

[Albertese]

...
Interestingly enough, "In A Mirror Darkly" might have been the first on-screen canon depiction of a Constitution class having aft torpedo tubes, but this notion to my knowledge dates back to Franz Joseph's schematic for the Constitution class. It depicts one or a pair (can't quite remember ATM, but I think it was two) mounted in the back of the lower bridge module, around the same area where the astronomical observation telescope is often shown.


...

Nope. As a matter of fact, all of the FJ materials place the torpedo launchers at the front end of the lower bridge module. The aft end with the telescope was always just the telescope.

--Alex

 

[JES]

^But it does stand reasonable to say that she might have been equipped with them at some point, though if this was the case, she would lose them during her refit.

 

[JES]

...
Interestingly enough, "In A Mirror Darkly" might have been the first on-screen canon depiction of a Constitution class having aft torpedo tubes, but this notion to my knowledge dates back to Franz Joseph's schematic for the Constitution class. It depicts one or a pair (can't quite remember ATM, but I think it was two) mounted in the back of the lower bridge module, around the same area where the astronomical observation telescope is often shown.


...

Nope. As a matter of fact, all of the FJ materials place the torpedo launchers at the front end of the lower bridge module. The aft end with the telescope was always just the telescope.

--Alex

Then I'm going to have to go the Cygnus and double check, because I'm certain that there is a set of schematics that shows the torpedo tubes being shown there. It was probably someone else who did the schematics that depicts this torpedo placement.

 

[Albertese]

^^^ Could be that someone else drew them that way. But, all I know about are the FJ TM and the Booklet of General Plans that FJ actually did... and I double checked them both before I posted.

--Alex

 

[JES]

Correction: it was Kennedy Shipyards that shows the Constitution class as having one torpedo tube in that area, which to my knowledge isn't licensed by Paramount, and so is probably wouldn't be considered canon.

There is a similar case for Strategic Designs.

 

[blssdwlf]

@JES - On this version, this Enterprise will just have 6 forward photon torpedo tubes in the lower primary hull. She didn't have a problem hitting Nomad that was almost behind her with a torpedo. As far as FJ's version of the ship, Havoc92 has an excellent build out going in his thread (and last seen had the torpedo tubes in the top bulge.)