Bonsai Class

[sojourner]

Well, I was bored tonight and decided to play with Sketchup after a long break from it. I opened up an old project file (which most found unconventional in design) and rearranged some of the components and came up with this:

Not sure if I will do any more to it. Just felt like a little lite designing.

 

[BolianAuthor]

Not bad... you should develop it.

 

[Albertese]

You made this in Sketchup? Dang, I guess there's more potential in that program than I thought! Seems like everything i've ever seen from that program looks like a cartoon without any compound curves.

Very nice work.

--Alex

 

[sojourner]

Created in Sketchup, rendered in Kerkythea. Which is a free rendering program. I got tired of the "cartoon" look.

 

[MadMan1701A]

Not bad. I'm not sure if I like the bulge at the back of the saucer, but those Nacelles are really nice.

 

[jaspertjie]

Created in Sketchup, rendered in Kerkythea. Which is a free rendering program. I got tired of the "cartoon" look.

Where can I download it and how can i render a Sketchup model with it?

 

[Wingsley]

I like it. The fantail on the aft of the saucer is especially sweet. I think you should give the saucer its own hangar deck, blending into that fantail. What size is this ship supposed to be? Like a 24th century Constitution-class?

 

[Kaiser]

This and the ship design it got its parts from looks cool to me

 

[sojourner]

Not bad. I'm not sure if I like the bulge at the back of the saucer, but those Nacelles are really nice.

Hehe, funny thing is, the nacelles are the one part that doesn't sit quite right. I will probably change the details but keep the over all form. Right now they look just a smidge too much like fishing lures. The fantail houses the impulse deck in the lower half. It's sort of kludged together right now, but here is a closeup of it:

Where can I download it and how can i render a Sketchup model with it?

Kerkythea.net. get the plugin for sketchup in the downloads section as well. It allows you to export your model straight into kerkythea.

I like it. The fantail on the aft of the saucer is especially sweet. I think you should give the saucer its own hangar deck, blending into that fantail. What size is this ship supposed to be? Like a 24th century Constitution-class?

I figure this to be smaller than a Galaxy class, not sure by how much. I was sort of envisioning it as the design that did not win the "contract" for a new long range explorer. Sort of a YF-22 to the Galaxy's YF-23. Later, with the borg and dominion threats, it too was put into production.

Trying a different nacelle. This is a very rough sketch, just to see how it might look.:

 

[Wingsley]

I think it would be neat if this were 300-350 meters long, sized to be a kind of 24th century analog to the Connie (maybe a design competing with Voyager's Intrepid?).

It reminds me a little of the Grandeur project. I was thinking that, after the Dominion war, the Federation had to restructure its fleet. Maybe they decided to get "back to basics" and built smaller cruisers instead of big Galaxy and Sovereign-class ships.

 

[BorgMan]

Hmm yeah, badass ninja bussard grilles! ^_^

Could you try to connect the pylons to the neck? Right now it looks a bit out of sync with the rest of the model...

 

[sojourner]

Could you try to connect the pylons to the neck?

Not sure what you mean. Connect to that piece of the neck that sweeps back and down to the secondary hull? Remember, this is just a re-arrangement of existing parts. The pylons and the neck will be changing to provide a much cleaner look.

Or do you mean something like moving the pylons forward to connect to the neck and having them sweep back to the nacelles? Not sure that would work, besides, I am going for more of a classic layout with this one.

 

[BolianAuthor]

The impulse engines on the lower aft saucer look great.

 

[Ziz]

The new nacelles have an Excelsior feel to them with the grille coming around the bussards. Try something with a more rounded/angled top, more Galaxy/Sovereign style.

 

[sojourner]

Believe it or not, I did some work on this this week. Most of it is not really noticeable. I went through and redrew the pylons, nacelles, and neck Got a really nice side view of the ship. Love the way the ship follows the curve of the nacelles. Makes me think of the old "ship design based on warp dynamics" argument for why Federation ships look as they do.

(click on thumb, then click on image again for 1920x1200 view)



hmmm, photobucket doesn't let you side scroll for some reason, the front of the ship is getting cutoff by the browser window.

 

[thesovereignman]

Believe it or not, I did some work on this this week. Most of it is not really noticeable. I went through and redrew the pylons, nacelles, and neck Got a really nice side view of the ship. Love the way the ship follows the curve of the nacelles. Makes me think of the old "ship design based on warp dynamics" argument for why Federation ships look as they do.

(click on thumb, then click on image again for 1920x1200 view)



hmmm, photobucket doesn't let you side scroll for some reason, the front of the ship is getting cutoff by the browser window.

I think that you should make the back of the engineering section look like the back of the Connie, with the curve.

I also like the idea of this being about the same size as the connie. Scaling the windows and stuff would be important in this part, because, to me, the swoopy looking designs always seem huge, no matter what the size.

I also like the blue bits on the first nacelle

It looks great so far!

PS: That's what imageshack is for

 

[sojourner]

Did some work on the shuttlebay(s). I have 2 variations here, not sure which one I like better. The first one I think works better from an engineering viewpoint. I like the second one better based purely from a design standpoint. The problem with it may be it's size. It looks a little too large for the ship (seeing as this is not a carrier).

I provided a close in and zoom out of each.

Oh, and ignore that cutout at the back of the engineering hull. It's going away.

 

[Ziz]

I don't like it being that close to the impulse engines. Imagine the heat and energy distortion issues a shuttle would experience entering and leaving the bay. Granted, the ship wouldn't be moving at impulse (or warp, for that matter) when shuttle activities are going on, but they also wouldn't completely shut down the engines during that time either.

As far as which design, if this is going to be around Connie size then the two small bays are all you need. The big wide one would only make sense on something big -Ambassador/Galaxy/Sovereign size.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Visually, I like option 1 the best, it's kinda different looking from the usual shuttlebay look, y'know?