Michael’s Art Challenge Thread

[Michael]

I'll stop there, but only because otherwise I'll just end up listing every detail you made sure to include.

Don’t stop on my account.

Seriously though, thanks for saying all that. It’s good to see everything comes across the way I envisioned it. The only thing I’m not sure about anymore myself when I look at it now is why I put Tom Riker in a tattered TNG uniform. I guess my thinking was that that’s how he would look if they saved him from Cardassian prison at some point?

I really like the asymmetry of #63.

Yeah, that’s what drew me to that ideas well. Ultimately though I decided it looked more like a space station than a starship. Still, I agree that another round of sketching could have made it work.

I did work out another pass at #41, because I’m intrigued by the idea of making Laura’s idea flow more organically. My thinking is that it could work almost like a Pringle, which is a really interesting form, if you think about it. The resulting sketch also looks a bit like a shell …

However, I ultimately went with starship #24, which was my favorite of the sketches. I worked it into a small Cardassian scout ship which I christened L’ra in honor of @Laura Cynthia Chambers. Spent the last couple of days constructing it in Blender and am rather satisfied with the results for now. The mesh is super imperfect and the underside isn’t very detailed, but I really think it works as a Cardassian ship …

 

[Tosk]

The only thing I’m not sure about anymore myself when I look at it now is why I put Tom Riker in a tattered TNG uniform. I guess my thinking was that that’s how he would look if they saved him from Cardassian prison at some point?

I think it works just fine. It might have been weird if he was the only thing that didn't go together, but it's full of mix-and-match DS9 that never happened so I personally think he fits in perfectly.

The more I look at it, the more I want a DS9 game done in this style.

 

[Praetor]

That Cardassian scout ship looks fantastic! A very original design that looks like it belongs on screen.

 

[Cyfa]

Ooh, Pringles! A snack for the main show

(I love it, btw. And it does also look like a shell - it reminds me of the slipper limpets that can be found on the beach here.)

So, on to the main show, and what a show! L'ra looks awesome - an amazing extrapolation! It really does scream Cardassian (although, I detect a little whisper of Ferengi too - the "pincers" and the raised rear put me in mind of the Ferengi shuttle).
I'm having some difficulty with the deflector/weapons array in the forward view. It's probably just my useless eyes, but I'm getting a pronounced optical illusion when looking at it. The array on the right looks like it's curving inwards and starting to go behind the one on the left. Is it some Cardassian trick??

 

[Michael]

The more I look at it, the more I want a DS9 game done in this style.

Yeah, me too. It’s been a dream of mine to create something like that one day. I basically have all the skills needed to do the artwork, but I’d need to learn how to do the programming part or find someone who knows about that stuff.

It’s not quite the same game style, but a couple of years ago I began working on an RPG style Deep Space Nine game for the Game Boy (using the free software GB Studio, which lets you create Game Boy games in a kind of drag and drop manner), but lacking the time and energy needed I only got so far as to create the (unfinished) top down map for OPS, complete with Sisko and Dax characters.

Ooh, Pringles! A snack for the main show

(I love it, btw. And it does also look like a shell - it reminds me of the slipper limpets that can be found on the beach here.)

Thank you! Come to think of it, shells are actually a pretty cool starting point for designing starship saucer sections. (There’s a tongue twister in there somewhere.)

So, on to the main show, and what a show! L'ra looks awesome - an amazing extrapolation! It really does scream Cardassian (although, I detect a little whisper of Ferengi too - the "pincers" and the raised rear put me in mind of the Ferengi shuttle).

Funny that you’ve picked up on that, because there were several moments during my work on the mesh that I thought about making it a Ferengi design. Being a sucker for everything concerning Cardassian design I was more determined to make it one of their ships, though.

I'm having some difficulty with the deflector/weapons array in the forward view. It's probably just my useless eyes, but I'm getting a pronounced optical illusion when looking at it. The array on the right looks like it's curving inwards and starting to go behind the one on the left. Is it some Cardassian trick??

Yeah, I can see how that part of it may be hard to read. I’m not sure I will be able to explain it better than what the renderings are already showing, but the idea is basically to have two smaller versions of those blue-glowing deflector thingies you find on a Cardassian ship next to each other housed under a kind of hood. So they are definitely meant to protrude outward. But yeah, especially that frontal shot has a kind of optical illusion going on. Although, come to think of it, that’s probably not the worst thing you could want for something like a deflector design.

 

[137th Gebirg]

I love 8-bit stuff like that. Reminds me of better days long ago.

 

[Michael]

@Cyfa, I guess an animation says more than a thousand words. This GIF should clear up how the deflector is built …

I also did a couple more renderings of the model: One shot showing the ship over a planet, one closeup of the bridge module (complete with pyramid ) and an attempt at adding it as seamlessly as possible to a shot from the show (this is one of the VFX shots taken from the high-definition footage they remastered for the What We Left Behind documentary) …

 

[Cyfa]

Thanks for the deflector GIF I knew they were supposed to stick out, but I was having a hard time seeing it - I had to kind of stare through it to get the deflector pointing the right way (like those autostereogram Magic Eye pictures)

L'ra looks totally in keeping wth DS9 - Brilliant!

Oh, and nice pyramid feature shot!

 

[blssdwlf]

The L'Ra is brilliant and feels like you could slot it into a Cardassian fleet and she would be right at home.

When I first saw the design I actually thought she was bristling with dual phasers as Cardassian phaser fire comes from the same structure.

 

[Michael]

Created this animated 1-bit pixelart homage to “Move Along Home” for the current Fan Art Contest entitled “Not Good Enough” …

And since creating that was a ton of fun and comparatively quick, I took some time today to create another one in the same vein, this time for TNG’s “Sub Rosa” …

I hope to at least create a third one, although I’ll still have to decide what episode I should go with.

Just for fun, here’s how the pixel graphics look in their original resolution. For some reason I find them so charming at this size …

 

[137th Gebirg]

I LOVE 8-bit art and animation like that (I'm a sucker for 'memberberries). I could so easily see doing something like this on my old Atari 800 40-some years ago. This is what things really looked like back then, especially in "high resolution" graphics modes. 2 to 4 colors available to use on the screen, tops. You captured it perfectly, Michael!

 

[Firebird]

Crusher’s heaving bosom in the Sub Rosa game broke me.

 

[tax1234]

I hope to at least create a third one, although I’ll still have to decide what episode I should go with.

One from Voyager, now that you have TNG and DS9

 

[Finn]

I'm trying to think of a Voyager episode too

 

[Tosk]

Surely the third in this "trilogy" is Threshhold?

 

[Michael]

I LOVE 8-bit art and animation like that (I'm a sucker for 'memberberries). I could so easily see doing something like this on my old Atari 800 40-some years ago. This is what things really looked like back then, especially in "high resolution" graphics modes. 2 to 4 colors available to use on the screen, tops. You captured it perfectly, Michael!

Thank you! And yes, while not super accurate to any period of home computer gaming (1-bit, 2-color graphics definitely were a thing, but certainly not at the resolution of the Super Nintendo I’ve used for these), they do take me back to my childhood as well. Hard to put into words, but I just really enjoy the simple aesthetic and the limited animation.

Crusher’s heaving bosom in the Sub Rosa game broke me.

Yeah, that’s one of my favorite details from that one as well.

One from Voyager, now that you have TNG and DS9

Surely the third in this "trilogy" is Threshhold?

Doing something from Voyager and specifically “Threshold” would have made a ton of sense to do as a third one, I agree. But the fact that I just created artwork for “Threshold” (and “Tuvix”, which would be another contender) a relatively short while ago, I decided to go with something a little different …

Which character do you pick in this groovy rhythm game?

Compared to the others this was a bitch to animate since there’s so many elements in motion. The project file is a mess and I’m so glad I’m finally done.

And, as before, here’s the GIF at its original pixel size …

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Thank you! And yes, while not super accurate to any period of home computer gaming (1-bit, 2-color graphics definitely were a thing, but certainly not at the resolution of the Super Nintendo I’ve used for these), they do take me back to my childhood as well. Hard to put into words, but I just really enjoy the simple aesthetic and the limited animation.


Yeah, that’s one of my favorite details from that one as well.



Doing something from Voyager and specifically “Threshold” would have made a ton of sense to do as a third one, I agree. But the fact that I just created artwork for “Threshold” (and “Tuvix”, which would be another contender) a relatively short while ago, I decided to go with something a little different …

Which character do you pick in this groovy rhythm game?

Compared to the others this was a bitch to animate since there’s so many elements in motion. The project file is a mess and I’m so glad I’m finally done.

And, as before, here’s the GIF at its original pixel size …

I'm so glad that this thread was brought to my attention. This is the most beautiful thing I have seen on the Internet this year.