My tos-era Romulan BIRD OF PREY design

[ancient]

I haven't been doing too much lately due a very busy Real Life, and I have a lot of art projects in various stages of non-completeness. But I finally dug in and hammered this design out, which I have been playing with for a loooong time now.

It's a fairly small TOS or maybe pre-TOS romulan BOP. Here is what I have finished so far:

Front, Top, Port, and Starboard views:


Aft and Bottom views:


The bottom view will eventually be the most impressive angle, once I get the bird of prey actually drawn/colored. (It's not a BOP until it has a large...bird of prey painted on.) The diagram still needs to be colored and detailed a little, but the line-work is finished.

I'm going to try to make a set of deck plans. It's only 2.5 decks, so that shouldn't be too much of a problem. I guess the plans will be a bit different than a starfleet ship. Torture chambers? I'm open to suggestions on how the interior should look, though I already have some ideas.

And if anyone wants to tell me their theory on what a quantum-singularity engine looks like, I wouldn't mind hearing it.

 

[Brutal Strudel]

Looks rather Steam Trek, which imao is a good thing. I look forward to seeing his develop.

 

[SonicRanger]

^^^

I also was thinking it looked rather steampunk too, although that's only a good thing (IMHO) if you're actually designing for a Steam Trek universe.

 

[JNG]

Yes, looks pre-TOS and kinda like a bat

I don't know about the torture chambers. If it's a small ship and intended for patrol, defense or whatever, then keeping everything more focused on the intended mission makes more sense. I do assume the Romulans also build larger, multipurpose ships which carry out scientific and exploratory missions in addition to their primary one of looking like scary ass-kicking giant birds.

 

[ancient]

That's interesting, I didn't intend for it to look Steam-punky at all. Aside from the wing shape it's made out of pretty standard star trek components.

I was trying to make a sort of cross between the TOS BOP and the STIII BOP. Then again, the STIII BOP is pretty mechanical looking too. Actually, pretty much everything from the TMP era - including the refit Enterprise - has a taste of that.

I don't know about the torture chambers. If it's a small ship and intended for patrol, defense or whatever, then keeping everything more focused on the intended mission makes more sense.

Yeah, I just put that out there since it's something a Federation ship wouldn't have.

I think the interior should resemble a Fed ship as little as possible. It is an alien ship, after all. Basic construction rules apply, of course, but other than that it's built by a race with a totally different mind-set.

 

[JNG]

I liked the weird, cramped-submarine everyone-looks-into-Spock-style-hoods-and-no-big-comfy-forward-viewer thing they had going on in "Balance of Terror." Gave it a different feel.

 

[judexavier]

Nice!
(What makes it look "steam trek"? I'm not arguing, just curious

The wings are cool. I've attempted BOP/Romulan things, and mine always looked cartoonish.
Sort of reminds me of the triangle shapes installed in stealth aircraft.
Do the wings have an airfoil cross section?
Do they fold/articulate as well?

Sorry for so many questions.
Anyway, looking forward to more.

 

[ancient]

I liked the weird, cramped-submarine everyone-looks-into-Spock-style-hoods-and-no-big-comfy-forward-viewer thing they had going on in "Balance of Terror." Gave it a different feel.

I'll be using a similar bridge layout to that.

Nice!
Sort of reminds me of the triangle shapes installed in stealth aircraft.

Not a bad notion, considering this is a romulan ship.

Do the wings have an airfoil cross section?

No. Aside from being much harder to draw three angles of , I don't think it's required for a starship.

Do they fold/articulate as well?

No, there's really no reason for them to. With the STIII BOP it kind of makes sense, since the wings would be in the way when the ship lands.

This ship's wings have habitable space, so making them move would be a bit much, imo.

 

[judexavier]

Do they fold/articulate as well?

No, there's really no reason for them to. With the STIII BOP it kind of makes sense, since the wings would be in the way when the ship lands.

This ship's wings have habitable space, so making them move would be a bit much, imo.[/quote]


Makes sense ofcourse. Moving rooms and decks would be rather scary and dangerous.

 

[B.J.]

Nice! I like the nacelle placement on this. The wings look a little thick to me, but whatever works for you.

(BTW, I did a Steam Trek RBoP a few years ago for an art challenge.)

 

[ThomastheCat]

This is a sweet design, looking forward to see it develop. As far as making this different from a Starfleet ship, maybe Romulan ships of this era had hibernation pods instead of actual bunks to fit the required crew in such a small ship?

RE: a quantum singularity engine, I always imagined something spherical in nature, but that's just me.

 

[ancient]

Ok, I've been busy but I do have some work on the internal layout done. Nothing special though.

Here's some exterior detailing:



And a close-up piece at 100% size:

 

[Bernard Guignard]

Nicely done there

 

[ancient]

Thanks, I decided to add some 'hull plate' look to it, but not too severe.

Here's every side but aft and bottom:



Bottom is partly done, but is the hardest - drawing a bird on the computer is much harder than with pencil...

 

[Praetor]

Very nice!

 

[FalTorPan]

I love the top and bottom views... but from any side the ship looks a bit... flat, as if the entire ship (excluding the nacelles) were molded using a cookie cutter.

I say again, I love the top and bottom views.

 

[Albertese]

Nice!
(What makes it look "steam trek"? I'm not arguing, just curious

...

For my money, what makes it look a little steam-punk is the jaggetty edge of the wings. It harkens to Disney's Nautilus and things of that nature. If the trailing edge of the wings were a smooth curve, they would feel more Star Trek like. Plus it would tie into the TNG Warbird with it's smoothly contoured hull.

That said, the colored version doesn't feel very steampunk at all since those colors would usually favor dark metallic colors, grays and blacks with pinstriping in gold or red. And here would have to be random curly-que elements to the decoration. Not to mention he obligatory exhaust stacks and bellowing smoke/steam! But this is a nice clean and brightly colored hull which helps it fit into Star Trek's look nicely.