Star Ship Polaris

[Admiral Buzzkill]

The ship is a little over three hundred feet long. I'm determined not to go the "Star Wars" route - a lot of nernies - because I prefer the pre-2001 look of ships like the Enterprise or other science fiction of the 1950s and 1960s ("Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea," "Forbidden Planet" and so forth). So really the only effective way to suggest scale is with windows. This is problematic too because of the ship's internal layout.

Eventually it'll probably be up to a few windows and scaling of the hull plates. The look of "Colonial One" on the new Battlestar Galactica may be a useful reference as well.

 

[Venardhi]

Really liking where she is heading. I couldn't quite make my ideas work, perhaps the ring elements could be used for a variant ship from the same fleet or something like that.

Is it just me, or is there a little bit of lens distortion in that latest shot? It might be in some of the others but the perspective feels slightly off and it is nagging at me.

 

[Tallguy]

Wow. Haven't looked in here in a while and I missed this! Terrific work, guys. Two of my favorite artists doing really really cool stuff!

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

She's into the shop for an overhaul - the horseshoe cowling is gone, hopefully to be replaced with something more dynamic. I was rather attached to it, but it brought the scale down too much, I think - there were too many automotive associations with it, including the visual equation of the rear sublight engines with tail-lights.

 

[Venardhi]

Perhaps the cowling could be retained on the bottom side. It works so well with the shapes it would be a shame to scrap it entirely, but I do agree with the scaling problem. That wouldn't be nearly as serious on the bottom side though, and you did say you wanted to differentiate them. A few greebles (perhaps some antennae and 'sensors', weapons or escape craft tucked into the cowling?) could easily fix the scale problem if it were the less-seen side of the ship where it wouldn't be as immediately apparent.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

 

[Kelso]

The ship looks damn good from the rear. I feel like I can see it moving.

Are those (ray)guns between the engines?

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

And hopefully someday soon we will.

Yeah, given that the heavy weapons are retrofit onto the ship we thought maybe they'd be "bolted on" to some kind of exo-structure that's not part of the original design.

I was leaning toward missiles, but aridas has about convinced me that, you know, if you can control gravity (which is pretty much de rigeur for building starships like this) you can accelerate sub-atomic particles at people real damn fast.

 

[TheLoneRedshirt]

I absolutely love how your ship design has evolved. It certainly has that 1950's - 60's Sci-Fi look, yet with a somewhat more modern feel to it. The colors are great - tasteful but not garish.

Terrific work!

 

[Venardhi]

And hopefully someday soon we will.

Yeah, given that the heavy weapons are retrofit onto the ship we thought maybe they'd be "bolted on" to some kind of exo-structure that's not part of the original design.

I was leaning toward missiles, but aridas has about convinced me that, you know, if you can control gravity (which is pretty much de rigeur for building starships like this) you can accelerate sub-atomic particles at people real damn fast.

The same would go for any kind of projectile though. Who says you can only have one or the other? Energy weapons might work better against 'shields' or for disrupting their systems, where projectiles or explosives might work better for other purposes.

 

[FrontLine]

I love this current iteration. Fantastic job.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Thanks.

We don't have shields or forcefields. Best idea is not to get hit by weapons fire.

The danger of hitting or being hit by anything in hyperspace is about nil. During travel within spacetime, we probably would have energy beams of some kind to sweep the path ahead with the emphasis on imparting a very low-energy "push" to small bits of matter at an extreme distance.

 

[Kaiser]

Whew Weee im liking the progress on this

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Going to do something different with the weapons and the "spine," so they're missing from this one:

The first version of the back ring looked a bit too squashed and twisted.

 

[HRHTheKING]

Great looking ship

 

[I Grok Spock]

Nice modeling work. It is however starting to look a bit like all of the components of the NCC 1701 integrated together.

 

[therealfoxbat]

Thanks.

We don't have shields or forcefields. Best idea is not to get hit by weapons fire.

The danger of hitting or being hit by anything in hyperspace is about nil. During travel within spacetime, we probably would have energy beams of some kind to sweep the path ahead with the emphasis on imparting a very low-energy "push" to small bits of matter at an extreme distance.

It all depends on how versatile your gravitic technology is.

If you can accelerate things away from your ship, then particle beams become feasible. Perhaps a combination of weapons. Particle beams would be more accurate and probably have greater range, while missiles and railgun bullets would pack a bigger punch at shorter distances.

Can the gravitic technology move objects laterally, or just toward and away from the ship? If it can, then there should be a dedicated gravitic projector to move objects out of the ship's path (navigational deflector).

Based on the technology described, a type of shield MIGHT be possible. How about a magnetic or gravitic field around the ship for the purpose of suspending tiny ablative particles to interfere with someone else's lasers or particle beams? (This wouldn't do jack against missiles or railgun bullets.) Something like that could work if there was a way to prevent it from interfering with outgoing particle beam fire or navigation. ("No, Captain. I CAN'T see where I'm going! Some IDIOT ordered a bunch of shiny confetti dumped outside!!") Even if you can get around this problem, there's still the problem of supply during long missions. ("Sorry, Captain. We can't raise the shield. Bob forgot to stop by the Party Supply Store and pick up more shiny confetti...")

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

A shield might be possible to justify, but it's not wanted. Maybe we need to better define what the limits of the gravity control are, because it sounds like it's opening a couple of cans of worms.

One of the problems with fictional technology of this kind is setting limits so that it's possible to tell stories in the way you want. Unfortunately, once you posit FTL flight there are just an enormous number of magical implications. This is a big reason that the uses to which technology is put in just about every space opera that goes on for any length of time - "Star Trek," "Star Wars" et al - are so remarkably inconsistent.

 

[therealfoxbat]

Okay. No shields.

I thought the quotes about shiny confetti would be worth at least a chuckle...

 

[USS Jack Riley]

Going to do something different with the weapons and the "spine," so they're missing from this one:

The first version of the back ring looked a bit too squashed and twisted.

Whoa. <clunk...picking up jaw from desk and wiping away drool mark> That is bloody brilliant right there. I have been watching the progression of this ship through its many iterations and love it just like this. I know you are adding the weapons and spines back on, but even without, I REALLY like this version. Maybe you could use it if you ever run into the civilian version of this beauty.

About the weapons/shields issue - there is another option (actually a couple) used in today's miltaries (or in the late design, early implementation phases) that might be useful as a guide.

For example, the Israeli military developed a 2 part counter to antitank weapons (RPGs, etc.). The first is an electronic scrambler that tries to confuse the weapons guidance system. If that fails, the weapon then fires a small explosive projectile at the incoming weapon. The point is not get a skin to skin contact but to have the defensive warhead detonate close to the incoming weapon to either destroy the weapon or cause it to fall short of its target.

Another is currently in early development phases (I don't think it has gone much past the blueprint stage, although I may be wrong - hey, I don't work for DARPA!! ) It is basically a teflon net that shoots out of the tail of a Blackhawk helicopter when the onboard system detects an incoming threat (again, like an RPG or a missile). The net opens up and causes the warhead to detonate before it can reach the helicopter.

Just some options other than your standard shields, ablative armor, polarized hull plating, etc.

Again, keep up the great work on this baby. Can't wait to see the finished product!