Star Ship Polaris

[Maurice]

Is that a binary clock from Thinkgeek on that set piece?

Oh, great art as usual Vektor!

It's a modified TIX clock. There's always been some plans to overpaint the console face and make some of those quickly-added plant-ons look more integrated. In fact, the metal pipes coming out of the console are paint-ins I did as a test.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Yeah, I like this. This is basically it.

The monitor designs carrying over from the Command Deck set help sell it as stylistically similar to the rest of the ship.

 

[dayxday1000]

Is that a Star Trek: Enterprise communicator stuck on the console?

 

[Vektor]

I was struck by something in this image:

At first glance, you don't see the arch and the ceiling structure, making the room seem more open and expansive. I rather like that effect and I think I'm going to try to do something more with it. I'm not getting rid of the arch but I may try to widen it a little or possibly create openings in the spaces between the girders.

I'm also trying a different configuration for the hub control stations based on some email exchanges that have been going on. Instead of the floating flat screens in a wrap-around arrangement, I'm doing something more like the control stations on the bridge, but I'm keeping the round gauge displays.

More updates later today.

 

[Maurice]

I like seeing more of the ceiling.

Seeing how you've sketched in the portions of the figured out of camera range gives me an idea: why not have the kneeling guy NOT be kneeling, but have some open panels in the floor and he's standing down amongst all the pipes and crap under the floor (grillwork?) That way we could scale down the live action photography and see much more of the room. (This shot is our first look at this room, so it's a perfect place to go wider.)

 

[Psion]

Forgive my digression here, but I'm somewhat reminded of a scanning electron microscope when I see these pictures, and that console with Vektor's perspective lines makes me think of the instrument's specimen port. What if that console was digitally extended to intersect with the engine as if it were some kind of "plasma tap" where analysis devices are clustered along with the control interface? I don't know what kind of footage you've shot with people moving around the set, but if no one steps between the console and the engine, it would be visually distinctive from Trek.

 

[Vektor]

I don't think it would work to have him standing in a hole in the deck. Perspective-wise, that would require the hole to be at least 3 or 4 feet further away from the camera. It's not going to look right unless he shrinks proportionally or gets shifted downward in the frame, which you might get away with if you could break him out as a separate element, but you told me earlier in email that he turns and hands a clipboard to one of the other characters. I can't think of a way you would be able to pull that off without the depth discrepancy being painfully obvious.

Let me ask you this: Does anyone enter or leave the left side of the frame, even partially, in any of these shots? I'm wondering if we might shift the live action to the right side of the frame and mirror the angle on the rest of the engineering space. Kneeling Man could then be working on something at the side of the alcove rather than right smack in the middle of it. Just a thought.

 

[Vektor]

What if that console was digitally extended to intersect with the engine as if it were some kind of "plasma tap" where analysis devices are clustered along with the control interface? I don't know what kind of footage you've shot with people moving around the set, but if no one steps between the console and the engine, it would be visually distinctive from Trek.

I actually considered something like this when I was laying out the perspective lines, but Kneeling Man is in the way. It doesn't help that, as mentioned in the previous post, he also has to hand a clipboard to the other character at one point, which I'm guessing would also be obstructed by an extended console.

 

[Maurice]

Let me send you the shots tonight and all will become obvious.

 

[Vektor]

Some tweaks to the big console cluster:

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

I like that.

We have a few circular animations that will fit those displays, with a little tweaking.

 

[Vektor]

Nothing says "engine room" like round guages and displays, I always say.

 

[Maurice]

Two additional things to think about:

• Krell Furnances viewed through hexagonal openings
• HAL brain room

And I think I may also have some circular graphics that would fit on those "scopes".

 

[Vektor]

The HAL brain room I remember well. The Krell furnaces from that point of view eludes me, though. Got a pic you can post?

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

At about the 3:40 mark:

[yt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHXfMjp2zqI[/yt]

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

BTW, take a look at the opening crawl on this 1956 trailer:

[yt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyXZl59M3H4&feature=fvwrel[/yt]

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

I'm continuing to make progress with the conversion of the Polaris model. The format conversion, breakup into LW surfaces and application of basic textures is probably close to 50 percent complete:

I'm pleased to have been able to more or less recreate the lander bay interior that Vektor had done considerable mapping and texturing on:

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

About 70 percent done:

 

[Santaman]

Looking good.

 

[sojourner]

Shiny! Can't wait to see this thing in motion!