Star Ships
- Thread starter aridas sofia
- Start date
I was waiting for people to ask me really i didnt want to seem like a pest by asking and there was a thread for them somewhere here but no-one there asked to use them and well
actually with out asking Lt.Carter here did do a 3-d of one
but after reading your post let me change my siggy ok?
actually with out asking Lt.Carter here did do a 3-d of one
but after reading your post let me change my siggy ok?
I forgot to update this thread. This is still very much a WIP, but it is meant to be the "heavy partner" to Kersarge upthread. A heavy cruiser predecessor to Valiant and Constellation.
Everest WIP
Interesting design, nice how you reference the TAS "Bonaventure".
Thanks, everyone! And I look forward to seeing what you're working on, Irishman.
Except for yesterday's WIP, I haven't posted anything in this thread in awhile, so I think I'll catch up.
Here are a series of cruisers that take us back in time from the Kearsarge and Everest of the 2210s to the era of the Earth-Romulan war around 2160. I've tried to show an evolution of the warp drive, from fewer and larger coils/rings, to more and smaller, stacked in nacelles of increasing length and size to accommodate. As the nacelles are capable of taking the cruisers further and further, the need for increased storage of fuel and supplies necessitates larger and larger secondary hulls, and bigger primaries to hold crews that now include researchers, security, and operational personnel.
Each image has a scale bar and a date indicating when it was launched.
Late Earth-Romulan War:
San Francisco
Amazon
Early Federation:
Agincourt
Cheron
Baikonur
Circa 2200:
Horizon
Archon
And Constellation, much discussed of late. This is my impression of how it was launched. For administrative reasons it is grouped under the Horizon class but really is a blend of Horizon and Archon, updated to reflect the latest technology. For some reason -- damage from battle or some other calamity or extraordinary circumstance -- it is largely rebuilt 17 years after launch. The secondary hull is largely used intact, as is the core of the primary sphere. New nacelles and an extensive refit bring her to the appearance I showed at the beginning of this thread.
Constellation (at launch)
Several additional notes -- the numbering system is based on "10" being the first UE Star Fleet design, back in the early 22nd century. The scheme is adapted right through the founding of the Federation, until 2203, when there is a reorganization. The one ship here that gets affected is Horizon, numbered "100" at launch and a decade later renumbered "1000". This Horizon was named for an earlier War-era ship that was lost shortly after leaving a planet named Sigma Iotia II.
Here is a size comparison of the above cruisers:
CRUISERS 2160-2213
Except for yesterday's WIP, I haven't posted anything in this thread in awhile, so I think I'll catch up.
Here are a series of cruisers that take us back in time from the Kearsarge and Everest of the 2210s to the era of the Earth-Romulan war around 2160. I've tried to show an evolution of the warp drive, from fewer and larger coils/rings, to more and smaller, stacked in nacelles of increasing length and size to accommodate. As the nacelles are capable of taking the cruisers further and further, the need for increased storage of fuel and supplies necessitates larger and larger secondary hulls, and bigger primaries to hold crews that now include researchers, security, and operational personnel. Each image has a scale bar and a date indicating when it was launched.
Late Earth-Romulan War:
San Francisco
Amazon
Early Federation:
Agincourt
Cheron
Baikonur
Circa 2200:
Horizon
Archon
And Constellation, much discussed of late. This is my impression of how it was launched. For administrative reasons it is grouped under the Horizon class but really is a blend of Horizon and Archon, updated to reflect the latest technology. For some reason -- damage from battle or some other calamity or extraordinary circumstance -- it is largely rebuilt 17 years after launch. The secondary hull is largely used intact, as is the core of the primary sphere. New nacelles and an extensive refit bring her to the appearance I showed at the beginning of this thread.
Constellation (at launch)
Several additional notes -- the numbering system is based on "10" being the first UE Star Fleet design, back in the early 22nd century. The scheme is adapted right through the founding of the Federation, until 2203, when there is a reorganization. The one ship here that gets affected is Horizon, numbered "100" at launch and a decade later renumbered "1000". This Horizon was named for an earlier War-era ship that was lost shortly after leaving a planet named Sigma Iotia II.
Here is a size comparison of the above cruisers:
CRUISERS 2160-2213
Yep, the Baikonur is my favorite too :P. Although the dart nacelles on Agincourt are fun as well.
A noticable evolutionary change seems to be the primary hull drifting away from the centerline. I know it's working towards the location of the Enterprise's saucer, but knowing you, you probably invented some perfectly believable reason for it
Oh, and I also like the variations in the Starfleet pennants.
A noticable evolutionary change seems to be the primary hull drifting away from the centerline. I know it's working towards the location of the Enterprise's saucer, but knowing you, you probably invented some perfectly believable reason for it
Oh, and I also like the variations in the Starfleet pennants.
While I like Aridas's designs for a lot of things, I never did like the 'Constellation Launch' configuration as if it were the same ship. We're talking an insanely radical reworking of the ship, akin to taking a 1978 Mustang and remaking it into a 2008 Lamborgini. Though you can argue that the 2271 Enterprise uprating is similar, it was explicitly mentioned in numerous places as uniquely radical, and the Constellation versions have nothing in common between the two, aside from the placement of the warp nacelles.
But that's just me.. mileage varies.
But that's just me.. mileage varies.
^ That's fair. I have to say that my unique take on Constellation has always been informed by the controversy over the 1797 U.S frigate Constellation. I was fascinated by that ship as a boy, and would beg my dad to take me to traipse around on its decks every chance I could. As a teenager, I searched out Howard Chapelle, a noted maritime historian and Historian Emeritus of the National Museum of American History, and a man who expressed strong opinions on the subject of the ship in Baltimore harbor. As a graduate student that was supposed to be spending his summer days researching elections in the National Archives, I would invariably find myself among the old Navy records looking for more information on that ship.
My fascination stemmed from the controversy over whether it had been scrapped, refit or rebuilt in 1854. I came to the conclusion that it had been scrapped, and that parts of the original ship's keel and ribs had been reused. That was pretty much what the restorers concluded when they undertook a massive project to save the ship in the 90s.
This background influenced the way I saw the TMP refitting, and certainly how I depicted the evolution of Matt Decker's Constellation.
My fascination stemmed from the controversy over whether it had been scrapped, refit or rebuilt in 1854. I came to the conclusion that it had been scrapped, and that parts of the original ship's keel and ribs had been reused. That was pretty much what the restorers concluded when they undertook a massive project to save the ship in the 90s.
This background influenced the way I saw the TMP refitting, and certainly how I depicted the evolution of Matt Decker's Constellation.
I graduated with degrees in both history and political science, and then went on to study history in graduate school.
Not to keep this thread too far off the subject of star ships, but had you seen an argument put forward about the placement of the masts? A few months ago I came across a site where the argument was made that because the placement of the masts were the same between the two ships that the current Constellation may have a more direct lineage to the original than just the use of some of her hull members.
It made for an interesting read, and I'll try to find a link as the site had some images of plans of the Constellation on it too. I've been fascinated with our original frigates ever since I built the Constitution for my father and had used a Dover book with her plans in it as a reference.
Geoffrey Footner has made an extensive case for the ship being a refit, but the evidence I leaned on was Chapelle's main point -- that the lines are all different. The draught, beam and length are all altered from the best guesses of what the original frigate looked like. And there's part of the problem, and why I was searching in the Archives -- the original drafts of the 1797 frigate were probably burned in the destruction of the Washington Navy Yard during the War of 1812. We are forced to rely on paintings and written descriptions to get any idea of the exact appearance of the frigate. But more recent work has been done by archivists to bring into question the authenticity of some of the documents that Footner relies upon for his case, and the Navy (and the staff historians) are firm in their contention that there is a clear difference in the materials used in the construction of the current ship from the remaining materials from the 1797 frigate's construction.
It is hard to determine why the records were so unclear. Was the Navy trying to build a new ship while only having authorization to repair one? That was the thinking, but there seems to be evidence that the navy had authorization to build a new ship, and would have built it whether the old one came into Norfolk or not. It might have been pure sentimentality that led to some of the fabric of the old ship being incorporated into the new one, and sloppy record keeping that led to the difference between the two never being made clear.
Anyhow, the last historian I spoke to that had intimate knowledge of the ship told me that his "best case" accounting concludes about seven percent original fabric, and no more. All in the lowest parts of the ship. If that's the case, and the transom has been altered, and the lines are different... it really doesn't matter what the relationship is from an architectural perspective. You can't use that ship to learn anything about the 1797 frigate, except a little about the species of wood and types of nail that were used in her construction.
Which struck me as similar to the depiction of that other ship that was described as being "almost an entirely new Enterprise". I imagined that the only thing that was reused there might have been a part of the spaceframe. And that later people argued over whether the ship destroyed in the 2280s bore any but the most tenuous relation to that original Constitution-class starship.
It is hard to determine why the records were so unclear. Was the Navy trying to build a new ship while only having authorization to repair one? That was the thinking, but there seems to be evidence that the navy had authorization to build a new ship, and would have built it whether the old one came into Norfolk or not. It might have been pure sentimentality that led to some of the fabric of the old ship being incorporated into the new one, and sloppy record keeping that led to the difference between the two never being made clear.
Anyhow, the last historian I spoke to that had intimate knowledge of the ship told me that his "best case" accounting concludes about seven percent original fabric, and no more. All in the lowest parts of the ship. If that's the case, and the transom has been altered, and the lines are different... it really doesn't matter what the relationship is from an architectural perspective. You can't use that ship to learn anything about the 1797 frigate, except a little about the species of wood and types of nail that were used in her construction.
Which struck me as similar to the depiction of that other ship that was described as being "almost an entirely new Enterprise". I imagined that the only thing that was reused there might have been a part of the spaceframe. And that later people argued over whether the ship destroyed in the 2280s bore any but the most tenuous relation to that original Constitution-class starship.
Of course, this being the 23rd century, I bet they can reshape materials on a much more fundamental level than currently. We all know what transporters and replicators can do. In the most extreme case, they can probably deconstruct a starship back into raw materials to a fairly large degree. Of course, this probably makes it even more philosophical if a starship is still the same after it has been turned into raw materials...
