Different people were arguing different things. I was always on the side of there were colour and nacelle variants (thou But some people were arguing there were bigger differences we couldn't see because someone somewhere said something.
Are these for real (i.e. from the FX house), or just wishful thinking fan guesses of what the ships might look like?
Just got the USS Toussaint special in the mail yesterday and its book contains orthos for all four versions:
So, yeah, looks like the images I found are all official. Looks like we've finally settled this. [*Remembers I'm on The TrekBBS*] Not.
Most of that detailing was done by Eaglemoss after the fact. As far as I know, there were only ever two variants of the Inquiry: short angular/long round nacelles (impulse engine and bussard colors notwithstanding.)
I do wonder about the dark lines along the pylons and their armpits, as seen on the two rightmost ships. If those fairly distinct features are for real, it's a true four-field even before we invoke engine glow color. Of course, a four-field is the worst of all possible options, from the in-universe viewpoint. It might make sense for Starfleet to first build the hulls with one engine type, and then to install more modern engines to some later on. But mixing and matching some radiator doodads on the pylons... Bleh. Timo Saloniemi
Some Eaves concept art for Seven's ship, the Classic Romulan BoP, the snakehead, and a Romulan transport https://www.johneavesart.com/apps/photos/album?albumid=16148999 Interestingly, his concept art for Seven's ship isn't asymmetrical like it was in the episode.
I like most of the ships from PIC. They're 24th century in feel for the most part and pretty well fit into the era.
Probably because everything was so damn dark and we couldn’t see much detailing! This seems to be a thing in Kurtzman world (at least for Picard and DISCO). Yeah, I know it’s space and it was all supposed to be a little more realistic-looking, but if we continue to have the conceit of hearing “pew-pew” noises in a vacuum during space battles, we should also be able to have some slightly better lighting, especially if we have multiple light sources from within a star system, both directed and reflected.