TAS made real....

[Christopher]

Rotoscoped what? The ship exterior in a few shots like the planet orbit stuff in the titles?

Yes, any shot where the ship changes aspect/perspective relative to the camera, where it's a fully animated 3D object rather than just a flat painting sliding across the screen. Those were traced frame by frame from TOS footage. The orbit animation from the titles was sometimes used sans planet to depict the ship turning or maneuvering.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

Footage of the ship from the second pilot got rotoscoped, from when it was inside the energy barrier. It's used when the ship is maneuvering, changing course, etc.

 

[Warped9]

I am seriously considering how I could tackle modelling the alien ship from “Beyond The Farthest Star.” Mind you we have only one complete view of the ship from one angle so that will have to do as I try to interpret what we can see.

Given how the Enterprise is not exactly as we saw it in TOS allows a measure of leeway in interpreting shape, so the final result likely won’t look exactly like what we see in TAS, but I should (hopefully) achieve a fair three-dimensional representation.

On another subject new drawings I’ve never seen before of the shuttlecraft in “The Slaver Weapon” found in the new Official Guide To The Animated Series has intrigued me to again tackle that design down the road. A problem with this design (as with many TAS ships) is that it isn’t drawn consistently the same whenever we see it and there are conflicting aspects to how it’s drawn. Again it’s not really well thought out as if it were a physical three-dimensional object. The best I can really hope for is to capture a fair representation of the general look of the design while rendering it as a believable design.

 

[Professor Moriarty]

Now you have to kinda squint to accept it as the same ship.

No need to squint!

Spoiler

”Ephraim and Dot” unambiguously canonizes that the pre-movie-era Enterprise and the pre-Star Trek IV refit are one and the same ship.

(Cool thread! Have missed seeing you here @Warped9! MOAR PLEEZE)

 

[BK613]

I am seriously considering how I could tackle modelling the alien ship from “Beyond The Farthest Star.” Mind you we have only one complete view of the ship from one angle so that will have to do as I try to interpret what we can see.

Given how the Enterprise is not exactly as we saw it in TOS allows a measure of leeway in interpreting shape, so the final result likely won’t look exactly like what we see in TAS, but I should (hopefully) achieve a fair three-dimensional representation.

I had started the BTFS ship back in 2015 for this contest (TAS Remastered ) but was never satisfied with the pods I made (I couldn't seem to tease the organic feel I wanted out of Sketchup .) It also grew to be quite resource-heavy, probably because of all the curvy connecting "stems." I may still have it on one of my portable drives.

 

[Warped9]

^^ That Orion ship in that thread looks pretty cool. Well done!

I’m not really worried about the vines although plotting their path could be interesting. And forming the pods shouldn’t be hard given they’re toughly egg shaped. Recreating the pods’ surface patterns could be a pain. It could get a bit involved if one assumed that no two pods are identical. The smarter choice might be to standardize the pods (except for size) to be all the same or make two or three different ones and use where appropriate.

I haven’t built a 3D model for awhile—not since before I upgraded my 2011 iMac so I’m interested in how well it will go. Since my last model I’ve upped my RAM to 32GB, swapped out my hard drive for an SSD and swapped out the i5 chip for an i7.

 

[Henoch]

@Warped9, I'm glad you are back at modeling, again. I think your previous work on Shuttles and the TOS Shuttlebay were great. Your Shuttlebay is my standard for a 947 foot ship. Thanks.

 

[Warped9]

There is not much rhyme or reason to this design. It's exotic and very alien looking, but there doesn't appear to be any logic to it. It was simply supposed to look weird and underline the fact animation could deliver what live-action resources of the time could not, at least on a limited television budget. I'm reasonably certain, though, that given sufficient time and money production resources of the day could have crafted something like this in physical form, perhaps for a feature film, but not for television.



I think I will have to try applying some measure of logic to it in plotting out the path of the branches. The only truly definite thing is that there is a definite end from which the branches originate. As to which end of this vessel is the bow or stern is anyone's guess.

Most of the pods appear to be at the end of a branch while a few have more than one branch sprouting from or converging on them. I can make a pod template and then resize and reshape it as necessary.

Just speculation on my part, but is it possible that this vessel can reshape itself for different purposes? Perhaps there is a form for starflight and one for being at rest and maybe others. It would be cool if Starfleet could encounter another one of these derelicts only in more intact form.

Another thought. Perhaps when this thing is operational the coloured patterns of the pod surfaces might actually move and change. In live-action that would be a truly weird effect to add to the existing weirdness.

 

[Christopher]

Daren Dochterman did a version of the "Beyond the Farthest Star" ship for the 2007 Ships of the Line calendar (specifically June '07, and reprinted on p. 141 of the 2014 edition of the hardcover book), though it looks like a painting rather than a 3D rendering.

 

[Warped9]

Daren Dochterman did a version of the "Beyond the Farthest Star" ship for the 2007 Ships of the Line calendar (specifically June '07, and reprinted on p. 141 of the 2014 edition of the hardcover book), though it looks like a painting rather than a 3D rendering.

I’ve seen that and, yes, it looks very much like a painting. And by the looks of the branches on his version look proportionately quite a bit thinner than the ones on the TAS ship.

 

[Warped9]

Okay, as I am studying this I am beginning to see a rough sort of pattern to this, particularly if I assume that not only have the pods been damaged, but the branches have been warped or twisted as well to some extent. If one assumes the ship could possibly morph into other configurations then the branches could have distorted the ship by some degree as the crew were wrecking their ship. If one imagines a longitudinal axis along the length of the vessel it's possible to envision the pods positioned around that axis in a rough symetry even as the branches would not all be symetrical. And the pods are really more seed shaped than egg shaped as I said earlier upthread.

Although it's a purely subjective viewpoint I somehow see the singular pod at the end (on the image's right side) as the aft end, for whatever thats worth.



I hope I can pull this off as it would make for some wicked photoshopped images. I see the branches as some highly reflective silver against the purple and turqoise-y coloured pods.

 

[Christopher]

As they said in the episode, the hull metal was drawn out into filaments and spun like a spider's web. So it's supposed to have an organic quality like it was grown. So the asymmetry may be its natural state. Probably each ship would have a unique configuration.

Although it's a purely subjective viewpoint I somehow see the singular pod at the end (on the image's right side) as the aft end, for whatever thats worth.

My impression is that it's the forward end, and the animation bears that out, with the ship moving to the right relative to the starscape. I'd say that's either the command module or the propulsion module pulling the ship behind it. Maybe the large cluster of pods just behind it is the main crew section and the smaller pods to aft are something like cargo modules.

 

[Warped9]

We can only begin to guess what kind of vessel this was. It could have been a passenger ship, a long haul cargo transport, a pleasure cruiser, a generation or colony ship, an exploratory cruiser, anything really.

And since the vessel is adrift, even though in orbit, it could be oriented any way given how the self destruct could have distorted the ship.

I think I will start by trying to plot the path of the branches in two elevations, from the side and the top. Once I get that to my satisfaction I can construct the pods.


Funny that I'm trying build perhaps the weirdest and most complicated thing seen in TAS. On that note, though, there is another pretty weird looking craft seen floating in the background amongst the collection of ships seen in "Time Trap."

 

[Christopher]

And since the vessel is adrift, even though in orbit, it could be oriented any way given how the self destruct could have distorted the ship.

Well, not really. Come to think of it, given how elongated it is, the only physically stable orientation would be a radial one, with either its nose or its tail pointing straight down toward the black star. If it had been knocked into a spin by its self-destruct -- or even if it hadn't -- it would've eventually been drawn by tidal forces into that radial alignment. (See Niven's "Neutron Star" or The Integral Trees.)

So if you're right about its flexibility, its natural configuration might be more closely packed, and we're seeing it drawn out into a more linear arrangement by tidal forces, although we'd have to disregard the star movement and assume the ship is oriented perpendicularly to its orbital path. Although why would that smaller group of pods need such long conduits leading to them if they were meant to be closer in?

 

[Warped9]

It’s anyone’s guess.

 

[ashleytinger]

Even metal cabling can stretch but not break under the right stresses.

 

[Christopher]

Even metal cabling can stretch but not break under the right stresses.

Indeed, if we're talking about a superstrong metal spun into filaments and subjected to tidal tension for 300 million years.

 

[publiusr]

There is not much rhyme or reason to this design. It's exotic and very alien looking, but there doesn't appear to be any logic to it.


Another thought. Perhaps when this thing is operational the coloured patterns of the pod surfaces might actually move and change. In live-action that would be a truly weird effect to add to the existing weirdness.

Well, in reduced gravity--things can grow large. It reminds me just a tad of the Eridani Princess
https://www.deviantart.com/stingray-24/art/Starliner-X-Ray-3-7-0-Eridani-Princess-302738870

Perhaps it was part of a larger structure--more fan shaped--and was damaged.

What it orbited?

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[Warped9]

If I recall correctly the Vorlon ships of Babylon 5 had surface patterns that moved.

 

[137th Gebirg]

The Shadows did too, I believe. It’s been a long time.