TAS made real....

[Warped9]

I have come to the conclusion that this thing is a major pain-in-the-ass to figure out. There is no way this can be made as drawn. At least I am finding it beyond my ability. Having said that I can reinterpret this design in another way that might capture some of its original concept, but will not look identical to how it was conceived.

We have to accept this was an idea quickly sketched out, but not fully thought through in terms of how it could actually exist in physical form. I understand what the illustrator was trying to depict, but I can't see how it could actually work in 3D. Essentially when you think you have solved one issue another arises to further confound you. It looks deceptively simple, but it is loaded with physical contradictions.

If you cut a curved surface with straight lines you can get a flat surface but the edges will still be very curved. Hence the contradictions as the illustrator was drawing a curved surface intersecting with a flat surface yet retaining edges with a straight line as seen from any angle. Uhh, no, thats a geometric impossibility.

What I can do is give the design a flat nose and flattened sides and end up with something somewhat resembling the original concept, but I can't connect the nose and sides with a third flat surface that will have straight edges. So I think this is the appraoch I am going to go with.

If others can prove me wrong I welcome their effort. Otherwise I am stumped.

 

[137th Gebirg]

Same problem I experienced doing the Orion Pirate ship orthos. Some of these designs, while really interesting to look at, simply weren’t meant to be rendered or make any kind of sense in the real world of Euclidean geometry.

 

[FormerLurker]

Reminds me of the problems I had drawing the ship Frank Cho designed for his 50 Girls 50 comic book about a decade ago. Well drawn orthos, front, side and top view. Except they were of three different ships that only looked the same in passing. Very frustrating.

Oh, and I didn't get the job. Whoever did, I don't even know if they got published.

 

[Warped9]

I am putting this design aside for now. it's just giving me too much grief to work out something I'm satisfied with.

For now I'm going on to the next thing.



This is an interesting looking design. It's been said over and over again that this (like all the TAS shuttlecraft) is simply too damned big as is to be stored regulalry within a starship hanger. As is it actually wouldn't fit in the hangar at all. But it should be possible to rescale it a bit to make it just possible to be loaned out to a starship on a temporary basis for specific missions. At those times none of the standard Class F shuttlecraft could be berthed on the flight deck.

The above image is also the best image of the vehicle as seen onscreen. Like many other TAS designs there is a varying degree of inconsistency in how it's drawn. So the task is to massage this into something still immediately recognizable while trying to make it a bit more real world.

Some observations. In TOS we rarely saw a door or hatch that swung open--doors almost always slid open. On that point I think I will make the access hatch more in the vein of what we usually saw. Besides I'm not going so far as to build an interior for this anyway. This exercise is pure indulgence in terms of worldbuilding because if "Mudd's Passion" had ever been filmed for TOS they most likely would have just used the familiar Class F shuttlecraft they already had rather than work up a completely new miniature. Mind you in "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" it might have been interesting to see a different shuttlecraft design that Lokai had stolen from the starbase.

The TAS illustrator like to make the nacelles bulky or clunky looking on Federation ships other than the Enterprise. I attribute that to shorthand thinking so I'm tossing that aside in favour of nacelles that look somewhat more streamlined as we saw them in TOS.

This is evidently a large craft where the pilot/crew sit high in relation to the access hatch. And odd that the nacelle actually obscures part of the hatch. On my previous effort on this design I set the nacelle a bit further back and reducing the ovarall scalle of the vehicle to make it less tall. This also resulted in the viewport being proportionately larger.

This is how I did it last time as I worked up a set of chematics that I later built the 3D model from.

 

[publiusr]

In TOS the automated freighter was called Woden. Spock's reference indicates it was an old style freighter converted to automation. Now we we will never know what the Woden might have looked like if Matt jeffereies had worked up something, but so many of us are assuming it could have been the same or similar to what we saw in TAS.

I never minded it being an old DY type sublight vessel--maybe with added nacelles as seen from an old Gold Key design I seem to remember. Even sublight craft can make sense, if there are enough of them being sent as cyclers--dozens bringing raw materials spaced half a light year apart--like trains

Great job! This is inspiring me to finish up my model of the Antares we saw in TOS-R.

I really like that.

I can see that as a separable bridge/lifeboat

 

[trynda1701]

I have come to the conclusion that this thing is a major pain-in-the-ass to figure out. There is no way this can be made as drawn. At least I am finding it beyond my ability. Having said that I can reinterpret this design in another way that might capture some of its original concept, but will not look identical to how it was conceived.

We have to accept this was an idea quickly sketched out, but not fully thought through in terms of how it could actually exist in physical form. I understand what the illustrator was trying to depict, but I can't see how it could actually work in 3D. Essentially when you think you have solved one issue another arises to further confound you. It looks deceptively simple, but it is loaded with physical contradictions.

If you cut a curved surface with straight lines you can get a flat surface but the edges will still be very curved. Hence the contradictions as the illustrator was drawing a curved surface intersecting with a flat surface yet retaining edges with a straight line as seen from any angle. Uhh, no, thats a geometric impossibility.

What I can do is give the design a flat nose and flattened sides and end up with something somewhat resembling the original concept, but I can't connect the nose and sides with a third flat surface that will have straight edges. So I think this is the appraoch I am going to go with.

If others can prove me wrong I welcome their effort. Otherwise I am stumped.

I can try to draw schematics physically, but just can't get the hang of it on computer. So to hear you say that, I feel your pain!

I am putting this design aside for now. it's just giving me too much grief to work out something I'm satisfied with.

No point in trying to work on it if it's stressing you out!

Okay. Start with a somewhat flattened disk, then make it narrower by thirty percent then, then try to find a shape to intersect it properly. I still think it looks funny, but it is what it is. Maybe it will look better as I start fleshing it out.

Whenever you want to come back to this design, I think this is definitely a starting point. As you said for all the designs in this thread, you're trying to show how TAS designs might have been made in TOS. So if the drawings and schematics don't work, to me, that's no problem. This is your project.

 

[Warped9]

Okay, I'm stubborn. Even though I had asserted I was moving on to the next design and putting the "computer mouse" design aside for awhile this thing kept eating away in the back of my mind. I was laying in bed ready to sleep for the night when this thing came to the fore once again and an idea began to coalesce. I tried to push it away, but the idea kept coming back. And the more I pondered it the clearer it became.

What we now have here is not a spitting image of the original drawing, but I think it does capture the concept and essence of that design while cleaning it up. And, now, I don't think it looks slilly. I gave up trying to maintain those straight lines and focused on reaching an overall effect. I think I now have something workable I can flesh out.



First of all I threw away the squashed sphere I had been trying to use to get that similar look from the original drawing. Instead I used a simple top section of a sphere then narrowed it by thirty percent. Then I created the shapes I wanted to intersect my truncated ovoid and cut away the remaining edges to get the shape and effect I wanted. When it was all done I then copied what I had completed then mirrored it verticlly by -1 to get a matching yet inverted copy, I then flattened that by forty percent and mated it to the upper section. Voila!--basic shape of wierd looking spaceship inspired by an obscure never used drawing.

I then shaved off a piece of the nose at an angle of ten degress, added the front viewport, and some detailing to the afte end of the wings and the tail. The stern was a separately created piece because it differs from the shape of the front--it's curved quite differently and is all that remains of the previous ovoid form I was using.

I see this as a Jupiter II sized ship with at least two levels and definitely not something that could fit onto the Enterprise flight deck. While ewe never actually got to see this in TAS it strikes me that it could have served for something like the stolen Aurora in TOS' "The Way To Eden," although I have the inkling of an idea of what that could have looked like rather than the goofy looking thing used in TOS-R.

 

[Redfern]

That...is...beautiful!

That is very much how the drawing "registers" in my brain.

Now, admittedly, I perceive the ship as much smaller, almost a "Smart Car" version of a warp capable vessel, those "triangles" to either side of the central square being additional panes of the viewport. But as there is nothing to suggest scale (like a figure standing by it), well, it's certainly open to interpretation.

Again, you nailed the shape! Congrats!!!

 

[Warped9]

The original drawing is very basic with little detail. I am interpreting the wings as the ship’s warp nacelles and the slot at the tail as the impulse drive. This could be somewhat analogous to the Cyrano Jones’ ship further upthread only of a different configuration. Landing struts and a gangway would likely extend from the underside.

If anything in TOS could be mistaken for a “flying saucer” this could likely be it.

 

[trynda1701]

Very nice indeed.

Looking forward to seeing this completed. Agree with the idea on size, and as we never see more than a nose of an unknown curved shuttle on the TAS hanger deck, which the original drawing might have been, that's fine by me.

And you've intrigued me about your take on the Aurora. Might not be on this thread, but would like to see your idea. Wonder if you'll try and use the basic shape of the reversed Tholian ship with nacelles, or something more original?

 

[Warped9]

And you've intrigued me about your take on the Aurora. Might not be on this thread, but would like to see your idea. Wonder if you'll try and use the basic shape of the reversed Tholian ship with nacelles, or something more original?

I think I would go with some sort of triangular shape that might suggest the Tholian ship from a distance, but also certainly be quite different overall. I feel rather the same about Kara's ship in "Spock's Brain." There was no need to completely replace the design as it could simply have been tweaked and fleshed out.

 

[BK613]

Dammit, now I'm gonna have to finish it:
https://www.trekbbs.com/threads/the-what-are-you-working-on-art-thread.196270/page-8#post-11298118

 

[Warped9]

Presently I’m trying to figure out what detailing this puppy needs.

 

[trynda1701]

Presently I’m trying to figure out what detailing this puppy needs.

Are you planning to keep the wraparound windows? I could see it with two windows a bit wider (twice as wide?) than the front one, without keeping the full width ones, if you think it will fit the new two deck size.

Maybe a couple of access hatches on the sides of the wings/engines. Maybe a long flat rectangle at the rear outer edge of the wings, hinting at the intercoolers on the top end on the bigger ships nacelles? Plus a few navigation lights?

 

[Warped9]

One can interpret whether those are actually wraparound windows or just markings. I find it hard to envision something like wraparound windows on a TOS ship. I tseems more like something we'd see on something like Space Ghost. However, I do like the idea of smaller windows bracketing the big main viewport.

 

[UssGlenn]

For now I'm going on to the next thing.

When you get back to this, is there anything in the episode preventing the gray "hood" from actually being the windshield?

 

[MGagen]

Great job, Warped9!

I feel your pain. Even something that we all know was an actual artifact, not a "napkin sketch": the TOS Shuttlecraft, nearly kicked my butt. Some of the features that look obvious are not what they appear once you start working them out in 3D space. Obvious shapes lead to contradictions where they intersect.

I must compliment you on capturing the beauty of the sketched craft. There is a real sense of movement to the sketch. Your interpretation honors this.

Really enjoying lurking in this thread. I'm with you in carrying the torch for the original TOS aesthetic.

M.

 

[Redfern]

When you get back to this, is there anything in the episode preventing the gray "hood" from actually being the windshield?

I was going to say this shot...

http://tas.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/blu-ray/110-BR/mudds-passion-hd-285.jpg

...until I actually looked at it and saw the details that don't really fit either arrangement.

So, uh, never mind.

 

[Warped9]

Some detailing. I opted fto forego the wraparaound viewport idea and went with the colour striping or whatever it could be. Cyrano Jones' ship had some sort of red colouring to the hull the purpose of which is not apparent (unless it's the 23rd century equivalent of putting decorative patterns on private spacecraft as opposed to contemporary civilian aircraft, boats and RVs). In this case I went with blue rather than red.

Thie original drawing was quite bare bones without specific detail. The small oval on the nose of the drawing I made into the craft's navigational deflector. The three simple panels on the back of the drawing's wings I made more substantial and distinctive while maintaining three main elements. The slot at the drawing's tail stayed much the same as the impulse drive. I also added a touch of detail on the outside of the wings to add some visual texture to what is otherwise a lot of blank hull.

 

[Henoch]

The striping gives the illusion that there is a "flat" between the window and front edge. Nice workaround. I also assumed the sketch was not complete especially in any details, so, your additions are very appropriate.