The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

[Redfern]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Another 3D interpretation of a character (actually the titular one, Lt. Mzzkiti) from my (currently inactive) on-line comic.

You may notice the pilot seating is actually a vintage barber chair. As with the captain's chair depicted in an earlier post, the space freighter's original flight deck was in need of major repairs. The fleet has declined the chief engineer's requisitions for replacement hardware. So, once again he has had to improvise. The engineer obtained a series of vintage barber chairs and got the notion to install them upon the flight deck and other work-stations of the ship as needed.

The chair was modeled by our very own Ptrope and was originally intended to be the captain's seating for a steampunk interpretation of the Enterprise bridge. He applied wood surfaces and brass fittings, but I gave it that mid 20the century chrome and enameled look. Well, most of the chrome electroplating as flaked away to expose rust prone metals. The chair has seen better days.

The enivornment is not meant to be the final design of the pilot or helm station. It's just a (hopefully) visually interesting "placeholder" until I assemble a better one. I mean, how can one cross the deck to reach the chair with all that hardware littering the deck?! All of the greeblied details come from various Coflek-Gnorg sets.

Melody By Lady LittleFox
"Furries for..." morphs by Beth Capsces
SPF vest by Little Dragon
SPF uniform by Little Dragon
Furrette 2 by Little Dragon
Hardware elements by Coflek-Gnorg
Barber chair by Ptrope

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Kaiser]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Nice

 

[Redfern]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

I remembered I had downloaded a Jestons inspired flying scooter from a site titled "Posette Forever" which I thought might be something Mzzkiti might like joyriding. So I arranged a simple composition using a rather familiar backdrop and a technique called "shadow catching". One aligns an object, usually a "ground plane", which does not actually appear in the final render, but it does "catch" any ray-traced shadows cast by the lights used to illuminate the subjects.

Melody By Lady LittleFox
"Furries for..." morphs by Beth Capsces
SPF vest by Little Dragon
SPF uniform by Little Dragon
Furrette 2 by Little Dragon
Scooter from Posette Forever

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Kaiser]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Daww shes cute ^_^

 

[Redfern]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

"Give us this day our daily fish."

While on leave upon her homeworld, M'Ress follows tradition by visiting the one of the regional temples to give thanks to her goddess.

Was Caitian religion ever explored? As far as I know, Peter David has been the only author to write about Caitians for the Pocket Books line of novels, and I don't think he touched upon the subject. But since I have not picked up a Trek novel since the late 80s, I'm pretty much out of the loop. Mercy only knows what ideas fans have concocted.

I just had this mental image of a monolithic statue looming within a natural cavern that I wanted to depict. Since the columns had an Egyptian motif, I dressed M'Ress in some fitting elements.

A silly thought crossed my mind. If that statue has anything so much as a digital timer to control the lighting, Kirk would probably vaporize that chunk of stone. You know how he is about computerized "gods".

Credits

Aiko 3...DAZ.com
Melody...Lady LittleFox
Body textures...Daio and Verge Visible
Face and body morphs...Beth Capsces
"Paw" morphs...Achronicity
Tail prop...Little Dragon
Mane...Ali
Collar...F. Coffill & L. Sweet
Bracelets, armbands & sash...Anton
Columns & dais...Kirwyn
Cauldron...Danie & Marforno
Cave...Poisen

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[largo]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

love it.

and that's why Mr. Kirk isn't allowed to beam down to friendly Federation worlds anymore.

 

[Kemaiku]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Never really thought about Caitian spiritual tradition, what would cats worship? heh.

 

[Redfern]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Thanks, Largo!

Something about the staging of this scene makes me half expect to see a Harryhausen designed animation puppet to lumber or slither into view. It has an about "Sinbad" feel to it.

Concerning Kirk, if he tried to phaser those huge statues where Spock tried to achieve Kholinar, I bet the crystaline ruby lattice would refract the beam all over the place! DUCK!!!

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Kail]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Bill, that is seriously cool!

 

[Redfern]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Thanks, Kail!

I had this scene in mind for a while and I finally got around to it this last weekend.

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Intelligence]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

That is super cool!

 

[Redfern]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

I was going to post this in a thread discussing the animated series within the TOS sub-forum. The discussion had somewhat devolved into a kind of "Uh, huh!" "Uh, uh!" parley, so I decided to display the "M'Ress 'streaking'" render (shown earlier in this thread) as a "pleasant diversion". After an initial comment by one participant right after I posted it, the thread went silent for a few days.

So I composed this render and had intended to caption it, "Oh, dear! Looks like I 'killed' the thread!" But right after I completed the render, someone finally posted in that other thread, effectively negating the reason for this image. So, I decided to display it here rather than "spamming" the other discussion.

Without the caption, it plays as a serious moment.

Credits

Aiko 3...DAZ.com
Body textures...Daio and Verge Visible
Face and body morphs...Beth Capsces
"Paw" morphs...Achronicity
Tail prop...Little Dragon (out of frame, but there)
Uniform...Oshikai
Mane...Ali
Crew Quarters...Ptrope

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Kaiser]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Nice one

 

[Redfern]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

M'Ress: "What?! Do I look like the ship's pet or something?! Do I look like I'd prowl around hunting vermin like tribbles or rodent things from Demorus?!"

Readers: "When you release your claws and bare your fangs like that, uh, yeah."

M'Ress: "Oh...well, never mind."

Just a silly "in character" rebuttal when "Captain Rob" wondered if M'Ress could be considered the "animal mascot/sidekick" that was a mainstay of so many other cartoons from the 1970s.

Credits

Aiko 3...DAZ.com
Body textures...Daio and Verge Visible
Face and body morphs...Beth Capsces
"Paw" morphs...Achronicity
Tail prop...Little Dragon (out of frame, but there)
Uniform...Oshikai
Mane...Ali
Crew Quarters...Ptrope

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Kaiser]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

awesome render

 

[Q2UnME]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Bill: Something about the color of the fur on her hands/paws makes it look almost like "old dead people skin". Perhaps a color more like her neck or throat area?

My two cents.....

Q2

 

[Redfern]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Argh! You been e-mailing a poster we'll simply call "K" upon the "CrossTime Cafe" forums (a private board I habitually haunt), haven't you?! She said the same d*mn thing!

The problem is that I'm using some commercial products pretty much "as is". The color texture is from one merchant who photo manipulated snapshots she took of her cat. That cat apparently had pale colored legs compared to its head. The "bump map" is from another merchnt and that person most likely used the "fur" setting from "Alien Skin" (a PhotoShop plug-in) which generates arbitrary "swirls" of patterns. Alas, the swirls that fall upon the UV coordinates of the hands happen to cut "across" the digits rather than along their length.

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Kemaiku]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

It looks awesome as usual for what you're working with. Are there other texture pack resources online you could maybe use to make a few test renders? see if any of them look better?

 

[Redfern]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Chemahkuu, The reasoning behind your suggestion has merit, but the sad fact is, of the products other have made, either for free or for sale, what I used here is about as good as it gets. The next option is to create one from scratch, either doing so myself or find someone I can sucker, er, I mean inspire, yeah, inspire; that's the ticket.

Okay, I'm being fippant there, but really, a custom bump map would need to be created, one that has "streaks" or "striations" running the length of the digits. Sounds simple enough, but like painting gaming miniatures, one needs a steady hand. The need just hasn't manifested itself until now since most of my prior images depicted the hands at some distance.

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Robert Simmons]

Re: The "Bride" of the "M'Ress Appreciation Thread"

Gee...this seems so...ahem...catty.