TSW's Design Thread

[Starwolf]

Hi Everyone,

I recently joined the TrekBBS forums, which is full of very talented Trek designers and artists. I wanted to share my designs with the community and even gain some suggestions for improvement, or even insight into new designs.


My STO DTNE Entry:

Runner-Up on the Design the Next Enterprise Contest - Frontier-Class

Maverism's 3D Model of The Frontier

Frontier MKIII (Suggestions for improvement by Mark Rademaker, Mr. Probert, and others.)


Federation Starships:

Percivial-Class Light Cruiser

Goddard-Class Science Ship

Federation Battleships

Vanguard-class Heavy Cruiser

Vega-Class Battlecarrier


Klingon Warships:

QoJ'Chu-class Battlecruiser

(My suggestion for STO's Klingon Flagship)

QiB'elth-Class Battlecruiser MKII

Ki'TaQ-class BoP with QiB'elth-Class Battlcruiser MKI



I look forward to everyone's comments and suggestions for improvement.

 

[Ensign Ro-]

There some real potential in some of those sketches. I especially like that one angle of the Vega Class. That would be interesting to see developed. :-)

 

[Kaiser]

Very awesome Ship Sketch's there

 

[JES]

You're not bad at all, but you still have a long way to go before you'll reach your peak. Then again, you could say the same about me.

I think that one of the things that you need to work on is using more curves and less angles, especially as you refine your designs, and this is especially if you're going to continue working on 25th Century designs. I think a prime example would be that blocky shape underneath the Frontier's cutout.

Looking at other people's designs, such as madeinjapan1988's Perception class and Galen's Legacy class has been an inspiration for me, so I would suggest setting aside some time to do so. Shipschematic.net and Ex-Astris-Scientia.org are some of my personal favorites, because they offer one of the widest collection of designs, especially for individual sites.

I wouldn't have suggested using Frontier or Vega for a class name, since there are already designs that use them, which are pretty well done too. I wouldn't have gone with Goddard either, given that there already is a canon ship of the Korolev class, one that I'm not to keen into accepting that she might be destroyed, which would have to be the case in order for your Goddard to exist. It might be a good class name for a later time, when the Korolev class vessel of that name has been retired, perhaps in the middle or late 25th Century.

You're pretty good at Klingon vessels, or you must put a lot of work into research for those patterns (or both), because they are excellent. I would have personally tried to emphasize sleekness a little more, given that they are 25th Century vessels, but that is honestly my own view point.

 

[The Axeman]

Definitely some potential there, some interesting ideas that could be worked futher. I particularly like the Goddard class science ship and the Percival has a lot of potential too. They're a little squared off in places, but not too much and it makes for a slightly different overall aesthetic. One of the weakest for me is actually the Frontier III, the proportions of the body are overwhelming the saucer and nacelles, making it look rather big boned. The klingon stuff is well drawn and looks like a lot of time wnet into them, but it's not really anything new. They all look like variations on the Vor'cha class.

 

[Starwolf]

First off, thank you for the responses. Someday I will endeavor to improve my designs.

Definitely some potential there, some interesting ideas that could be worked futher. I particularly like the Goddard class science ship and the Percival has a lot of potential too. They're a little squared off in places, but not too much and it makes for a slightly different overall aesthetic. One of the weakest for me is actually the Frontier III, the proportions of the body are overwhelming the saucer and nacelles, making it look rather big boned. The klingon stuff is well drawn and looks like a lot of time wnet into them, but it's not really anything new. They all look like variations on the Vor'cha class.

Actually they were inspired by the D7 / K'T'inga, especially the Qib'elth which was a modern take with more of inspriation from Kahless's Bat'elth.

But I'm surprised the comments regarding the Frontier MKIII, since the original for the DTNE was regarded needing improvement. I didn't post it, but here is the Frontier MKII. The weakest was the nacelles on the original, which ended up being too small and I beefed that up a bit. The Secondary Hull was regarded too Sovereignish and I went back and redid that, while retaining the classic Enterprise-lines. But on the MKII people commente don the hump, so I sleeked that out. The Excelsior neck and Impulse Engines was suggested by Mark Rademaker. But since its a sketch and not done on CGI, it may look better after it's modeled or drawn up on the computer.

You're not bad at all, but you still have a long way to go before you'll reach your peak. Then again, you could say the same about me.

I think that one of the things that you need to work on is using more curves and less angles, especially as you refine your designs, and this is especially if you're going to continue working on 25th Century designs. I think a prime example would be that blocky shape underneath the Frontier's cutout.

Looking at other people's designs, such as madeinjapan1988's Perception class and Galen's Legacy class has been an inspiration for me, so I would suggest setting aside some time to do so. Shipschematic.net and Ex-Astris-Scientia.org are some of my personal favorites, because they offer one of the widest collection of designs, especially for individual sites.

I wouldn't have suggested using Frontier or Vega for a class name, since there are already designs that use them, which are pretty well done too. I wouldn't have gone with Goddard either, given that there already is a canon ship of the Korolev class, one that I'm not to keen into accepting that she might be destroyed, which would have to be the case in order for your Goddard to exist. It might be a good class name for a later time, when the Korolev class vessel of that name has been retired, perhaps in the middle or late 25th Century.

Well, I'm just here to enjoy designing. But my idea of design is different than those ideals. I saw MinJapan's Perception class a few years ago, and when I entered the DNTE I had to take a different approach since on one end you had his design and on the other you had DJ Curtis's Enterprise-F. So I took the ideas Probert used to create the D and Eaves creating the E by tweeking the previous Enterprises. But since the original ideal was to incorporate elements of the Enterprise J, I simply evolved the Sovereign and added the traits such as the saucer deflector and the pylon rooted Secondary Impulse engines (which evolves up the pylons in future generations).


As for the Ship's names, it's not going to be possible to avoid overlaping names given the size of the Trek fandom. So best we could do like with Novels in that we can have similar titles, but with different authors. That way we all are only limited by canonization of ship-classes and we can name our ships, which is partially that gives them character.

You're pretty good at Klingon vessels, or you must put a lot of work into research for those patterns (or both), because they are excellent. I would have personally tried to emphasize sleekness a little more, given that they are 25th Century vessels, but that is honestly my own view point.

In all honesty, I initially drew them on the fly. The Qoj'Chu I actually drew up in a few hours.

But I'm surprised you don't think of them as sleek. I thought they were. I know there is a moderized D7 that was posted here that truly is sleek, but don't want to end up copying that person's wonderful work. I just wanted my warships to look like they can dish out some punishment and take it as well.

 

[The Axeman]

It may be that we are more used to seeing a lot of different views of ship designs. When we only see it from one view you may not get the jist of what the artist has envisioned for the rest of the ships proportions. I notice the ones I like had a couple of views so I could get a better idea of what was going on.

Also we should remember the first rule of art criticism. 'Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one'.

 

[Starwolf]

Haha, indeed.

I'm already at work on Multi views of the Frontier MKIII and the QoJ'Chu.

 

[Maverisms]

I must say, your Klingon work is bloody good. I'm not sure if it's the lines or the attention to detail, but I'd definitely like to see more.

I haven't forgotten about the Frontier, btw. My time isn't really mine lately, and what I have had has been locked into a book I really need to write. (It isn't a very exciting book, unless you happen to be into Quality Management).

Hopefully that will change soon, but I don't really expect anything to let up before the middle of next month.

 

[JES]

You're not bad at all, but you still have a long way to go before you'll reach your peak. Then again, you could say the same about me.

I think that one of the things that you need to work on is using more curves and less angles, especially as you refine your designs, and this is especially if you're going to continue working on 25th Century designs. I think a prime example would be that blocky shape underneath the Frontier's cutout.

Looking at other people's designs, such as madeinjapan1988's Perception class and Galen's Legacy class has been an inspiration for me, so I would suggest setting aside some time to do so. Shipschematic.net and Ex-Astris-Scientia.org are some of my personal favorites, because they offer one of the widest collection of designs, especially for individual sites.

I wouldn't have suggested using Frontier or Vega for a class name, since there are already designs that use them, which are pretty well done too. I wouldn't have gone with Goddard either, given that there already is a canon ship of the Korolev class, one that I'm not to keen into accepting that she might be destroyed, which would have to be the case in order for your Goddard to exist. It might be a good class name for a later time, when the Korolev class vessel of that name has been retired, perhaps in the middle or late 25th Century.

Well, I'm just here to enjoy designing. But my idea of design is different than those ideals. I saw MinJapan's Perception class a few years ago, and when I entered the DNTE I had to take a different approach since on one end you had his design and on the other you had DJ Curtis's Enterprise-F. So I took the ideas Probert used to create the D and Eaves creating the E by tweeking the previous Enterprises. But since the original ideal was to incorporate elements of the Enterprise J, I simply evolved the Sovereign and added the traits such as the saucer deflector and the pylon rooted Secondary Impulse engines (which evolves up the pylons in future generations).


As for the Ship's names, it's not going to be possible to avoid overlaping names given the size of the Trek fandom. So best we could do like with Novels in that we can have similar titles, but with different authors. That way we all are only limited by canonization of ship-classes and we can name our ships, which is partially that gives them character.

You're pretty good at Klingon vessels, or you must put a lot of work into research for those patterns (or both), because they are excellent. I would have personally tried to emphasize sleekness a little more, given that they are 25th Century vessels, but that is honestly my own view point.

In all honesty, I initially drew them on the fly. The Qoj'Chu I actually drew up in a few hours.

But I'm surprised you don't think of them as sleek. I thought they were. I know there is a moderized D7 that was posted here that truly is sleek, but don't want to end up copying that person's wonderful work. I just wanted my warships to look like they can dish out some punishment and take it as well.

It's not exactly impossible to avoid using names that are already used, but I will agree that it is very difficult. I personally want to add something to fandom with my designs, and avoid contradicting what is already there, and I think that coming up with a unique class name is a good skill for a starship designer to develop. I avoid using a name for a class if a design that is well done enough already uses it, and especially if the visual has a registry and name.

For 25th Century vessels, they look conservatively sleek, at least in my opinion. I personally think that your Klingon designs look like they were commissioned before the beginning of the 25th Century, perhaps during or after the Dominion War, and that they share quite a few design elements with the Negh'var and Vor'cha class vessels, only they look a little more refined.

In all honestly, I nearly said that they don't emphasize sleekness considering that they are supposed to be from the 25th Century, period, because most Klingon vessel fan designs for the 25th Century go in a very sleek, streamlined direction, but then, looking at most STO designs, those aren't as sleek as some of the fan designs from around the same time period, so in this case, I have to chalk it up to personal taste.

 

[Starwolf]

I must say, your Klingon work is bloody good. I'm not sure if it's the lines or the attention to detail, but I'd definitely like to see more.

I haven't forgotten about the Frontier, btw. My time isn't really mine lately, and what I have had has been locked into a book I really need to write. (It isn't a very exciting book, unless you happen to be into Quality Management).

Hopefully that will change soon, but I don't really expect anything to let up before the middle of next month.

Take your time.

Hopefully I will get done with the Models of the Frontier MKIII and the QoJ'chu before TOR's Beta Testing.

It's not exactly impossible to avoid using names that are already used, but I will agree that it is very difficult. I personally want to add something to fandom with my designs, and avoid contradicting what is already there, and I think that coming up with a unique class name is a good skill for a starship designer to develop. I avoid using a name for a class if a design that is well done enough already uses it, and especially if the visual has a registry and name.

Yes, but given this point in time designers would have to start dwelling into names from mythology that isn't really Roman or Greek.

For 25th Century vessels, they look conservatively sleek, at least in my opinion. I personally think that your Klingon designs look like they were commissioned before the beginning of the 25th Century, perhaps during or after the Dominion War, and that they share quite a few design elements with the Negh'var and Vor'cha class vessels, only they look a little more refined.

In all honestly, I nearly said that they don't emphasize sleekness considering that they are supposed to be from the 25th Century, period, because most Klingon vessel fan designs for the 25th Century go in a very sleek, streamlined direction, but then, looking at most STO designs, those aren't as sleek as some of the fan designs from around the same time period, so in this case, I have to chalk it up to personal taste.

Indeed.

But to me the Klingon design philosophy is basically bulking up their Battlecruisers. The Vor'cha filled in some of the D7's weakness in the neck boom and put on thicker armor, and the Negh'var takes that a step further. So I figure that in a way their next warship would continue bulking the ship up, but at the same time slender it down.

 

[sojourner]

I personally only worry about canon class names and very well known fanon class names. Names of individual ships are no real worry and can be easily explained.

 

[Blip]

I really like the Goddard, it looks like a great TNG-contemporary successor to the Oberth... I think the Percival looks more late C24th than 25th though.