Topic: WIP (yes, still) shots of James Formo's Bradbury

[atheorhaven]

(posted here for the first time)

Yes, I know that this was supposed to be done tonight.. but.. I got inspired.  

Check this out..
http://www.strategyplanet.com/sfc/sedl/dropbox/alec/imgs/bradbury_8.jpg

I've now finalized the secondary hulls.. and my inspriation was observation decks!  And the ship now has a "10 Forward" on the upper saucer, plus a front and back observation deck (briefing rooms) up there, making for 7 observation decks on the ship.  Yes, this shot *is* a teaser, but also shows that more work on the lower saucer needs to be done.  Thrusters and deflectors are now finalized, the detailing on the secondary hulls are complete, the upper saucer needs a small lighting tweak and it'll be done, which leaves:

- lower saucer detailing and finalizing
- any detailing on the nacelles to be completed
- two rear lights (upper/lower) above/below the impulse engines

And I think that that'll do 'er..

Apologies for the wait James.. but I will get an ingame screenie out this weekend.  

[James Formo]

no apologies needed dude. She is looking sweet.   Anyway I started another project of my own so I am kinda preoccupied myself. I  can't get over how realistic those red and green lights look.  

 

[atheorhaven]

Quote:
no apologies needed dude. She is looking sweet.   Anyway I started another project of my own so I am kinda preoccupied myself. I  can't get over how realistic those red and green lights look.    

Thanks... and you'd be impressed with how nicely this puppy renders up now.    I may still tweak the "10 Forward" windows a bit more before release yet so it doesn't quite look so much like a room open into space.  (grin)

[James Formo]

Well I am really impressed with the work you have done. I may have to spruce up the mesh a bit now. hehe.

I may mesh in the captains yaht now that you textured it in.  Looks nice.  



I just looked at the pic again. I could also mesh in those forward viewing windows so they face slightly forward instead of down. Can build a bit of a frame around em- Good place to watch the battle from  

I also want to do a kitbash of this where it has just 1 secondary hull and the back of it is a bit deeper to serve as a carrier.  In fact I did the mesh earler but I would redo it with this file as the textures are already mapped.

atheorhaven would it be possible for you to do a second registry.  so a second bmp of the sauucer top with everything identical except the name is the USS Newton and the registry is the next # in the series. Then I'd be all set for a kitbash

 

[atheorhaven]

Quote:
Well I am really impressed with the work you have done. I may have to spruce up the mesh a bit now. hehe.

I may mesh in the captains yaht now that you textured it in.  Looks nice.  



I just looked at the pic again. I could also mesh in those forward viewing windows so they face slightly forward instead of down. Can build a bit of a frame around em- Good place to watch the battle from  

I also want to do a kitbash of this where it has just 1 secondary hull and the back of it is a bit deeper to serve as a carrier.  In fact I did the mesh earler but I would redo it with this file as the textures are already mapped.

atheorhaven would it be possible for you to do a second registry.  so a second bmp of the sauucer top with everything identical except the name is the USS Newton and the registry is the next # in the series. Then I'd be all set for a kitbash

Sure could.. and those changes sound great... one thought, could you also mesh in a slight curve in the lower saucer as well?  Bumped outwards of course..  If you could do that, then that'd make the textures on the lower surface stand out a little better as well.  

I've tried to make that effect with the lower texture, but if it was physically there, that'd be better.  But it does sound to me like you're going to need the mesh as it stands now from me, eh?  (I had to remap in the deflectors to get them to work properly).

All these changes you're proposing is just a clever way to get your hands on this early, eh?  (GRIN)  (Just bugging you)..

[James Formo]

Sure could.. and those changes sound great... one thought, could you also mesh in a slight curve in the lower saucer as well?  Bumped outwards of course..  If you could do that, then that'd make the textures on the lower surface stand out a little better as well.  

I've tried to make that effect with the lower texture, but if it was physically there, that'd be better.  But it does sound to me like you're going to need the mesh as it stands now from me, eh?  (I had to remap in the deflectors to get them to work properly).

All these changes you're proposing is just a clever way to get your hands on this early, eh?  (GRIN)  (Just bugging you)..  




Well actually I think I can make all the changes when you get it all done. So go ahead-keep at it .

As far as adding more belly to the underside. Good observation.  I am not sure if I can without redoing the saucer because I may have all the vertexes so close together it might be hard to select the ones I need.  This was only my second mesh ever so had to work based on what I could do.  Maybe I could get the middle a bit.  Otherwise the deflectors would get blocked a bit.


Anyway I'll wait till you have it how you want. Then I'll see what I can do cause I have a little more experience now. Did  this mesh 4 months ago or so.  I might have to move the textures around a bit to alighn  the windows perhaps.

What I do shouldn't cause anything to have to be remapped. My only concern is that when I bring it back into milkshape and then save it after altering-I wonder If the I-maps will still work. Milkshape  reads i-maps as transpariecies.



From looking at pic-I remember why there isnt much belly on bottom. Because of the double hulls below it doesn't work the best. Even on the high poly one I used as a guide it was near flat on the underside.  Do you mean the entire underside or just the area between the 2 hulls?


 

[James Formo]

Well did some research cause I remember I had tried adding belly to the saucer but it didn'y look good. It takes away from the dual hulls. Here's the best pick I could find-it is pretty much flat as a pancake.  I think though the the lip or  edge is wider. I could widen mine.  Still that wont help bring out the textures below.  

http://www.trekships.org/brad_closeup30000.jpg



I will likely have to send it back to you if I add the captains yaht because I'd have to map the textures to the new part and then the i-maps come into play again.  

Anyway its looking good and I don't want to start creating more work for ya. Like I don't know how you feel if I work on the mesh and then it needs remapping.  


another edit-notice how much nicer the deflectors look on the mesh in the pic than on mine.  Sigh-thats a tough shape to figure out.  Instead of kitbashing the Bradley.  That pic inspires me to build the Newton from scratch.

 

[James Formo]

Well my 3rd post in a row.  I kinda pulled an all nighter here. I redid the saucer, seondary hulls/ warp struts(all 1 piece now)

Not sure what a capt yaht would look like so just added a globe and give it a deep belly between the hulls. Still has the same bridge. The saucer has the exact same width and length but is deeper. Hulls might be a tad deeper too. The deflectors are 100% better.  Just threw on some crappy taldren textures to help bring out the shadows. I don't have any way to post a pic at the moment. So I'll send a couple shots in thru e-mail  tomorrow.   If you want to map your textures to the new mesh, that would be sweet. Other wise just keep on with the old one. Whatever you want.  Oh yea if you want the new mesh give me a hollar and I'll send it over.

I also completed another mesh that I had been working on-but its still top secret-    I'll send a pic of it too-let me know what you think of it. See if you can tell what it is.  

[atheorhaven]

Quote:
Well my 3rd post in a row.  I kinda pulled an all nighter here. I redid the saucer, seondary hulls/ warp struts(all 1 piece now)

Not sure what a capt yaht would look like so just added a globe and give it a deep belly between the hulls. Still has the same bridge. The saucer has the exact same width and length but is deeper. Hulls might be a tad deeper too. The deflectors are 100% better.  Just threw on some crappy taldren textures to help bring out the shadows. I don't have any way to post a pic at the moment. So I'll send a couple shots in thru e-mail  tomorrow.   If you want to map your textures to the new mesh, that would be sweet. Other wise just keep on with the old one. Whatever you want.  Oh yea if you want the new mesh give me a hollar and I'll send it over.

I also completed another mesh that I had been working on-but its still top secret-    I'll send a pic of it too-let me know what you think of it. See if you can tell what it is.    

For a Captain's Yacht, I usually think of it looking somewhat like a round skipping stone that's attached to the bottom on the Galaxy Class, and sort of like a capital O with small wings on the Intrepid Class.

You can see the Calypso (Patrick Stewart's name for the Captain's Yacht on the Ent-D) over at ex-astris-scientia, and that'll give you an idea of what they're like.  

But yes, send over the new mesh, and I'll try mapping the new textures to it as well.. and work on both to see which final product looks better.  

[atheorhaven]

This is still the WIP shots.. (haven't finished the lighting tweaks and such, plus the lower saucer still needs to be done), but I still wanted to get this into SFC and see how she looks.  So, What do you think?  
http://www.strategyplanet.com/sfc/sedl/dropbox/alec/imgs/bradbury_sfc2_1.jpg
http://www.strategyplanet.com/sfc/sedl/dropbox/alec/imgs/bradbury_sfc2_2.jpg
http://www.strategyplanet.com/sfc/sedl/dropbox/alec/imgs/bradbury_sfc2_3.jpg
http://www.strategyplanet.com/sfc/sedl/dropbox/alec/imgs/bradbury_sfc2_5.jpg

Still a little work to go.. but it's now in SFC as of today.  

[James Formo]

The screenies look great.  Anyway the captains yaht looks like a flying saucer .  Thanks for the info on the calypso. I have a plastic model of the galaxy so will go from that. Only the bottom part of the yaht is visible.  I will do up the yaht. rename the groups and get the mesh over to ya tonight.  NOte there will be a group called shields. Its a small box  to the side of the ship (invisible in game) that makes the shields jarger so they don't touch the ship.  Just in case you wondering when you see it.


ps got the files all zipped and ready. um atheorhaven  your mail box is full.  

 

[atheorhaven]

Yeah, I just noticed that.. I had a gentleman send me a 1.3MB file.. if you can send it in the afternoon tomorrow, it'll be cleared out..

Sorry about that..

[Lord Schtupp]

I like the integrated sec. hull/warp engine idea. Looks good, clever!

[James Formo]

Quote:
Yeah, I just noticed that.. I had a gentleman send me a 1.3MB file.. if you can send it in the afternoon tomorrow, it'll be cleared out..

Sorry about that..  

Pages: 1  
atheorhaven  
Lieutenant Commander  
 

 no prob- just as well I added a framed forward window gruop. If it doesn't work for your textures you can always delete it. Also beveled the front saucer so it is looking more beefy   side note the windo has a flicking face. Only noticeable from rear angle and not bad. I despise flickering faces though.

see my trouble is -I am a perfectionist  who  is not perfect

         
Lord Schtupp , thanks for the comment. The design is ny Lance. Atherohaven is doing a miracle job with the textures.
My mesh skills bringing up the rear her I think  But hey this was my second mesh and just redid it a bit better. Learned quite a bit on this ship  
 
 
 

[Unknown Warrior]

ME  LIKE.................ME LIKE







Unleash the warrior within you.  

[Rod O'neal]

I was just looking at the pics and was wondering if you were gonna "paint" it like the orig. or leave it monochrome? It looks nice the way it is, but I'd like to see it with the blue on the belly etc...

[atheorhaven]

Quote:
I was just looking at the pics and was wondering if you were gonna "paint" it like the orig. or leave it monochrome? It looks nice the way it is, but I'd like to see it with the blue on the belly etc...  

Totally up to James... but I think that we need something up in the front still.  A blue band up there sounds fine to me..  I was going to ask him if he wanted me to either add some color, lifepods, or a torpedo launcher (textured in).  

And if I map a texture in on the lower nacelles, it'd also let me add in some lower hull lighting too.. so if I throw some blue down there, I can throw some lights down there.

But I did have a look at the new mesh, and there's a lot of really nice elements on it.  Unfortunately, I have to remap all the textures to it, and that's stretching some of them.  So.. what I may wind up doing (with James' permission) is combining some stuff from the new mesh to the old.  I'll get everything as nice looking as I can on this one.  

[James Formo]

Quote:

Quote:
I was just looking at the pics and was wondering if you were gonna "paint" it like the orig. or leave it monochrome? It looks nice the way it is, but I'd like to see it with the blue on the belly etc...  

Totally up to James... but I think that we need something up in the front still.  A blue band up there sounds fine to me..  I was going to ask him if he wanted me to either add some color, lifepods, or a torpedo launcher (textured in).  

And if I map a texture in on the lower nacelles, it'd also let me add in some lower hull lighting too.. so if I throw some blue down there, I can throw some lights down there.

But I did have a look at the new mesh, and there's a lot of really nice elements on it.  Unfortunately, I have to remap all the textures to it, and that's stretching some of them.  So.. what I may wind up doing (with James' permission) is combining some stuff from the new mesh to the old.  I'll get everything as nice looking as I can on this one.    

As far as the texturing goes. You have my complete trust to do anything to it you would like. (with the exception of pink polka dots -

Atheorhaven-you da man. Saving this from the scrap heap

I am not sure I follow what you mean by combining stuff from the 2 meshes. Do you mean like combining parts from each mesh into 1?   Which part is stretching bad. The saucers or the hull?  Maybe post some pics or send me some.

If its the saucer- you might be able to resize it vertically-so its more narrow.  Or resizing the hull so its more shallow or narrower/wider. I might be able to tell by looking. Of course resizing stuff would mean gaps in the mesh would open, but the other parts could be raised or lowered to make them flush again.

If its real bad you could always import the yaht to the original saucer mesh. That might be less work for you. I never thought about that they might be stretched.   Dang sorry about this dude. The original mesh would be good enough. Don't want this to start to become like a job instead of fun

Still thinking here-Have you already mapped all the textures to the new mesh?  This isn't a ploy on my part to get my hands on it  , but I think I would be able to resize the new mesh so that the textures wouldn,t stretch.  Then I could send it right back to you.  I am kind of wondering how the deflectors look on the new mesh.

edit-just realized that your working with the mod file so bet you can't try breaking the mesh up eh? Hmm- will I still think that if you have en mapped I coukd unstretch em by tweaking the mesh. I also just found out the correct way to divide up faces so I could map the hull into left/right  without getting distortions.   I learn something everyday. You do realize your working with a rookie