Weekend Miniproject: 2300AD Bayern

 I just bought a bunch of e-books (most of which I already have in printed form) from Bundle of Holdings. It's the second edition of the 2300AD Science Fiction Roleplaying Game from Mongoose. The item that most attracted me to the collection was the Bayern campaign boxset. The GDW edition Bayern was a very curious thing. A science campaign with the focus on space exploration and a finale right out of 2001/Contact. First contact with a proper god-like alien intelligence. Awesome stuff. Except that the first version was thin on details. The lack of deck plans was unforgivable. For a campaign centred around a giant starship, you just don't miss that out.

Anyway, looking through the new books got me excited again. I thought maybe I should do an update build!

Gavin Dady produced the ship's original model and deck plans himself. They're fine, but Gavin isn't an artist, and 3D modelling isn't a core skill set of his. So here goes...

GDW illustration by Steve Venters (1988)

Gavin Davy's model, following the GDW design pretty closely in the component list

The Mongoose Art Department spruced up in the current 2300AD style

I've already made a couple of starts on this. A few years ago, before the latest version of the book and its Bayern design was finalised,

A few years earlier...

Working off the GDW proportions.

The latest version begins with blocking out:

A starting point - blocks!

Hab work in progress

 

The second habitat, the R5000, has been a bit more trouble. It's at the scale where windows just don't make sense. The central area has windows, but they'd be the size of large buildings. Stupidly enormous!

I'll rethink the approach. Back in the day, windows could be handled using a noise mask rather than painting individual faces. Much more sensible!

Bonus Space Habitat

 Next up, Space Habitat 5000.

5km Radius, 12km long. It's big!

The 5k is a more mainstream habitat. I'm not happy with the workings on the end-cap. I'll redo them tomorrow.

Space Habitat 1600R

 The first habitat is done. This one is smaller than most. I've pegged it as the first, a prototype model. It is smaller than an O'Neill cylinder but still pretty darn big, with a 1600 m diameter and 2000m length. From the Fusion plant to the space docks, it's more like 11km. Huge! Huge!


More water play

I had another delve into True-Terrain 5's new water. It's complicated, but I've finally worked out why my early TT4 terrains somehow looked more detailed. I've not been using Adaptive Subdivision in TT5. I found it unstable, presumably because I was putting in ridiculous parameters I didn't understand. I got it working, and some of the close-to-camera areas look super-detailed.

I will play some more!

Space Habitat

 I'm creating more Orbital Elements content, including more ships and deck plans. However, before that, I need to create some of the standard habitats and surface settlements.

First off is the Space Habitat 1600m. This is the first large habitat design for constructing settlements at the Earth-Moon Lagrange points. It is so named because its habitat cylinder has a 1600m radius.

 

At 3200m across and 2000m tall, it's the biggest space-shippy thing I've built "to scale".

End-cap and stem

Going into that end-cap detailing.

True-Terrain 5 Water

 I was busy creating a scene that uses True Terrain 4's water system when True-VFX dropped the first test version of TT5's new water system.

Old water. Lots of Depth-of-focus

New water! Ocean system. Over-amped but very configurable

Lake system.

Ocean system. Foam!

Ocean system. Needs configuration to remove the excessive waves.

Loving it, but a lot to learn.

Rig!

 Firstly, Alien: Romulus is excellent!

Andy (played by David Jonsson) is my favourite character.

Alien Romulus offers nothing new; it's like a horrifying "The Best of Alien" album featuring masterful covers from previous episodes of Alien films. Set between Alien and Aliens, the retro-vibe is back, and yet it manages to weave elements and story points from prequels and sequels that nudge the movie out of the decaying orbit of a simple pastiche effort. So why is this the best Alien film since 1986? Mastery of the elements and discipline to keep things simple. The film never tries to pull the backstory into the foreground; you get an intriguing prologue that tells you the "how" and a fantastic cameo presence to drive the backstory, delivered in just as few lines of dialogue to explain the "why". Most surprising of all, I instantly liked all the characters. People making bad choices is an essential ingredient of the monster movie genre, but it's refreshing that all bad decisions make sense in their moment here.

Rig

I'm almost done ... probably done with the Rig

Moody lighting!

I must use more external lamps to light stuff!

Logo character art from Midjourney!

Orbital Elements - Medium Rig Nudges and paint

 The Rig slowly progressed, not because of any problems; I just gave it a day off. I played with landscapes, then returned to it this afternoon.

I tweaked a few things, but nothing major. I added some different elements to the back. Instead of just mirroring the front elements.

Front tweaks

New rear elements in play

I'll come back to it tomorrow. Tonight, I'm off to see Alien: Romulus. 

Orbital Elements - Medium Rig backwards and forwards

 

Some thoughts on my process

My 3D modelling—maybe my entire "art" journey—has been a race between my critical standards and my capabilities. There have been times when I've turned my back on 3d in general because everything I produced was rubbish, and I knew it. Maybe you have a lot of fun initially because your standards are almost zero, so everything you create has the merit of being made. I remember modelling in Caligari trueSpace, where I would complete every challenge in a couple of hours. I was productive and learned a lot, but everything was a quick sketch. I think this set some bad habits that have taken a long time to recognise, never mind overcome.

So, I reached a point with the Medium Rig where I felt like I was in the home stretch—just a few more touches and call it complete. But I'm now tending to question this feeling, and I force myself to look harder and compare the output with other people's 3D stuff that I admire. So I don't complete it. I get back and redo things. Then, I redo some more. This feels like important progress!

Removing the cargo module, and I like the spindly quality. Those legs look mismatched, though.

Nice end-caps. Accented in yellow. Thruster nozzles too dark.

 I'm not sure about the fuel pods or the command module. Remember that the vehicle's standard vector is "upwards". This way, constant acceleration produces simulated gravity, making the floor/regular deck arrangement.

Trying out different command modules. Messy!

Meh, on the first step.

I decide to go shopping in my old model catalogue. I'd done fuel tanks and command modules that I'd liked in some earlier Orbital Element models. I argue that elements are duplicated because these vehicles share standard components. 

Fuel tanks from a "grabber" utility rig

Command module and crewmember derived from my "squid" cargo-hauler.

See the squid in this post.

Progress continues! Doubtless, a few steps back will also happen before the end.

Orbital Elements - Medium Rig concept

 I made a breakthrough on the light rig. Firstly, I realised that a light rig is a "space car" and that it is too small to benefit a group of PCs. So, given that the two players in the group have 3 "light rig" points from mustering out, I'm turning their light rig into a 300 displacement-ton heavy rig. Whoop!

"Iron Butterfly"

The Bart Banks HR-771 Modular Transit Vehicle. Mounting four ZysKa-12s, the Bart Banks lifts a 100-ton cargo module into orbit from any surface settlement and then carries it to near interplanetary destinations. Fuel bladders can be fitted to the cargo module to extend the range at the cost of cargo capacity.

Orbital Elements Ship Sheet:

A member of the crew stands on the roof of the cargo module.

In-flight.

Alternate Command Module. A tad too "Space 1999"

Originally twin-engined, I decided to move to 4 because it looks a lot more balanced.

Happy with the base form.

The first build was a mess of muddled shapes. 

Concept sketch

Slow going

 I'm back in Blender, but oh the rust that has formed. It's only been a week away. As well as having trouble producing a satisfactory base model, I had some instability issues with the geo-scatter. I tested a smaller scene, which was okay.

Geo-Scatter without the crash-to-desktop

Concepts

 More "Dropship" Too much, I think.

This is the concept I'm going with. 

Back from our summer holiday

Dordogne region of France, east of  Bergerac

We stayed in a cute chalet on a campsite with a super pool, a good-quality restaurant, and more Rocomadour cheese and foie gras than is good for you.

I'm keen to get some work done in Blender. I'll create a terrain inspired by the Dordogne's limestone valleys and an Orbital Elements space vehicle for the next playthrough. Coming soon!

Dordogne has lots of amazing limestone cliffs. Most of them are topped by amazing châteaus.

I did most of my sketching at the pool. My meagre drafting skills took a hit.