Aerial shot progress

 

It's about to get busy with Christmas, just a bit of time to tinker with last night's previs shot of the ship arriving. This version has the ship dropping down through the clouds. It's a slower, more plausible staging for a ship that is hundreds of metres long.

Boulton's back!

 So I've been trying to build a starship from Charles E. Gannon's Caine Riordan: Terran Republic novels. It's the Bolton/Boulton-class cruiser.

The previous attempt was back in January this year. See these previous posts. I was pretty happy with how it was going but not happy enough to push on. I decided it was time to return to the Terran Republic, and I'd still like to build a shift carrier, a giant space vehicle very similar to the Earth ships that appear in the Avatar movies.

On with the Boulton, for now:

January's version:

More curvy but not as dagger-shaped.

Today's efforts:

Spin habitats folded in.

Spin habitat folded out.

Hail Mary!

 I just finished Andy Weir's Project: Hail Mary on Audible. I absolutely loved it! 

It made me want to build a quick model of the starship featured in the book. So here we are:

It's not a super-quality build, but it was a fun diversion from the other jobs I should have been doing. It is a clever design with a centrifuge to simulate gravity using cables to reverse and extend the habitat pod, then have the ship spin on its own centre of mass. A lot simpler than hamster cages and rings..

Medical Frigate: Endgame

 I've pretty much completed the modelling. That isn't to say that I won't redo a few elements. An airlock door, here. A few more banks of lamps and lights. Maybe even a ship name embossed on the hull, when I think of the name.

Guns, guns, guns. Tiny ones, just for point defence.

Dropship bay at the bottom. Docking bay at the mid-point.

That hulking mid-section makes me think of a snail lugging its shell.

UV mapping. I won't go wild on the surface treatment. It fits best into the Aliens style by using high contrast and stark treatment. The colour palette is subdued and bleak, although different from Sulaco's battleship grey with a blue cast.

Medical Frigate: Yet more details

 I was planning to complete the modelling by the end of today. Not quite, but not too much left to do. I'm reasonably happy with the progress. The command section (front bit) looks much more like the Sulaco than originally planned. It's referential but not slavishly copied.

Engine Port details and Lower Hospital block section still to do.

There might be a few elements that I redo. The forward/rear airlock door for certain.

I'll definitely have the modelling finished tomorrow. It will then be deck plans, all the way down.

Floundering a bit

 Some projects run smoothly. Some don't. Some projects should be abandoned quickly, but are not.

I don't know where this project sits on the spectrum. I'm keen to do it. It's a tiny bit different -- a ship that exists (unofficially for copyright reasons) in the Alien universe. A medical frigate that looks like it belongs as a variant of the USMC Sulaco.

It's not coming to me because I've made quick starts without a lot of detailed planning. I've pushed into level-2 and level-3 details before getting the big pieces right. Age-old modelling problems for me.

Earlier design

Updated design

I liked the idea of an E.M. shroud, a radar shield for stealthy operation. It didn't feel like it sat well in the Aliens universe. The Sulaco has a tower projection that does the same job.

Making stuff out of simple forms but going into the details before the blocks are complex enough.

First effort. I realised the shield plates are not circular on the outer surface. See above from an approach that is closer to the Sulaco.

McQuarrie Truck Progress

 
I don't think I've gone overboard on the details just yet. There's some tidy-up and improvement required here and there.

Real windows. Next, I need to provide the cabin details.

Ramp machinery needs a bit of work. More ladder mechanisms and a big box on the end wall.

Some more work on the nose stuff. Lamps and sensors.

A few creatively "off" days

 You must get them. Days when you're just not feeling it. I've had a few. It's also half-term, so my sons are home, which means quite a lot of noise and fuss.

So I saw a concept illustration by Ralph McQuarrie, the Star Wars concept artist who most defined the look and feel of that universe. It's not from Star Wars but another movie concept that sounded very intriguing.

 I loved the idea of an endless grassy plane. The idea here is that the whole planet is a giant grassy plain. I'm not convinced that's plausible, but that's fine.

The design work is cool, "science-fictiony" while his Star Wars stuff is more stylised. This is sorta Battlestar Galactica - although I can't find the source, so I'm not sure of the film.

I'm going to recreate the scene. I'm terrified about working on the space traveller, but that's going to be tough. The All-Terrain Vehicle, I'll make a bit bigger, I think.

Rejected concept - a bit too Mass Effect

Rejected concept: The windows. Not keen!

Game on!

I don't want to go overboard in the detailing, but more details to come.