LW9 UTF Spectre - Umbra Class Vessel

[jcaesar]

This is a rebuild in LW9, of a *cough* spaceship which I've been building, so it's a re-work in progress :). It's currently a stupid-fat model, in that most everything (except the interior image seen through the windows) is actual geometry. Why? Well, some shots I want to get close, and bump maps just don't do it for me.

Once of the things I found difficult to get to my liking is a base texture which handles a key light behind the camera as well as in front of it. The majority of the ship uses the same base nodal tree. The engine flare is modelled, and uses one of the IFW2 Nodal shaders.

I'm using the LW occlusion shader and the new shading models.

I should note, some of the nurnies are from the Ultimate Nurnie Collection, but most of them (as is everything else) modelled by me.

J

[kylekoch]

Hey thats a beautiful model J. Im working on the Kurv studios viper and the serenity 2 tute at LWG, so I can really appreciate the work that went into this. I havent even messed with the nodal yet but I know Ill have to read up a little before I do. Great work!
kyle

[duke]

Neat! What was the point of plugging the normal from spot info into the shading nodes?

[jcaesar]

Neat! What was the point of plugging the normal from spot info into the shading nodes?

Well, originally I used some planar grime maps, and I think I just left those in there--I think my original intent was to not to get the stretching you get with cubic image maps. Probably don't need them in there, and I have to read up more about all this stuff. Being just a hobbyist, I've not had a lot of time to play as much as I would've liked :)

Having looked at many of the examples from the beta forums, I looked at what some people were doing, and tried some of the same things. I still have to play with the base texture a bit more so I can get a little more anti-specular grime to be a bit more apparent.

Thanks for the comments.

[ceasare]

I like the model, and the occlusion-shader......

but when it comes to reality,occlusion is something that is not available in space, at least not in the way you used it.
The can be a big area-light (near a planet) with a few more lightsources, but there's no dome full of light.

It's a great model and I don't know what kind of look you want to acchieve, but now it looks a bit cartoon/graphic-style.

Wich (of course) can be your goal.

If your hunting for reality, it could save some renderingtime to forget about the occlusionshader.

I hope you like the critics,your model and render looks awesome, but this was just a thing I noticed and wanted to let you know.:thumbsup:

Ceasare

[kylekoch]

I like the model, and the occlusion-shader......

but when it comes to reality,occlusion is something that is not available in space, at least not in the way you used it.
The can be a big area-light (near a planet) with a few more lightsources, but there's no dome full of light.

It's a great model and I don't know what kind of look you want to acchieve, but now it looks a bit cartoon/graphic-style.

Wich (of course) can be your goal.

If your hunting for reality, it could save some renderingtime to forget about the occlusionshader.

I hope you like the critics,your model and render looks awesome, but this was just a thing I noticed and wanted to let you know.:thumbsup:

Ceasare
I dont know, it seems that in the middle of a rich star cluster, nebula, or whatever there could be a very bright light sphere. I have always wondered what it would look like in the middle of one of those super highly populated star star clusters. I bet it would be bright.

[duke]

The big space CG debate is realism vs. presentation. Hardly any space CG sequences in film or TV are lit "correctly" - instead they use miraculous light sources to make space more presentable to the viewer.

[jcaesar]

I appreciate all the comments. And I'd agree that it is a bit cartoony right now. I'd post a render of the full ship, but it's only half rebuilt, so it would be mismatched (and probably more appropriate for the WIP thread).

Still, there is, as I see it three basic camps for sci-fi (not including anime)--there may be more, but I think these are the big three:

Star Trek Style:
Lots of incorrect, but otherwise "cool-looking" lighting.
Very clean textures/ships, for the most part.

Babylon-5 Style:
More physically accurate lighting, dirtier textures

Star Wars Style:
A mixture of the Star Trek Style and Bab-5 style, with texture "dirtiness" dependent on the vessel's race, etc.

At the moment, my personal favorite is accurate lighting. The render as posted is using the "star trek style" multi-spot and a single directional lighting style. I haven't yet decided which lighting style I want, yet.

Partly because I don't really have any "project" in mind since I'm just hobbyin' with LW--currently.

Finally, regarding the design (and this is where the texturing comes in) is a kind of combination of Galactica (the old series) mixed with ST:Federation as well as Star Wars.

In terms of capital ships, Federation textures are remarkably clean (except perhaps when super close--then you can see grit, etc.). Galactica textures, are a mix, and SW textures tend to be quite battle worn.

I'm still trying to find that mix of grit, versus cleanliness (in terms of what I want, not the texture)--so I'm still kind of playing with it. I also noticed that LCDs tend to show the graphic brighter, so I need to check my CRT settings :(

Anyhow, I do appreciate the comments--good, the bad, the ugly--it's the only way we learn :).

J

[oDDity]

I'd imagine the ships in Star Trek are surrounded permenantly by a shield to stop asteroids and other flying debris from smashing a hole in the hull, and therefore it couldn't get dirty.

[jcaesar]

You've just brought out the inner-Star Trek geek.. You are warned!

Yes, there are navigational shields which, when coupled with navigational tractor beams, deflect both small and large particles. Giant particles (i.e. big asteroids, etc.) are avoided by altering the navigational path. So with that in mind there are a lot of things that wouldn't happen to the hull, and wouldn't be placed in the textured envronment.

But, while travelling through a nebula or other pockets of charged gas, shields are negated, so the hull would technically react to whatever gas is out there, and would more or less be similar to moving through an atmosphere. I would expect that my grit maps in that case might have a myriad of different colors, depending on what the residue left by nebula particles is.

Lastly there is the routine maintenance thing done by many races, so I'm guessing some of the time, the ship should be super clean, and others randomly colored grit mapped.

J

[duke]

I heard Data doubles up as a space-sponge for the hull.

[mattclary]

That big dish on the front of Federation ships is called a "navigational deflector". It pushes all sizes of junk out of the way. If it didn't, the hull would be instantly eroded by microscopic grains of dust, not to mention what the occasional asteroid would do.

"Start Trek the Next Generation Technical Manual". More than you will ever need to know about non-existent technology. :thumbsup: