Star Trek - My Ultimate Enterprise!
oh please please please release this after you have finished your work is totally amazing i would even pay to use this in animations it is that good. You have really captured the cinematic feel and scale of the ship with the ammount of detail you have put in.
Honestly not sure what I'm going to do with her when I'm done. I've been crazy busy at work for the last couple of months - hence no updates - but it's slowing down a bit so I may be able to get back at it soon.
fingers crossed as this project is one of the best i have seen in a long time. It also inspired me to go off and redo the rec deck and hanger bay but still they are not a patch on your creations lol.
UPDATE - Back at it!
After several months away from this project, I am back at it. I'm sure you all know how it is... work, life, etc., from time to time needs to take priority over personal fun stuff. Anyway, I'd like to be able to tell you that I'm back to making cool looking stuff - but as it is I'm just back to the mind-numbing optimizing and clean-up process that I was in when I last posted.
Good news is that my work - although very much invisible to the eye - is paying off quite well so far. I haven't done a total poly count in a while, but I know fro checking partial counts from time to time that I'm getting it down to a much more reasonable amount. Also, since I'm having to really look at what I've built and how I've built it I've been able to do some creative tweaking here and there. So that's at least been a little fun.
So all this to say, I'm back to posting on this - but I won't be posting on this for a while 'cause I'm still doing sh*twork.
Looks great and some of it is not so invisible, yes i might not be in your face but it does break it up quite allot and of course means you can get a close as you want.
Dang. When I see this I want to go back an rework my Discovery again.
Wow, this is amazing work. The eye candy is insane!
Kinda makes me wish I had the time to do simular.
This ship is still the most elegant design in sci-fi.
Love the detail work you put into it.
This is an incredible thread! Has there been any more work on this?
I had to put it aside for a couple of months because work got crazy busy, but I'm back on it now. So there's still progress being made. Slowly to be sure... but progress to be sure as well. I'm still doing a lot of clean up and instancing to reduce the poly count. I'm still working on it but there's really not much to show as far as images are concerned. But thanks for the continued interest! And patience!
So things have finally started to slow down at work. Just in time for Christmas break and then the new year s already looking to be just as busy as the last. Ah well... job security, right?
Anyway, today I finally managed to get caught up to where I was when I went "off grid" in terms of poly reduction, instancing and optimizing. All the little graphic details on the secondary hull, pylons and the neck have been completed. I only have a few interiors left to optimize and so I will be alternating between doing those and adding all my graphic bits and pieces to the rest of the exterior.
Lastly, here's a nice front view of the Enterprise for your enjoyment - just because it's been forever since I've done a pretty render of the whole ship.
The secondary hull and the nacelles have not been adorned with their little bits and pieces of graphic goodness. Well, there's a little bit of finesse work I still need to do on the nacelles... but it's very nearly done.
I'm finding that when I move to a part for which I have no reference for these little graphic bits, it takes me about two or three iterations of what goes where. For example, I did up the graphic bits on the nacelle to look very similar to the secondary hull but saw that it was just way too busy. I've since simplified it - but I think too much and now I need to go back in and put just a touch more details in there. I think there's a balance between my two iterations that I need to find.
Anyway, that's it for now... I'm going to start on the primary hull graphics next.
Looking nice, might want to run some loops along the jaw of the bay platform to even up the smoothing algo.
Ha! Ha! Please don't start picking apart the geometry yet... it's in no condition to be critiqued. It's probably the sloppiest mesh I've made in years at this point! And I'll be extremely lucky if that's the only part I'll need to fix once I'm done.
At work we are waiting for a few big projects to kick off and so I've had a little bit of down time, and so I've been able to get a lot done on my little side project here.
Long story short, I received a Polar Lights 1:350 Enterprise Refit model kit for Christmas and I've been going into full research and planning mode in order to get started on building it. As a result, I noticed that there were several areas on my 3D model where the aztecs were way off - specifically on the secondary hull and the nacelles. I know it'll never be EXACTLY the way it was in the film, but this was just too far off for my taste. So I went back in and redid a lot of the aztecs and - for about the six-hundredth time - adjusted the pearl materials a bit. I also tweaked the external lighting and rebuilt part of the nacelles and the bridge / B-C deck to get them a little bit more accurate. I love working with Al Dinelt's 3D model, but there are a few areas that I thought could be improved.
The third one would be the complete set up with the fully built-up 3D interiors that I have been posting for the last year or so on this thread.
Plus you can mix and match them as well. I've done some preliminary animations starting in the fully 3D botanical garden and then flying out the windows to see the exterior of the ship. I put in the 3D botanical garden and for the rest of the interiors, I used the flat renders. Nothing to show yet on that front because I'm still tweaking render settings for animation, but I'll eventually post some for you all to see.
Finally, I've started to add the external graphic bits to the saucer section… beginning with the bridge. This is really one of the last things to do. Once the saucer section graphics are done, that's it with the little graphic bits. Of course, because I'm an idiot, I've only put the graphic bit on the port side of the ship; so I'll have to mirror those - smartly and efficiently, of course - to the starboard side.
Then, there's final clean up on all of the geometry, organizing and naming all the parts, etc. So maybe I have a little bit more to do than I think, but dare I say I'm getting closer to the end of this project?
Recently, someone commented on one of my productions that the neck detailing is wrong on the refit models. Bailey had the red stripes interrupted by the vertical paneling, whereas the studio model shows that the stripes are continuous.
My mental health not withstanding, I appreciate your comment very much. Don't know how that got past me all this time... I was indeed aware of that fact but I guess I just never saw the forest through the trees or something poetic like that!
Stunning work, if you sell it you have loads of options to upload to TS, CGT and such. As for uploading here, use Mega NZ or WeTransfer and use PM to give people the links, that way at least you can know who has it.
How many polys is this beast now then.
That is actually quite respectable considering the detail you have put into her.
...if she ever gets completed!
Wow! Has it seriously been since January that I've had the chance to work on this? Well, I guess that's the way it goes with a "while I'm not busy at work" project. Things at work have been crazy over the last several months... not in a bad way at all. We've just been very very busy - which is awesome - but I have not had any real time to devote to my little side project.
Anyway, things are slowing down a bit here and there so I was able to get back into it recently. As far as the graphics go, I'm just slightly further along with the little graphic bits on the saucer... but, like I said, I'm getting back into it.
And then, again, I've tweaked the pearl colors on the exterior. I'm thinking I've got them just where I want them. But you know, I'll probably change them again at some point!
So that's it for now. Hopefully I will have some more time to keep on with this thing. It ain't over yet!