I am brand new in this forum and to Blender and this is my first “serious” project.
I want to achieve a concept ship, kind of retro sci-fi one… I have a lot to learn in 3D modelling, I know a bit of theory but that’s all… for exemple it took me hours to figure how to make a correct UV map from a simple shape.
I have some serious troubles with the metal material on the engine, the thrust chamber texture sucks… Also as I am a true beginer I don’t know how to achieve a large amount of details (wires) and keeping the project light ( the blender file is 5Mb).
very nice engine, ship around it is perhaps too simple though. it has great details(the rivets and greebles) but it’s mainly just a “teardrop with side bulges” shape. you’ve given t a nice paint scheme and it’s good to see it’s nuclear powered(the only realistic option for a high performance spaceship). i would suggest doing a two engined craft using similar shapes but a more complex form for the main hull, as for altering this one: try adding some landing gear and some rcs thrusters, and add a couple of fuel tanks to the sides of the engine(make them cylindrical and help on with beams and girders in the same sort of colour as the engine(perhaps a warning label or two on either side). when it comes to doing any other ships i would definitely keep the engine you have designed here and make use of the same sort of texturing and greebling, the small details here are top quality.
Thank you very much for your feedback Jagdpanther, the rcs thrusters and fuel tanks is a great idea… I come back soon with an improved version of the ship. Thanks!
here is the version with the RCS thrusters… Of course it’s a WIP and I have not started yet to create the environnement. Also I will add some gears and weapons. But for the moment I try to improve the materials… I am on a good way to find the metal texture I want… but I am not satisfied with it yet
you should also have some thrusters pointing forwards and some others pointing more outwards to the sides. you need enough thrusters(atleast) for the six basic motions. translate left-right, translate up-down, translate forward-back (your main engine already covers forward), turn(either way) x axis, turn(either way) y axis, turn(either way) z axis. there are many ways to arrange thrusters to allow for all the possible motions, if they are very cleverly placed you can use 8 thrusters or sometimes even fewer. the modelling on those thrusters is brilliant though i can’t spot any landing gear yet. if i may i would also like to make you a suggestion, add some radiators. these would be a great way to make the overall shape a little more complex whilst not having to alter(by much) what is already built. if you design the radiators so they can fold inward you could have one extending from below the engine and one from above, then for atmospheric flight and landing they could be retracted down so that when folded in they would only bulge out a few centimetres above and below the current upper and lower limits of the model, this folding makes it much easier to fit landing gear. “earth force 1” (from babylon 5) used radiators and although it also had radiators poking out to the sides(which i advise you to omit and just concentrate on the vertical ones) it had vertical radiators too, which show the type of vertical arrangement i am suggesting.
Hi, this is a great start. Here is something to think about for the overall design of the ship. The body and the engine of the ship could be more in harmony; for example, use textures in the body on the engine and shapes from the engine on the body, or the other way around. It seems almost like the engine is naked, use more elements of design from the ship to dress the engine.
There needs to be a lot more variation to the metals used in the engine, in my opinion. Some bits of an engine get hot and corrode/erode, whilst other bits are cooler and discolour differently.
What really looks odd to me is the panels and other details on the main body. There is too much paint effect, and not enough texture effect. It looks like a toy that has the panels painted on, rather than a real object, where the panels are denoted nearly entirely by the actual geometry, and only slightly by the grunge and damage around the edges.
