I’ve been working on this on and off for the past month now:
It’s getting there - I want to do a little more 3d modelling, but i’m not really happy with the general feel and composition of the scene. I can’t place my finger on what it’s missing, but I suspect it’s largely background and lighting related. The scene is supposed to be heavily industrial, with a sky tainted and stained by smog. I shall be adding in smoke and propeller blur from the ship itself.
But I must say, I’m not convinced by the texture of the balloon.
And usually for an airship like this, like the zeppelin… the surface of the balloon not perfectly smooth.
You see a bit the armature under the balloon.
A small picture is clearer than a long definition:
I like the way you are heading with the technical drawing style. Though, I think it needs something to help pull it out of the background, maybe a rim light or a fresnel effect on the material?
Also, when I look at pics of ships sails, you’ll see a fair bit of ruffled movement in them, I think that would help make the sails feel more alive.
The reason for the rounded hull rather than the faceted Zeppelin shape is the design basis - the intention was to have a Schutte-Lanz type rigid envelope:
It uses a geodic arrangement, rather than the traditional transverse framing of the Zeppelin type. Many of the Schutte-Lanz ships had wooden framing as well.
I think the problem is the image is too flat. Yellow on yellow doesn’t provide enough contrast, and the weak shadows don’t show off the form well. It could use a darker background, such as wispy clouds against a dark ocean far below. Engineering-wise, the tail fin could be made larger, and you could add a pair of horizontal stabilizers at the back (since the front one seems to be fixed). Finally, perhaps consider using the rule of thirds.
I used a new texture (found online) and allowed the ship to project a shadow. I also added smoke and motion blur on the props, as if the ship is flying off of the page. The version above is a 25% render at 10 samples; the final render will be at 500 - i’ll set it to redner tommorow evening, unless anyone has any pressing feedback.