Competition #13 - TwiiK

[TwiiK]

Hi everyone.

I recently came across some excellent video tutorials over at moddb.com done by Stormy. Stormy apparently is a member here so I had to check what this site was about. I noticed the competition forum and here I am.

I've browsed the other threads and like so many others here I'm rubbish with a pencil so there will be no 2d concept art from me.

I love science fiction and I've got heaps of references for any sci-fi project on my pc. I looked through them all, but nothing really caught my eye. Then this morning I woke up with this cool idea which I think is fairly unique.

My idea is that an alien race made their home planet into a ship enabling them to travel infinite distances with access to unlimited food, water and man power. I also think I've thought out "sci-fi" solutions to the whole sunlight issue and whatnot, but I will have to get back to that when and if I'm positive this is the direction I want to go.

I realize I'll have trouble making a smaller vessel resembling the mothership, but I will have to make some sort of infrastructure surrounding the planet giving it a distinct look. My goal and vision is to have it look like half spaceship, half planet.

Another problem I'll probably face is not having enough geometry to work with. We'll see how that turns out.

Here's an early test. Sort of like a test of concept. The extruded continents is something I found over at turbosquid. They're made by panaitsdv.

[cnflkt]

Welcome.

What you have do so far looks solid, however i would suggest you sit down and develop your idea.

I don't really care if you can't draw, just sit down and get some ideas and shapes going


The idea of a planet incorporating into a ship is nice one, but if you look at other designs by participants on this forum you may need develop and elaborate your idea, try and think out of the box!

Think real terms of how you would make or incorporate a planet into a spaceship... maybe some sort of force/containment field manifold? or maybe a brute force structure built off of the planet?

Also think where best to utilize polys.

AFAIK you'll be unable you use the planet model you found, everything has to be new by design and your own work. Also considering some "alien" species made a ship out of their planet... using earth as the planet is hardly alien ;>

Keep at it

[fabiodan]

A planetship eh? Make sure your ship's design doesn't get too boring, nor the planet's design. If that happens then the attentions are either focused on the planet or on the ship, fully. and that's bad. You have to play around a lot with colors, too.

[TwiiK]

I'm throwing in the towel on the planet ship.

It's mainly the polygon count which forces me to come up with something else. I've never made low poly stuff before and the vision I have in my head needs billions of polygons, not thousands.

Also I realize this is more of a 'spend 3 hours a week for your entire life' kind of project. Not a competition project.

I've attached 2 renders of what was supposed to be a moon orbiting the planet. The aliens have bridged the moon to the planet and made it into the control center for the whole "ship". The scale on the different objects is very irregular in those renders because it's just sort of a 3d sketch. You can see an entire office building in the background of the first render while the windowthingy on the front is supposed to be the bridge.

I'll see if I can come up with a more standard spaceship design now. I already have an idea I think will work better. Focusing more on rectangular shapes now as spherical shapes eat polygons for breakfast.

Hope to have something to show by the end of the day.

[fabiodan]

It's easy. You make the model below the billion-tri idea, then create a low poly model and use normal mapping techniques. simple huh?

[nazul]

yeah of course this could work... the idea is great!

I have one comment though ^^ looking at that hangar deck in your moon my first thought was;"those ships going in there are huge!!"

you can always make some concept drawings and then decide, the whole idea of a concept GL!

[ColdRolled]

i like your moon idea twiik, but i agree with nazul on the hanger openings. but maybe you were thinking that a whole bunch of smaller ships could fly out at once? and also like fabiodan had suggested, if you want to create something really hi poly, go for it, you can just normal map it onto a nice low poly model

im curious though, what sort of weaponry will it have? will it have a bunch of small turrets or death star beams or will it just rely on the fighters for protection?

[TwiiK]

Like I said there are some scale issues with the different parts in those renders. Having buildings like the one I have in my render covering 1/4 of the hemisphere doesn't look all to good in my mind.

I started working on another ship right after my last reply so the planet ship is sitting this one out. I will make a planet ship model that satisfies what I visioned later on.

I'm aware of the power of normal maps, but there's only so much you can fit on a 1024 map without it all turning into mulch. The original scale of things I imagined being something like the death star in star wars. Also I wanted complex shapes connecting the moon and the planet and cities floating in the atmosphere. That's the sort of stuff I was refering too and that's not something I can do with a normal map.

I'm sure you could pull off an excellent planet ship with 7000 triangles and a normal map, but I want to do my idea justice if you know what I mean.

I will get some renders of my new ship posted shortly.

[ID Conceptart]

I think your going the right way and that it all comes down to good texturing atm

[TwiiK]

Hi again.

Work and school is taking up all my time at the moment so spare time for 3d is limited. Also, it's not that tempting to sit down with 3ds after having already spent countless hours in front of a computer screen at work or staring into books.

I had some time off a couple of days ago, but no internet so I couldn't upload what I had done. I have both time and internet now and here's some updates. What it is is basically 2 quick 3d sketches I did based on 2 concepts I found on the net. I seem to have lost the concepts when I recently upgraded the pc. I'm not worring much because I will go my own way with one of the ships anyway, but it would be nice to show you what I based the ships on.


Mothership 1:

I have plenty of books with H.R Giger work and tons of Giger references on my pc. This ship is supposed to resemble the Giger alien's head. With slick organic forms.


Mothership 2:

This is supposed to be some kind of human ship overtaken by an alien entity. (For the starcraft nerds: Similiar to how the zerg could take over a terran base). The sister ships of this ship won't be ships, but organic alien parasites coming out of the tube on the top. Ready to attach themselves to other ships.


Here's a fun glow/particle test I did simulating fighter ships coming out of the hangar bays of the first mothership:



I would like some input on which ship to continue with. Myself, I like the first ship, but I'm not sure how to continue with it. The second ship I know exactly what to do with and will surely take alot shorter time to finish.

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TwiiK