Yet another space fighter

TwoBrainedCylon · May 28th, 2005, 10:38 AM

This is the rough model of yet another space fighter. This one is built to accept different modules for different missions. The only permanent weapons are the cannons mounted on the nose. The rest are loaded and swapped as needed. The side racks are akin to those of an Apache and can consist of rocket packs, more cannons, or both. The wings hold dumb bombs. I was planning on those being either a two big heavy bombs, four medium bombs, or six racks for basket bombing.

I appreciate all feedback -- especially before I get further along with this thing.

Sandy

jewels · May 28th, 2005, 10:48 AM

Watches the ordinance descriptors whiz past her....Um, swappable weaponry--good. Tail stabilizer looks like the front edge is a little vertical, maybe angle it back some more? This looks like a compact version of a heavy bomber. Pilot and bombadier flown or just pilot?

Overall, better lines than those raptor things, but they're for cramming more crew aboard it seems.

Titon · May 28th, 2005, 10:52 AM

Looks cool sir.

I was looking at your Lightwave layout. For some reason i could not get used to having the grids there.

Gemini1999 · May 28th, 2005, 11:26 AM

Sandy -

Looks very nice....!

Kinda reminds me of an A-10 or something.

The nose is very big in relation to the rest of the ship - anything inside?

Looks like it would be very manuverable, but not made for speed.

Is it hyperlight capable, or is it strictly a sublight job?

Is the cockpit accessable from underneath, or do you have to climb over the wings to ge to it? The weapons pod would seem to preclude more direct access to the cockpit from the side.

I would like to see more....

Bryan

Fragmentary · May 28th, 2005, 11:34 AM

Probably because Revenge of the Sith is still fresh in my mind, but when I look at the picture something makes me imagine the body/cockpit component being detachable from the wings/engines. Maybe for sub-light travel or atmospheric flight?

peter noble · May 28th, 2005, 02:01 PM

Nice one Sandy. It reminds me of an A-10 a bit too.

It looks like the wings might snap off with the paylod she's packing!

Best,

Peter

TopGun · May 28th, 2005, 02:55 PM

Looks sweet

gmd3d · May 28th, 2005, 03:43 PM

As a new Lightwaver myself .. I like it. will you be making it available for us

TwoBrainedCylon · May 28th, 2005, 11:25 PM

Thanks for the feedback so far. I kicked around the concept and dropped the heavier engines, although I liked them. Logistically, it seems like the fighter would go for about six minutes and then run out of fuel. I scaled them back to something reasonable.

I envisioned the inside to be packed with a fair amount of ammunition for the nose guns, quite a bit of fuel, and a power plant to convert the fuel into ionized hydrogen exhaust. The wings will swivel like the Star Wars Imperial shuttle for landing but will act more like the Klingon Bird of Prey wings during flight. This is an in-system fighter, although for the project I'm planning on using this for it needs to be able to go to the edge of a solar system and back.

Sorry, Taranis, but for the moment, this model will be held. I release a lot of my models but this one will be locked down for a while.

Here's the current status.

Sandy

peter noble · May 29th, 2005, 03:18 AM

Sandy, I like the wings a lot better and the panel lines are great. Are you going to have flaps on the wings and stabiliser fin?

Also, there seems to be a lot of laser cannons, have you considered missiles on the wing tips like on an F-5?

Titon · May 29th, 2005, 06:09 AM

Looks good so far.

I'm wondering though if those pods on the side may make the ship a bit unstable? Meneuvering with those would be very minimal.

Lara · May 29th, 2005, 02:35 PM

Love seeing stuff like this in progress. Insight into the creative process and all that

In the reaer view, the wing attachment to the body seemes a bit light? Perhaps a bit thicker at the base to smooth the attachment line and take the small step off the bottom ?

Cheers,
Lara

TwoBrainedCylon · May 29th, 2005, 03:06 PM

Peter,

I tried the missiles and didn't come up with anything I liked. I didn't much like the guns either. I thought about the maneuverability and chickened out and went with some stabilizer fins. I tried them bent outward but they looked kinda lame so I chickened out there also and bent them inward. I'm not sure how these will work out when its animated but I'll wait and see until then. Its an easy fix if it needs to be altered.

Don,

The pods would cause a lot of drag but to some degree that's more or less the point. I wanted something that seemed like the pilots would be sacrificing some capability to get all the extra firepower. I like the way they detract from the swoop feel of the fighter. The overall idea is that you don't want to be at the recieving end of this thing if it gets you at optimum range and then just lets loose. I had more weapons on it but it was getting to the Frogstar fighter stage so I went with something a bit more reasonable.

Lara,

When I get to the wing mounts, they'll be hydrolic lifters that swing the wings up and down into position.

I'm still not very happy about the texturing but this is how its coming so far.

Sandy

peter noble · May 29th, 2005, 03:24 PM

I like the texturing and the winglets are a good idea. The wings, winglets and fin would look more aerodynamic if the tapered instead of being the same thickness IMO.

Great stuff, keep it up!

Best,

Peter

Titon · May 29th, 2005, 03:28 PM

Gotcha!

Sandy did you ever try radiosity renders as your textures?

Here's a sample of what i'm talking about. This is off of the fill in ship i did for Zoic. The textures applied to each side of the container is basically a flat radiosity image rendered with shadows turned on. I simply did some minor air brushing in photoshop.

TwoBrainedCylon · May 29th, 2005, 06:43 PM

No. I haven't tried those yet. I've been doing the dirt the hard way in photoshop.

Sandy

TwoBrainedCylon · May 29th, 2005, 08:17 PM

Peter,

Tapering the wings was a really good tip. My only concern about this design is that without the pods, when you look at it nose on, its similar to one of Richard's GWOM fighters. I guess I'll have to accept that since I spent most of the time trying to make it not look like an A-wing or a Jedi fighter. Hopefully the similarities to the GWOM fighter will be reduced when its animated and the wings move.

I worked up the engines and machinery to go in the back. I still have a bit of modeling to do before I get to doing the real pods but at least I'm on the finishing touches now. I know I'll go back and do some more reworks of the textures since I'm still not getting right look to this. (Translation: Don I'll be ICQ'ing you).

Sandy

Lara · May 30th, 2005, 02:01 AM

The lifters give it a better reason to attach as it does . Tapering does wonders for proportions!!
Cool stuff

Cheers,
Lara

peter noble · May 30th, 2005, 02:20 AM

Sandy,

It's looking real cool. I don't make the connection between the GWOm fighters, I do an A-wing or a Narn ship from B5 but it's real hard to come up with any design now that doesn't echo something else.

Best,

Peter

gmd3d · May 30th, 2005, 02:29 AM

I like the detailing alot. looks like a tough little attack bomber..

Titon · May 30th, 2005, 05:32 AM

Starting to look good sir.

warhammerdriver · May 30th, 2005, 08:08 AM

Kinda reminds me of a tank from FASA's old game Renegade Legion.

Looks good!

TwoBrainedCylon · May 30th, 2005, 01:06 PM

I thought it looked a bit like this fighter but after looking at the GWOM shots, they don't look very similar. In fact, now that I look at this more closely, this one looks like a stretched out TIE fighter with the ball cockpit replaced by a Viper cockpit. I'm sure Richard did this so he could reuse the Viper cockpit mockup he had made for Second Coming.

I've pretty well finished the modeling except for the pod connections. They'll go into the slots on the sides. I intended the pods to be rigged so the pilot can jettison them if he's fired everything on them and still in combat.

Here's the dreaded gray renderings. (These are dreaded for the modeler because you can see all the flaws in modeling this way).

This gives me two models now I need to texture, the other being the AB Raider.

Thanks all for the feedback. I found it very useful while working on this.

Sandy

gmd3d · May 30th, 2005, 01:44 PM

Looks cool TBC

TwoBrainedCylon · May 30th, 2005, 05:16 PM

Thanks.

Here's a couple more. Then I'll stop bugging you guys with this one until its painted.

Sandy

Gemini1999 · May 30th, 2005, 06:15 PM

Sandy -

You're not bugging us in the least. It's rare that someone asks for input on unfinished work. There are some that would just say "Here it is, like it and if not, shut the hell up".

I'm not a CGI savy person, so it's a rare treat to see the work in it's various stages. I appeciate the opportunity very much.

Thanks for including us in the process...

Best always,
Bryan

BST · May 30th, 2005, 06:24 PM

Sandy,

I'm like Bryan, just a member of the viewing audience and trying to get up to speed on this discussion about things like polys, renders, textures, etc....

Nice work, though, it was a pleasure seeing this effort from the ground up.

Care for a cup of coffee?

Pete

Tanky · May 30th, 2005, 11:26 PM

Looking really really good. Keep up the good work!

TwoBrainedCylon · May 31st, 2005, 03:51 AM

Always looking for a good cup of coffee.

Thanks for the kind words of support.

I'm always open (and looking) for feedback. Sometimes I ignore it but I always find it useful. It also pushes me which is a good thing. Peter has been one of my key critics and kept me on track for several works when I was ready to say "To Hell with it, its good enough".

Sandy

jewels · May 31st, 2005, 08:13 AM

Very cool, I like how it's evolved and the smaller engines make much more sense. I like that there are 3 too, it didn't look quite right with 2.