Continue reading »]]> Once again I did a lot of work on the ship without writing one of these updates so there will be 2 updates. In this update I am focusing on the designing of the front entrance of the ship, the front landing gear and the main docking rings. In the next update I will be covering the rear landing gear, the buildup of the primary weapon and a few exterior details.

In order to accommodate a front entrance for the ship I added on to bottom of the bridge section giving the ship a “big chin”. The additional depth of the bridge section allowed me to extend the turbolift shaft to the new entrance. In addition to being the front entrance to the ship, the new bottom of the bridge serves as the front landing gear.

Since the turbolift can only be opened on one side, I created a new instance of the turbolift with the front door closed. I also created a version the turbolift shaft without windows or doors so it can be walled off. I then created the walls inside the entry room using the same panels from the escape pod junctions.

This entrance is designed much like the main entry in the stern as in the hatch is also the loading ramp. The final angle for the ramp when deployed was determined after the front feet of the landing gear were finished.

The front landing gear are basically just leveler feet. They are designed to conform to the surface the ship is landed on. I started out with a rectangle to represent the outermost dimensions of the leveler feet. I then made the front and back of the rectangle pointed. 120 degree point in the front, 150 degrees in the back  I then rounded each corner in the new 6-sided shapes using arcs that are tangent to the vertex of each corner. I then used the offset tool to repeat that shape several times, progressively smaller inside the first. I then used the push/pull tool to create the profile of the ring that will surround the future leveler foot. I then beveled the edges of the ring that extend down the most. I didn’t want the surrounding ring to look like it was just a ring on the surface of the hull so I gave it an inner surface.

The actual feet for the leveler feet are the same shape as the outer rings. They are just enough smaller in size to move freely inside the rings. I made the feet thick enough to make them look substantial enough for size of the ship. I beveled the outside of the feet and added treads that fit the shape of the feet.

I decided to make the docking rings on the bridge section of the ship similar to the ones on the Tantive IV Corellian Corvette but with a different hatch design. Why a different hatch design? Well, it’s impossible for me to tell how the ones on that ship even work. Yes, I did eventually figure out the ones on the Millennium Falcon for my first ship design but there was more to work with on that one. The ones on the Tantive IV just look like a bulge with a tiny out-of-scale hatch on it. So, the actual docking rings are similar but that’s where it ends. The images in the gallery below will show the buildup of the outer ring.

The hatch I designed is comprised of 8 doors arranged in an octagon that open inwards. The doors are surrounded by the inner rings of the docking ring which are designed to interface with small freighters and transports. More specifically, the inner rings are for my smaller 210CR Blockade Runner to dock with. The center hub that locks the hatch is attached to the bottom door. The upper 7 doors open first followed by the bottom door. The bottom door recesses into the floor of the airlock when open. The airlock will be finished at a later time.

What’s next? The rear landing gear, the buildup of the primary weapon and a few exterior details.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

Continue reading »]]> In the last progress update I addressed the creation of the escape pods and the piece of the hull section corresponding to the pods. This time I am going over the modeling of hull behind the Escape Pod section and including the basic design of the sub-light engines. A lot of work on the model has been done beyond what will be covered in update so I am running behind on the updates. But, it’s not like there is a deadline on a hobbyist project like this… Now that the ship is really starting to take shape I am now posting pictures throughout the updates.

First up I worked on the Dorsal Corridor that goes from the Hangar Catwalk to the Bridge Section. I removed the top part of the Escape Pod Hull Section to make room for the Dorsal Corridor. Starting with a narrow corridor section I removed the door openings, cut the top half off and stretched it to the length of Dorsal Corridor. Then I designed the profile of the canopy to be similar to the shape of the Hangar Catwalk only upside down. I extruded the profile to the length I wanted for each canopy section. I then designed the “ribs” between each canopy section. After I was happy with the design I copied each section until I filled the entire length of the corridor. I then made the terminated ends of the corridor that connect to the other sections of the ship. The lower walls of this new corridor need wall panels and dividers so I fleshed them out with standard wall panels and created new wall panel dividers that were half the normal height.

Now to join the Dorsal Corridor to the rest of the future hull I created a cowling that would act as a junction and run to the edge of the Hangar Hull. I got inspiration from the Consular-class ship, the Radiant VII, that was used by Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn and the Padawan  Obi-Won Kenobi to board the Trade Federation battleship at the beginning of The Phantom Menace, which was then destroyed. But before it was destroyed it had a dorsal corridor that connected to a cowling on either end and that was the basis for the cowling on my ship. To make this design work I had to make a narrower turbolift junction to fit inside the new cowling.

I then got inspired to finally add some color to the ship. I made the main hull color a dark grey. The Dorsal Corridor looked a bit boring so I added a strip of dark red as an accent color. These colors may eventually change but for now I think it looks good. To properly display the colors of the ship in the SketchUp Style that I use I have to make sure every piece of the model uses only one color so the lines on the edges of objects are the same color as the color of the faces of the objects. The only time individual faces have a unique color or material is if it is intended to be a light source or surface detail. If you are not careful when the edges are set to be the same color as the object’s material you can end up with flashing edges that show up when using the camera controls to move around the model. When I colored the Dorsal Corridor, I went back into the components and divided them into groups of pieces to isolate the colors I‘m using.

For the Mid-Hull Section between the Escape Pods and the Hangar I basically extended the profile of the end of the Escape Pod hull section to the Hangar. Because not all of rooms in this section would fit into this shape I widened the top and bottom out to the full width of the hull section to make everything fit. This left it with the sides appearing flat, so I made a raised panel for the outside of the walls and colored it in a contrasting lighter grey. I suppose this would act as additional protection for the Briefing Room contained inside the section.

At this point I decided to add windows on either side of the Briefing Room. On the inside, the cutout for the window is surrounded by a cowling similar to the internal windows overlooking the inside of the Hangar. On the outside of the hull I created a cutout for the shape of the window and beveled the inside edges to make the windows look more deliberate. For the transparasteel windows themselves, I made them the same shape as the inside of the inside window cowling and made them 6 inches thick. I also designed bulkhead doors that will slide across the outside of the windows in the event of the windows being broken from enemy fire. The bulkhead doors are not apparent to the casual observer because they are one big door with a hole in the shape of window opening and work like a guillotine.

To transition the Mid-Hull Section into the Hangar hull I created another cowling to go from the Dorsal Corridor cowling to the top of the Hangar. I then created the basic shape of the Hangar Hull Section. It is slightly pointed to avoid it from looking flat and thrown together. I beveled the edges parallel to the ship instead of rounding the edges like I might tend to do. I then inset the front faces of the Hangar so I can later add random details to the surface that are seen on vessels from the Star Wars Universe. These details would serve no real purpose but to add an industrial feel to the ship.

For the Hangar Bulkhead Door openings on the Hangar Hull, I made them the same shape as the inner perimeter of the bulkhead door cowling on the inside. I decided that I should also inset the space around the outside of the Hangar Hull Bulkhead Doors. Because there wasn’t enough space on the side of the hull to do this I just framed out larger side panels with beveled corners and merged them with the side of the hull. I was looking at hangar door openings on some ships from Star Wars and found that many had a luminescent border to highlight the entrance s I added a similar element around the doors. After contemplating what to do next I decided I didn’t like how the angle of the front of the Hangar Hull transitioned into the cowling so I made it flat where the pieces meet. Next I colored the Hangar Hull Section in dark grey. The Landing Bay doors needed an opening in the bottom of the hull so I took care of that.

After some thought I decided the ship needed an Observation Tower at the stern for tactical purposes. It is similar idea to the bridge towers on a Star Destroyer or even an aircraft carrier or battleship for that matter. Also, I needed something tall in the back of the ship to house the smaller backup sub-light engines that I created placeholders for. I started out making a tower that was similar to the one on a Venator-class Star Destroyer except for only one structure on top instead of two. I made it about 7 decks high from the top of Deck 5. It looked a bit strange being as narrow as I made the tower so, to compensate for that I added bulges to either side. The bulges could possibly be for fuel storage and/or the main reactor but that hasn’t been decided.

I needed to extend to tower to the back of the ship and I needed there to be a turbolift shaft right under the Observation Deck. This required the tower to extend farther forward than my initial intent. I had no need for more rooms to be in the back of the ship so I left it at 3 decks. I didn’t want a bunch of wasted space there so I contoured the rear of the hull into the lower height of the stern of the ship. The back of the tower was too narrow for the backup sub-light engines so I made the width of the tower widen in the back and taper towards the front. I tried to make it look good with the tower all the way to the back of the ship but it wasn’t working for me so I pushed the part above the bulges forward. This caused me to eliminate one of backup engines. I then made the face of the back of the tower slightly sloped and added a ridge to finish it off.

The next thing I did was work on the rear fascia of the ship. I made a panel to fit the shape of the back of the ship and created a surround for the loading ramp. The large part above the ramp would probably house the Hyperdrive Generator. This is approximately where the Hyperdrive Generator is located on a Venator-class Star Destroyer. On the panel I added a beveled edge and inset the face of the fascia. To add more detail a spacer was put between the hull and the rear fascia.

Now that I got to this point it was time to work on the sub-light engines. Unfortunately I failed to capture images of the buildup of the engines and the struts they are attached to so I will summarize the best I can. First I removed the place holders and then I went a different direction that I had originally intended again. I got inspired again by the Consular-class Radiant VII and I decided to make the engine layout similar to that. The Radiant VII has three main engines and they are evenly spaced and in line with each other. They are attached to wing shaped struts and then attached to each other. I made some wing shaped struts and made the front of the engines and attached them to the struts. I had to give the engines a proper scale and when I got them to a size that looked good I realized they were almost touching the ground if the ship were to land. To fix this I skewed the tips of the wings upward a bit. I was going to have just 2 main engines and have 2 backup engines but I decided the 2 main engines were very far apart. There was enough space for 2 more main engines so I decided to have 4 main engines and forego the idea of smaller backup engines. I then went back and extended the rear fascia along the back of the winged struts.

The back of the engines were based on the engines from a concept sketch of the Rebel Blockade Runner. They are big and bulky and just what I was looking for. Inside the engines is a turbine that I borrowed from my last ship only this time twice the diameter. I decided to make the outer two engines about 20 feet shorter than the inner ones and visually I think it looks better. The last thing I did was try a few different paint schemes and settled on one that looks balanced. The whole ship might end up with a different paint scheme but this will work for now.

In the next update you will see the Bridge Section and Observation Deck take shape. I’ve already done the work I just need to share it on the blog.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

Continue reading »]]> This time around I made a lot of progress on the model’s interior. In my last update I said I was going to work on the engineering and cargo section but I didn’t stop there. I did some preliminary work on the Bridge, designed the Turbolifts twice, modeled some interior windows to allow viewing of the Landing Bay and Engineering Room, designed the Sleep Pods for the Bunkrooms and made the Briefing Room much larger. While working on all of those aspects, I also reconfigured the layout a bit to make things more cohesive with what I envision the ship looking like. I now think the model is almost too big for SketchUp to handle so expect some growing pains in the future.

In the Engineering Room I accomplished putting up all the basic wall panels and implementing the enclosed catwalk that will surround power core allowing unauthorized passengers to bypass the engineering room. The floating catwalk is based directly off of the design of the catwalk above the Landing Bay. In addition to the straight sections there are corner sections allowing for 90 degree bends. Initially the catwalk was to be a true circle around the power core but I decided it was too complex to make and would take away from the theme of modularity. I could have done it, but I didn’t want to devote too much time to doing it. After the floating catwalk was done I added some support struts to, you guessed it, support the weight of the catwalk over the floor of the Engineering Room.

After working on the Engineering Room I started on the Entryway which will serve as the main entrance for the ship and access point for the cargo bays when landed. When it comes time to work on the ship’s exterior the loading ramp will be added. The first thing I did here was to create an enclosed catwalk along the ceiling that will eventually provide access to the maintenance ports for the sub light engines to be added later. Once that was done I put up the wall panels. I then modeled the bulkhead doors for the cargo bays. At the front of the entry I added two small rooms that connect to the Engineering Room. The next step was to add the wall panels to the cargo bays.

I decided to do some work on the main bridge but only as much as I could do since there is no outer hull. All I did was added the wall panels for the back and side walls and model the floor for the upper level.

Next I went to work on creating the Turbolifts. At first I was lacking inspiration so I made a big square box of a turbolift. I’m not go into much detail on their design because I ended up scrapping their design. But, before I made the decision to scrap them I worked on other parts of the ship.

I did some thinking about the Briefing Room and I thought there should be some windows for observation of the Landing Bay. For the windows I simply modified the standard bulkhead door to have a pane of transparasteel in place of the door. I added the windows to the back wall of the Briefing Room’s second level. I also added these windows to the turbolift rooms in the entry area. This allows observation in to Engineering Room and into the entry area.

The next things I decided to work on were the sleeping pods in the bunkrooms. The bunkroom will be the sleep quarters for the starfighter pilots/flight crew and for the engineering crew. The reason I decided to make pods instead of bunks was to save space. Their design is based directly off the sleeping pods used in the Kamino clone training facility as seen on Star Wars: The Clone Wars Season Three. I scaled mine a little smaller to fit my standard wall panel dimensions. The inside of the pods are actually pretty spacious inside and include a ceiling mounted computer terminal and a storage cabinet for personal belongings. They kind of resemble an MRI machine but that is purely unintentional.

The Briefing Room seemed too small so I doubled its size and put up it’s wall panels. I then extended the second level around the perimeter of the room. I then added an inner wall on both levels as a back drop for the speaker’s podium. It also creates a buffer zone for the entrance into the room. I also added a entry door for the upper level.

The final thing I worked on was redesigning the Turbolifts. The reason I didn’t like what I first designed is that they completely blocked the view down the corridors and they just looked boring. The new turbolift design is round and see through and a lot better looking. There will probably be many other components that I will end up changing in some way.

What’s next? I’m really not sure. I might add some color because all the white is starting to irritate me. I will probably finish the rest of the basic wall panels before doing much else. It won’t be too long until I begin on the exterior.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

Continue reading »]]> Now that my first starship model (the 210CR) is finished I have decided to start on a new one. This time around I have decided to create something much bigger: a capital ship. By definition a capital ship is an armed military vessel with a length of 100 meters or greater. Based on the work I have already done it is currently 236 meters long which is 86 meters larger than the Tantive IV Corellian Corvette that I used as a benchmark for my last starship. It will have many of the same features as the 210CR but on a much larger scale. In addition to those features it will have 3 full decks, a hangar/landing bay for a small complement of star fighters and a shuttle or small freighter (must fit Millennium Falcon), retractable laser cannons, traditional Star Wars style escape pods, robust landing gear and more viewports this time. It will also have a more complete engineering section including backup power cells, life support systems, garbage compactor (dianoga free) and water treatment facilities.

So far I have modeled the general design of the interior walls, the bulkhead doors for the rooms and main corridor, and created the empty rooms and bulkhead sections.

I decided to continue the idea of keeping my ships modular. This time around I expounded on the idea by creating a layout grid of 4’x4’ squares spaced apart by 6 inches that every wall panel, fixture, door will strictly line up with. Each wall module will be four feet wide and nine feet tall. Each basic wall module will consist of a top and bottom light bar for ambient lighting that are both 6 inches tall and a 4×2 grid of 2 foot square wall panels. These standard 2 foot square panels can then be replaced with additional modules that fit the 4×2 grid configuration.  Between each wall module will be a 6 inch wide divider. When a perpendicular wall is added, it will take the place of the divider this will prevent the need for fractional wall panels.

The bulkhead doors I for this ship are based on the design of the ones from the 210CR with the exception that there is just one layer of doors instead of two. The corridor bulkhead section doors function the same way as the ones on 210BR but are designed more similar to the room bulkhead doors. The openings of the corridor sections are arched and have cowlings that are reminiscent of the ones seen in the Millennium Falcon.

With modularity being key to the design of the ship I have created standard rooms/bulkhead sections that all align with the layout grid I have established. Each room section is spaced apart precisely to fit the layout grid. These standard room sections have cutouts with matching plugs for multiple bulkhead door configurations. This makes it so the standard room shapes are versatile for any type of room. All non standard bulkhead sections will also align to the layout grid.

To assist me in the layout of the ship I have created a rudimentary drawing in Photoshop with guides arranged in the layout grid I chose. This allowed me to visualize and plan where the bulkhead sections will be. I then finished creating the bulkhead sections for the ship and arranged them according to the drawing. After doing this I quickly realized that the bulkhead section for the hangar/landing bay was much too small to accommodate star fighters and the Millennium Falcon comfortably so I moved things around and significantly enlarged the section. This currently makes the ship appear to be pregnant but I will try to balance it out soon.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

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Continue reading »]]> Now that my starship was done it needed a name so what I came up with is the Outer Rim Industries 210CR Fortified Blockade Runner. I didn’t want to use a known company name from the Star wars Universe because I don’t want my ship to be confused with ones in the films, books and other expanded universe sources. I choose the name Outer Rim Industries because the Alliance to Restore the Republic (a.k.a. Rebel Alliance) was mostly comprised of worlds from the Outer Rim territory of the galaxy and my intent is that this ship serve the Alliance. .Why 210CR? CR are my initials and 210 was derived from 2010. CR is also the prefix on the model number of the Tantive IV Corellian Corvette (CR90) in Star Wars which is similar to my 210CR. The Tantive IV was used as a blockade runner but due to the amount of guns my ship has, it is no ordinary blockade runner so I added “fortified” to it’s name.

To read the full specifications of the 210CR Fortified Blockade Runner, visit the My Starships section of my website.

To download and view the entire model you must have either Google SketchUp 7.0 or 8.0 installed. Click the link below download the model in the version of SketchUp you’re using:

SketchUp 7:
http://www.mediafire.com/file/1buf01ltf2iz2df/210CR-SU7.zip

SketchUp 8:
http://www.mediafire.com/file/a7av5wnrgl5c9nc/210CR.zip

To see the image gallery click here or  view the slideshow below:

Continue reading »]]> After working on my Starship Project for over a year it is finally finished! It’s not like I am tired of working on it because I have enjoyed working on it the entire time. There just comes a time when you have to declare a project done before it becomes the proverbial white elephant in the room.

In this final update (which it turns out to the longest and with the most pictures, 55 total) I have wrapped up all of the loose ends. I finished head and showers room as well as the stateroom bathrooms, furnished the cargo bay with cargo containers and a way to move the cargo, redid the furniture in the mess hall, created ceiling light fixtures, created graphics for the display screens and made miscellaneous changes.

I created individual stalls for the waste extractors; there is not much difference between these and ones seen on Earth. I decided to make the doors swing in and to make that work in the limited space, the doors are made in two parts where one side nests in the other. When the doors are swung inward the nested half would automatically retract to save space. The waste extractors are the same as the one in the brig.

On the opposite wall from the waste extractors I modeled the hand wash sinks. I used the lower half of the waste extractor as a starting point for the sink. I shortened it and created a bowl and drain. The faucet has buttons on top of it to control temperature and flow rate. There is a simple soap dispenser to the right of the faucet and a hand drier on the left side of the sink.

The shower stalls are one-piece units that hang on the wall in the shower room. They each have a built-in bench to sit on and a shelf for bath supplies. The showerheads resemble those trendy UFO shaped ones becoming popular these days. The showers are controlled digitally with a panel across from the benches. In the shower room I also modeled a bench for dressing with hooks above to hang clothing.

The details of the bathroom are quite boring and nearly make me yawn as I sit here writing about it. The elements of the crew bathroom are used again for the bathrooms in the officer staterooms. Moving on…

The next part I needed to tackle was the cargo bay’s container storage system. I couldn’t find a good example for the types of containers that would be used in Star Wars so instead I settled on ones you might see watching Star Trek: The Next Generation and beyond. The ones used in the later Star Trek series were typically containers that are actually used in real life that look sleek and modern and made of plastic. So I searched for plastic crates I liked on the web and came up with one that would work. I made some additions to the design of the containers I found: one being the ability for them to interlock when stacked, another being hinge less and lastly an electric locking mechanism that could also be used to track the container. I made the containers in two different sizes that can be stacked on top of each other interchangeably. I originally thought the containers need to be held in cages but after several failed design attempts I decided it wasn’t necessary. I settled this in my mind by making the many containers magnetized to hold together during transport. While working on the containers I decided to enlarge the engineering room and shrink the cargo bay down a bit to make it easier to view the inside of the engineering room.

After the containers were done I needed a way to load and unload the cargo bay. I know previously I said I wouldn’t be modeling droids for the ship but out of necessity I decided to make a cargo loader droid. Again I went to the web for inspiration and found examples of cargo droids on Wookieepedia. I liked what I saw but they did not seem big enough for the job. I finally decided on modeling something similar to the Viper probe droids that were sent to Hoth to surveil the Rebels in the Empire Strikes Back. They are plenty big enough (though a bit menacing) for moving the cargo containers but with too many arms. I reduced the arm count down to just four placing them in the corners of the droid. The droid didn’t need as many sensors as the probe droids so I left many of them out. The resulting Viper Cargo Droid is just what I needed and should surely scare off any looting Jawas lurking nearby.

To complete the cargo system I needed a vehicle to move larger quantities of cargo containers. For this I designed a repulsorlift pod with the cargo containers in mind. I found these on Wookieepedia and they were mentioned in a few Star Wars comic books. It is basically a floating platform piloted from the back that is powered by repulsor engines. The engines use imaginary space-time mumbo-jumbo particles that are harvested by black hole power refineries. The point is they defy gravity and effortlessly move stuff around in planetary environments or any place or ship generating it’s own gravity.

Before I made the cargo repulsorpod I took a slight detour. I got to thinking about the tables and chairs in the mess hall and how they didn’t go with the flow of the room. So, I ditched existing tables and chairs and came up with a new idea for chairs and subsequently their matching tables. The chairs are formed from just 3 pieces: two metal rails and a sheet of “transparasteel” (a strong glass like substance) that are bent into the final shape. The tables are made the same way to match and made to be long and narrow to accommodate more people. The new furniture works much better in the room.

Next I worked on lighting fixtures for ceilings in the rooms off of the main corridor. They’re designed to be modular and comprised of an array of recessed lights (resembling can lights) that are surrounded by a tapered bezel with illumination around the edges. They would likely be made in a shiny black material that would gently reflect the light. For the large open sections of the ship I created a small square array of these lights to be repeated evenly across the ceilings.

A smaller change I made to the ship involves the docking ports. Early on I modeled the docking ports to match those found on the Millenium Falcon but I was never quite aware of how they operate and even now I still don’t know how they work. But at the time I made them I left no way for them to open due to my uncertainty. All I did this time was add a hinge to the doors so they can open outwards. So now at least they appear to function. Someday when I get a better idea I will change it. Also, early on there was an outer ring that protruded past the doors but when I changed the hull design to have alcoves for the docking ports I got rid of outer ring. I added the ring back into the design to make it once again consistent with the Millennium Falcon.

From the beginning I knew that the display screens were going to need some graphics. Nearly every screen on the ship up until now were just blank and at some point in time I was contemplating leaving them that way to save on size of the SketchUp data file. After I blew way past the size limit of file uploads for the Google 3D Warehouse the file size savings became irrelevant. For the screen on the computers in the computer core I created a simple status display with statistical graphs on one side and a meter of some sort on the other side. For the weapon targeting displays I carefully positioned the camera between the gun barrels and created snapshots of their view. I put crosshairs on the targeting displays and they were done. Every computer console needed a keyboard so I created a keyboard graphic that resembles the layout of the keyboard I saw in an interior photo of (again) the Millenium Falcon. For the display of the cargo computer consoles I made an overhead shot of the cargo floor to indicate a visual record of the cargo bays contents. This is to help keep track of and to find all of the cargo listed in the manifest. I borrowed elements of the computer core displays placing them above the overview. I labeled the screen using a galaxy basic font that is used in Star Wars. The final display screen I created was for the engineering computer console that displays the status of all of the ship’s vital systems. Again this display borrows graphics from the computer core displays and portions of the display are labeled in galactic basic.

One final detail to the ship was added in the ready room. The ship needed an insignia to represent who owns it so I added a large logo of the Alliance to Restore the Republic also known as the Rebel Alliance to the back wall of the ready room.

There were many mistakes that were fixed and micro changes that were made in the completion of the model which are really too negligible to mention but effected the overall quality of the model. I tried to go through the entire model with a fine toothcomb and I think it is in pretty good shape.

My final work on the model involved creating all new scenes for the model to show off all the details and features. There are now 99 different scenes in the model. About a quarter of the scenes are not labeled and they are there purely to smooth transitions between scenes when the scene animation is played.

The production of the Starship is now complete. It was really fun working on it and I am already contemplating the next one I intend to model. In the next blog post I write on the ship I will unveil the name, make and model of the ship. I post a link to the model so anyone with Google SketchUp 8.0 can download it and take a look. I will post a final image gallery using the labeled scenes I created and possibly post the animated walk through on YouTube.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

Continue reading »]]> I’ll be posting the next update (possibly final update) for my starship project soon. But as of today it just occurred to me that I have been working on this model for over an entire year! I started on it on October 12, 2009 and it is still not finished. Of course, I continue to enjoy working on the project I just never expected it to take over a year to do. At some point I will have to declare it done and beyond that I may revisit it for a “refit” later on.

There are some things I would like to revise that would require me to considerably tear into the model to fix. The main revision I am considering is making the heights of the walls consistent on the top and bottom levels of the cargo, engineering and bridge. This would probably also entail making the walls of the rooms along the main corridor the same height as the mid level of the cargo, engineering and bridge. Furthermore, I would also want to make the floors in the large sections thicker than the current thickness of 3 inches to be more consistent with ship seen in Star Wars. Doing all that would require the outer hull to become larger to accommodate the new changes. I have many other changes I can see making as well: recessing the main weapons into the hull and make it so the pop out of the hull when in use, replacing the landing struts with beefier legs that flip down instead of the current scissor mechanisms, adding porthole windows to select rooms and replacing one airlock/docking port.with a conference room.

Now you can get the picture why the project has taken so long: I don’t know when to call it done.

Continue reading »]]> I had previously said in my last update that the next update would probably be the last starship project update but in reality there is still a lot to do. A lot of time has passed since update 15 and that is due to other SketchUp projects taking focus. The Infirmary and the Brig are now done to my satisfaction and they are the main topic for this update.

The first thing I did this time was to define the spaces for the head and showers. I removed the second door to the head and showers because there was no reason for a separate entrance. For the interior of the room I added a dividing wall right down the middle and put a pocket door on it close to the entrance. The first half of the room when entered will be the head and the other will be for the showers. These rooms will be finished by the time of the next update.

I then moved on to creating the space for the Infirmary and the Brig. The brig only needed to be a small room so that’s why I placed these two unrelated rooms in the same hull section. I made the space for the brig a quarter of a room and I left the rest for the Infirmary.

The brig is made up of two rooms: the entry area and the actual cell. The entry is is just one standard wall panel deep and the cell takes up the rest of the space. The cell has solid black walls making it the only room on the main ship without modular walls. The cell door uses the same design as the pocket doors but with a reinforced transparasteel windows. Next to the cell door is an additional transparasteel window on either side of the wall that the cell door slides between. The cell door is only operated by the internal entry door control panel for obvious reasons. Inside the cell is a padded bench for sitting or lying on. Attached to the end of the bench is a waste extraction unit (toilet) which I just realized I left out a sink, oops. I’ll add a sink later.

For the Infirmary I needed to accommodate what, in Star Wars, is called a bacta tank. It is basically a tank filled with a substance, called bacta, which has special healing properties. The injured patient is submerged in the bacta and suspended with a harness and breathe with an apparatus. They stay in the tank until they are sufficiently healed. The problem is that there is enough headroom in the room to lower someone into the tank from the top, so I had to lower the floor and raise the ceiling. I built stairs into the floor at entrance of the Infirmary. I then modeled the tank and a platform at the top of it. I put a ladder panel on each side of the platform to allow access to it. I then made a simple frame with a winch to lower the patient with the harness into the tank.

I took a break from the project for a while and when I returned to it to finish the rest of the Infirmary. I created the control panel for the bacta tank which finished that part of the room. I then went on to designing an exam table. I didn’t have much to go on so I designed the exam table similarly to the operating table seen in Star Trek: The Next Generation. I built in a full body scanner that is hinged over the bed surface. The scanner is mounted to a track underneath the table. I put in two of these tables on the back wall. There needed to be a display behind each table so I designed them based on the computer console display screen. I then added a computer console next to the exam tables. Because of the lowered floor I had to make the patient displays low enough to be at the proper height. When they were finished I didn’t like it because it took away from the modular design of the ship and it made it hard to add storage to the room. So it occurred to me that only the floor for the bacta tank had to be lowered. I moved the stairs to just in front of the tank platform but making it only wide enough to walk down it. I then fixed the patient displays and computer console to make them the right height. The last thing I did was put some storage cabinets by the door.

While the ship is still not finished I still accomplished a lot this time around. The only things remaining to be done (until I think of more) are the fixtures for the bathroom facilities, more interior lighting, shipping containers for the cargo section and graphics for the display screens. I might also reconfigure one of the airlocks into a conference room with a round transparasteel window. I mentioned a small morgue in the last update but there is just no room. I will figure something out. I won’t be adding droids to model which would be cool but I think that will make the model way to complex and big in file size.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

Continue reading »]]> In my last update I said that I was going to work on 4 things this time. Well, that didn’t happen but for good reason. I didn’t create Hyperdrive motivators because I found out that a Hyperdrive motivator is the same as a Hyperdrive generator and I already made the generator. I didn’t move the main entrance of the ship because I couldn’t find a feasible place to move it to. I wanted to move it to the airlocks because that makes the most sense given that the Millennium Falcon is configured that way. The reason why I can’t do that is the fact that the lift would have to be able to raise or lower the people more than 22 feet. That’s ridiculous! So what I did accomplish was the kitchen equipment and the rear facing weapons.

For the rear facing weapons I started by modifying a quad laser cannon. I just took a half of the quad laser cannon, removed the disc and created a hinged mount for it that restricts horizontal movement (5 degrees inward and 15 degrees outward to avoid shooting the sub light engines or bumping the side of the ship). The mount housing pokes through the wall of the cargo section and has a round door accessible for maintenance inside the cargo section. There are 2 of these dual laser cannons on each side of the cargo hull.

For the kitchen equipment the first thing I modeled was an electric range. This may seem funny putting something like this on a spaceship that isn’t even from Earth but if you watch Star Wars – Episode II: Attack of the Clones you will see something similar in the scene in Dex’s Diner. It hangs on the wall in place of a wall panel and has a smooth glass top. I also created a matching range hood for each of the 2 ranges.

Continuing in the kitchen I created modular cabinets that match the style of the electric range that also hang on the wall. One of the cabinets was then further modified to become a sink. As you can see in the pictures the sink is again similar to a kitchen sink found on Earth but why reinvent the “repulsorlift”. What is different is the faucet which is operated by buttons that set the temperature and the flow rate right on the spigot.

And finally every kitchen needs a trash can so again I created one in the style of the electric range and again it hangs on the wall. I placed 2 more of these trash cans on either side of the Mess Hall entrance.

The final thing I did this time was add 2 additional landing struts in the back of the ship because I felt just two in the back were inadequate.

Along the way I also replaced all 2 3/4 and 2 1/4 panel walls with 2 1/2 panel walls to reduce the amount of components. This doesn’t reduce the file size by much but I’m trying to optimize the model as much as I can. As it currently stands the model is 17 megabytes.  I plan to upload the completed starship to the Google 3D Warehouse once done. The 3D Warehouse only lets people upload models up to 10 megabytes  so I’ll have to break it up into pieces and people will have to reassemble it.

What’s next now? The head (bathrooms), the brig, the infirmary with a small morgue and possibly some ceiling lighting. Update 16 will likely be the final update where I will declare the project finished! One problem though, it still doesn’t have a name…

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update:

Continue reading »]]> Once again I have broken my record (like a broken record) of snapshots for these starship updates with 40 pictures. This time I worked on the rest of door controls, the elevator controls, but most importantly I created the new engineering section in its entirety. There also were some more inconsistencies and minor underlying issues were solved.

The first thing I did was to fix the table design in the mess hall so the ridge would no longer be in the way people sitting at the ends of the table.

Next I made the controls for the main elevator on the bridge. They are all based on the design of the pocket door controls I designed earlier. I then added the controls for the “Jeffrie’s tubes” which are identical to the bulkhead door controls. Once I was done with the control pads I added detail to the outside of the pocket doors so they match all the other doors on the ship.

Most of the shortcomings I mentioned in the last update were taken care of this time in the form of the new engineering section. The first thing I needed to do was to move the cargo section back by 22 feet to make room for the engineering section. That required me to lengthen the hull plating to cover up the new gaping hole I created. I copied the cargo section and pasted it above the ship so I could turn the copy into the engineering section. I shortened the newly created section and cut out a hole for the bulkhead doors. Then I had to make the front wail of the cargo section flat again. I then reconfigured the wall panels to cover the walls. I also removed everything from the cargo section that would now be located in engineering. I didn’t make any snapshots until I finished creating the empty engineering section because it was just boring busy work. I then moved the engineering section in place in front of the cargo section.

Continuing the work on the engineering section I extended the crown lighting under the upper floor and added columns to support it. Once that was done I moved on to modeling the hyperdrive equipment. I decided to place the hyperdrive generator on the lower floor of the engineering section on the front wall. It’s design is based on the hyperdrive I saw in the cross section drawing of the Millennium Falcon I mentioned in the last update. I found only one other example of a hyperdrive generator online but it was just a monolith with a lot of detail that I didn’t want to add. I made the generator upright as opposed to flat so it would fit against the wall. I added some tubing at the bottom of the generator to connect to the wall. These manifolds connect the hyperdrive generator to the four power generators and to the hyperdrive motivators that will later be added to the outer hull.

Since I added manifolds to the hyperdrive I decided the power generators needed exhaust manifolds. I created these in the same way as the small ones. The pipes wind upward, then converge into one then the pipe widens and connects with the ceiling. Above the exhaust pipes I created a round vent on top of the ship to expel heat and gaseous vapors.

The next job was to design the computer core for the ship. I decided on placing the computer core on the lower level back wall of the engineering section. To make it fit I extended the floor above to create enough depth underneath so the computer core wouldn’t extend past it. For the core I decided to make it a network of several (10) computer racks containing 6 modules each. The computer core would work much like modern distributed computing systems. Each CPU works autonomously with the others and share the load creating a powerful and redundantly safe computer core. In the middle of banks of computer racks I created a network cabinet that contains a central hub where all the computers in the core and the rest of the ship connect to each other (most likely with fiber optic cables).

And finally I decided to create some display screens that show a schematic of the ship from several views that would highlight problem areas going on in the ship. This was inspired by the the ones seen on Star Trek The Next Generation in the main engineering room on the Enterprise that have the same function. To do this I simply created a style making all faces black and edges orange and set the camera to parallel projection. I then took snapshots of 4 different views and combined them into a single image. The resulting image was then used as a material. I placed one of these screens on either side of the computer core. I also decided to put them on the main level of the bridge. In addition I create 4 blank screens for the bridge to be used for tactical or communication applications.

The ship is now about 95% complete. What’s next? Hyperdrive motivators, relocation of the entrance (Likely to have two: one entrance in each airlock), the kitchen equipment and rear facing weapons.

See the gallery below or here to see what was added this update: