Interstellar spacecraft for a short film

#1

I’m making a spaceship! Woohoo! I’ll try and document the process as much as I can here.

Here’s some progress of the concept work. The first ones were just random crazy ideas for shapes. The ones towards the bottom are me picking the shapes and ideas I liked the most, then backtracking to make them more realistic and figure out how they would actually work. I used this amazing website as reference for the technical details, things like what to do with heat, the need for whipple shields, inspiration for the structure, how a vehicle like this would be assembled in space, etc. My goal isn’t really to make a realistic spacecraft, just something that looks like it could be. The technology level I’m going for is “NASA + unlimited budget + 30 years”

This is the concept I’ve settled upon, detailed slightly but still just a super rough mockup. What I’m going for is probably well described as a love child between ISS Venture Star from Avatar (Just look at that thing. So freaking cool) and the Hermes from The Martian.

Now it’s down to start actually making the thing. I’m going to switch between Cinema 4D and 3Ds Max for modeling. 3Ds Max has faster modeling tools, but C4D has some tricks up its sleve that will help - like dynamic booleans, much better object management and the amazing Mograph cloning. I’ll eventually texture, look dev and render in Max/Vray.
Wish me luck!

#2

Slowly starting out by detailing the mockup a bit, so that the placeholders are a little more specific and thought out, instead of just randomly placed primitives. I’m trying to pay attention to how this thing would work structurally and logistically, but that makes it slow work.
After this I plan on going through and replacing the placeholders one by one, then do a final pass with greeble and details. I’ve never really done a model with so many different objects before, so just organizing it all will be a learning experience.

Here’s the progress on just the habitation and engine parts. Next up, radiators, whipple shields, and a ballistic missile pod that possibly plays a role in the screenplay.

I know it’s dangerous to get distracted so early, but I couldn’t help but also make a planet for use in a test image later. I’m using, using this photo of Saturn as the reference for realism, but I changed the look to be an exoplanet, and I will probably modify it even further later to make it more unique and interesting. It’s interesting to try and replicate something like this. While it at first looks like just a sphere in a disc, it needs a ton of subtle tweaks to get everything looking correct, like the different layers of atmospheric effects, the sub-surface scattering, light that scatters through the backside of the rings, etc. A fun distraction.

I like the kind of compositions you can do with rings.

#3

Awesome work so far, it looks great ! :applause:
I really like your concept, and your approach for finding the shape you wanted. Nothing to complain about, this all looks great and interesting. If you start making saturn please share your progress of how you make it, would be very interesting to know, i have never tried to make a planet so im a bit curious as to how you make it :slight_smile:
I will definetly follow your progress on this, good lyck and keep them updates coming ! :wink:

#4

I was recently on Mark Benson’s exibition Otherworlds and I can recommend for inspiration to watch some of his space photos, really nice stuff, has amazing collection of Saturn pictures among many others.
https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=michael+benson+space&biw=1920&bih=926&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjOp_bHvtTLAhWjc3IKHafqDxcQ_AUIBygC

#5

@LuckyBug

This is great! I’m reading up on some interviews with him. Definitely some good reference I’ve missed, thanks!

@Elgstrom

Thank you!
I used Saturn as my reference, but the end result is what you see in my post, a fictional exoplanet that just looks like Saturn :). Later on I’ll modify it even more so it’s a bit more interesting and creative, a bit more like a totally foreign planet.

I used a sphere with a texture I made in Photoshop using a bunch of random images that I blurred, stretched out, distorted and recolored. I used a subsurface scattering material to make the transition to shadow on the planet (the terminator) softer like in my reference.
then I added a couple of new spheres just slightly larger to replicate some of the atmospheric effects. They were just normal diffuse materials with various combinations of falloff maps in the opacity.

I made the ring texture by stretching a 1px strip of a random image I found, and then moving parts of it around. used the luminance channel as opacity.

#6

wow, this stuff looks pretty cool. i’m not into the space thing as much as most, but i know great modeling when i see it. cant wait to see more

#7

Like the idea.

Your ship designs struck a cord, when via researching a topic came across Nautilus-X, a NASA concept for a space exploration vehicle, also no harm getting distracted…happens! which by the way nice realism, especially Saturn’s rings and thanks for the breakdown. Anyways will keep tabs on how you get on :slight_smile:

#8

good idea :thumbsup:

#9

I’m glad this is the kind of vehicle that my design is reminiscent of, that’s exactly what I’m going for. I’ll have to make some design decisions that are more like traditional sci fi, simply because of the time constraints, but I’m trying to make this look as NASA as possible.

Thanks! Here’s a modeling update:

I’ve worked on some smaller elements, like communications and cargo modules and such. I find that building a collection of smaller objects helps when working on the bigger ones. Instead of trying to model a ton of unique detail into each large section of the ship, I can just model the base shape, then fill up the surface with parts from the smaller objects. Greeble ftw.

I’ve planned out the design so there are lots of repeating elements. For example, the only reason I have four engines instead of one is that now I can do a quarter of the work, and still get a ton of detail. Here’s an example with the spine of the ship, you can see how it’s just one section copied out:

I’m also finishing the radiators (the big ‘wings’), but I can’t figure out what to put on the outside of them. They need to look like coolers, but they also can’t look too much like a CPU cooler, because that won’t work in space with no air circulation.
I’m also not quite happy with the square patterns on the inside, but I’ll fix that later if I have time.

#10

I have gathered 450 reference images and movie screen grabs for this project so far. Every one of them was specifically selected for some shape, surface, color scheme, composition or other quality that I liked and wanted to keep in mind. I made a contact sheet just to see what it looks like, and thought it might provide some insight to what is going on in my head as I’m working.

Here’s a link to the original res image

#11

Thank you DGruwier for explaining how you made your planet, quite clever using several spheres and the result looks great already. The modeling on your spaceship is coming along real nice as well, it looks beautiful and intruging with all its small details ! :slight_smile:

#12

I like the detail of the models and the realism of Saturn so far :thumbsup:

One side note though, if you are using Saturn in your short film–I might consider changing the rings. If you are planning on a close-up with Saturn’s rings in the short film, you should take into account that Saturn’s rings are made up of millions of small asteroids and objects. If you zoom in on the rings and they still seem like they are paper thin, it will kill the realism. Might I suggest using particle systems to create the rings for close-up shots while using the ring images as color guides to tint the objects and asteroids. You could even animate them revolving around Saturn on circular paths and each path consist of a different material to match the ring pattern.

If you are not planning on a close-up of Saturn’s rings, then I would leave them as they are because they look great, as does the satellite.

#13

Coming along quite nicely.

I have gathered 450 reference images and movie screen grabs for this project so far. Every one of them was specifically selected for some shape, surface, color scheme, composition or other quality that I liked and wanted to keep in mind. I made a contact sheet just to see what it looks like, and thought it might provide some insight to what is going on in my head as I’m working.

An axiom of 3D modelling, is that “You Can Never Have To Many Refs”.

This is, after all obviously a project of some complexity, So to be honest, the more research carried out prior and during each stage of the process make for a plausible outcome at completion, at least I’ve found in the past.

But yeah as above gathering specific material supporting a given train of thought concept’ing a design aesthetic is practically fundamental.

Anyways keep up the good work.

#14

@Elgstrom

Thank you, glad you appreciate it :).

@GreyDuck99]

That’s a good idea, although I believe to see the individual particles in the rings you have to be extremely close. I’ll definitely keep it in mind though, it could be a cool effect to sweep over the rings very closely.

@sacboi

Exactly, I had a specific start date for the project since this is part of a final exam, but before I began, I spent months gathering reference and reading up on space travel in my spare time.
Anything you have a good reference of, is something you don’t have to invent from scratch. Inventing takes orders of magnitude longer than simply assembling from parts, even if those parts are completely unrelated.

____________________

New update:

Finished modeling the fuel tanks. Hard to wrap my head around how the trusses in between the spheres would worked, so I basically just added random trusses (reusing parts from the heat radiators) until it looked like it could potentially hold together. It definitely would fall apart immediately in real life, b you’ll never get any closer to them than this, so it’s fine for now.

I can’t wait to see what it all looks like with textures and stickers and nice materials and everything, but I have to endure! I promised myself I wouldn’t start going into look dev until all the modeling is 100% done :surprised.
must. resist.

#15

good good
keep up & good luck :thumbsup:

#16

@Mr-Evil-studio

Thank you! All of the modeling needs to be done by next week, or I won’t be able to render in time for my exams, so I could use some luck :smiley:

New update:

Getting close with the main body of the ship. I don’t expect to get any closer with the camera than this, so I’m fairly happy with the level of detail. Although I do need to add some greeble on the back of the engines and on the structure that connects the engines to the radiators.

Any thoughts? Any specific parts that need some love? Right click and open the image to see the full 1920*810 frame.

#17

I came across this cool design for a foldable origami structure:

…and thought it would make a cool alternative to the classic zigzag NASA heat radiators:

So I combined them to this. I’m still not quite sure about these, I’ll have to see them in context of the rest of the ship. I’m worried they’ll just look like weird zigzags. I’m not going to animate them folding out, so I didn’t take care to actually model them out so they could be rigged to fold for real. That’s alright, they just need to look like they could potentially work like that, which is my philosophy for this entire project in general.

Just to be clear, these are the low intensity heat radiators that go on the habitation part of the ship. From what I could figure out, realistically you need two cooling systems for a ship like this, one for the intense heat of the engines, and one for just the normal heat buildup of electronics and people.

#18

This is a great piece of work. When you are finished I would love to see this in the Science and Technical art forum to share.

#19

Thank you! Where is that forum? I can’t find it :slight_smile:

New update:

I’m working on the habitation part now. This part is supposed to look like a conventional spacestation, so I’m borrowing some of the visual elements from ISS, even if they don’t make sense in this context. I think it helps sell the association.
I can’t for the life of me figure out what the two big habitation modules should actually look like, but hopefully that’s the last big challenge of this project.

Here’s an full render of everything together so far (but no materials yet). Fun fact, any spaceship’s “up” is opposite the direction of thrust, which means that the correct way to see this spaceship is actually standing up. It’s basically a gigantic tower, and I tried to keep that in mind while designing the structure.

Figured this is a good oppertunity to show how the shield in front of the habitation area shields the crew from the, presumably, deadly amounts of radiation from the engines.

#20

I’m not finished with modeling yet, but I was losing my concentration, so I decided to skip ahead and start shading and doing some test renders instead.

I’ve been modeling in Cinema 4D because it has a nice workflow for working with lots of small objects and duplicating them in various ways. But I’m migrating everything to Max because it has much better texturing, shading and rendering features (especially paired with Vray)

Here’s what I have so far. The “tail” part is missing, because I’m still working on that. At this stage it’s becoming more obvious which parts need more detail. I’ll deal with that last if I have time.

Here’s a WIP of the habitation module, along with thumbnails some of the previous concepts. I’m not completely happy with it, as it was causing me some headaches to figure out a shape that had that balance of looking good but also realistic. Eventually I settled on something I thought looked alright and started detailing that. Sometimes you’ve just gotta settle and remember that the audience doesn’t care how closely it matches your grand vision.