3D The Endless Pluto Station Thread [Archive]

tobian

17th May 2006, 11:36

Well would you look at that, don't post on the forum for a few weeks and the whole place falls apart!

Well I thought I would re-introduce my station back on here.. I've added a few details here and there, so I thought I'd share, and this thread is probably endless as it's taking for ever.. for obvious reasons ! :)

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test84-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test84.jpg)

Hope you all like, and I've had to link this externally, as it doesn't seem to like my image size in here! :)

Martocticvs

17th May 2006, 11:38

Looks great as usual mate - and that panelling job is extremely effective.

CGandy75

17th May 2006, 11:41

Awesome image.. Great details! Plenty of interesting details to keep the eye busy

Ozylot

17th May 2006, 11:43

Thats huge! Whats it supposed to look like when its done?

tobian

17th May 2006, 11:54

Cheers guys !

Yes it's been so long that no one can remember what it looks like in the whole again! :)

http://comby.star-fleet.org/ my archive has the full 'test' series, so you can see the whole thing as it was waaaaaay back when I was still trying to figure out lightwave LOL

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test09.jpg Is, I think, the first image I showed :) Still with large chunks missing hehe :) I should compose a highlights page :D

Ozylot

17th May 2006, 11:57

Stunning!

Nevets

17th May 2006, 12:00

That is a jaw dropping image.

BorgMan

17th May 2006, 12:12

Woow. That's a really, REALLY effective panelling job! And that's a REALLY nice torpedo launcher! Is there a possibility that you might do a render with, say, a Nova for reference?

tobian

17th May 2006, 12:24

Take 2 models into the shower? Hmm it may well melt my computer :D that's only a little bit of the station and it's about 1.2 million polies.. fairly well optimised :D Hence I don't have all of it loaded for the test!

The scale of the image is as it appears, those are deck lines you can see, and each deck is approximatelly 3.3 meters high ( I work to an odd scale for historical reasons - the scale everything imported into lightwave from Illustrator!) Unlike most ships, stations/etc, you can pretty much see how big it is. and I have to say it is NOT that big ! :D Though the Nova would indeed be a good ship to put next to it... and not dwarf it hehe!

FYI.. the large 'gun' in the centre of the image is a Pulse phaser array.. when I re-rig it, it can swivel, to aim.. There isn't much space for actual photon torpedoes inside it hehe, but it is rigged directly to the warp core, so it does have a good kick to it! There are doors on the cargo bay as well, but I like leaving them open, to let a bit of air in... err out :D

Freak

17th May 2006, 12:32

that is a dam fine station you have there. I will be keeping an eye on this one.

baxart

17th May 2006, 12:39

I'll get my jaw outta my lap and tell you it's amazing!

D.M.J.

17th May 2006, 12:40

Really really nice. You are forgiven for taking so long!

SnowCrash

17th May 2006, 13:34

I find the lack of detail disappointing.........

Seriously, that's some great work. The attention to structural detail takes my breath away....

Aethernaut

17th May 2006, 14:30

Yup, it's still really, really good. And just keeps getting tastier with every new thread! :D

Jedilaw

17th May 2006, 14:50

Scha-wing!

Love those details, man! Nice prelim textures, too.

tobian

17th May 2006, 15:25

I have all the panels as different surfaces, with a bunch of layers and textures.. I'm hoping to put anisotrophic shading on them, once I get Lightwave 9 :) That should make them stand out a little more!

Thanks for the compliments guys!

tobian

18th May 2006, 00:23

Ok a minor update.. just playing round with the model - and did an interior shot.

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test85-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test85.jpg)

It took many many passes to get it that smooth, but while I was away at the cinema.... :D

There are no lights inside that bit.. just the exterior lights, and the bright faces ! :D

Martocticvs

18th May 2006, 00:26

That looks rather tasty. Well, it you're a creature that likes to eat energy it does... Looks good too!

Sarraj

18th May 2006, 00:29

ya this stuff good. Wit hthat blue carpet with white-ish walls and that blue tube thingie, makes me think Star Trek has a new modeler :) If it does die and totally dissapear.

IRML

18th May 2006, 01:02

it looks rather good tehbian, you are progressing very well indeed

Samurai

18th May 2006, 01:09

Nice work mate- I wont pretend I know what a pulse array is, but it looks pretty. ;)

tobian

18th May 2006, 01:12

Horay, I am a startrek Necromancer! :)

Thanks for the comments guys

and for a pulse array.. think the Defiant's phaser blasts :D Beyond that, use google like everyone else!

Tovette

18th May 2006, 01:16

That is an f-ing sweet station there. I had been following it since before the crash of the site. I love it.

TheGreatRaja

18th May 2006, 05:22

looks sweet :)

I must get back to my interior work...

Freak

18th May 2006, 08:15

the interior look very inpressive. you really get the feel of the power that the station uses.

tobian

18th May 2006, 09:38

Cheers guys !

I am really quite amazed just how well that carpet texture works hehe :) I may tweak the EPS texture a little, as it can look a little bland, but it has the look I was going for: You don't want to go firing any guns in there ! :D

I will get round to making the warp core..but don't get your hopes up just yet, it's going to be some time! :)

Those displays should also have graphics on them, but... one thing at a time :)

DarthMaya

18th May 2006, 09:46

Man my jaw hit the keyboard:eek: . OWW!
1.3 million polys! I used to think that one million was infinte and now I see it everywhere I look.:)

TheGreatRaja

18th May 2006, 09:49

Rumor has it that the Big G (from BSG) is over 10 Mil :)

tobian

18th May 2006, 09:50

LOL, well the last time I had all of the station loaded in together, it was over 2.5 - it's probably closer to 3 million now :)

and yes, it is somewhat of a strain on the CPU :D

IRML

18th May 2006, 09:54

Nice work mate- I wont pretend I know what a pulse array is, but it looks pretty. ;)now now, we all know you're really the biggest trekkie around :p

Comco

18th May 2006, 11:13

I love the artisic style in that first shot...I can't even put my finger on it but it is such a unique scene.

Love your work man. :cool:

Captain Boh

18th May 2006, 11:24

Looks great. I don't know that I could put so much work into something like this. I admire your dedication.

tobian

18th May 2006, 11:39

Thanks.. though to be honest I often spend as much time in post, cheating, as it does rendering hehe :D (though to get them that smooth with adiosity lights, it takes 2-6 hours to get them really smooth!)

I may have to try and do an Ambient Occlusion pass, to try and bring out the detail a little more! :)

With regards to the time taken: I'm doing this as much because I want to finish it one day, as because I use it for a test bed of my modeling skills, hence it keeps improving, as I find new ways of modeling something... Still actually thinking up what detail to put on it is more timetaking than actually modeling it.. sometimes :D

Captain Boh

18th May 2006, 11:42

I usually just give up when things start to get difficult. I guess it doesn't help that I have a five year old computer and software to match ;)

tobian

18th May 2006, 12:00

Well just don't make any stations with a horrendously complicated layout, over 3 million polies and render them with lots of soft reflections and full radiosity... and you should be fine ! :)

I once had to do everything within 10 MB of ram - ahh the good old days.. no wait, they sucked :D Get a new computer ! :D

Captain Boh

18th May 2006, 12:02

I'd love to, only problem is, I can't justify getting a new PC, and I can't afford to get a new Mac yet.

Though, I'm certanly doing better than 10 MB of ram.

Dark Angel

18th May 2006, 12:43

Look fabulous, any more updates?

tobian

18th May 2006, 12:45

Well then what's stopping you! :)

No more updates for a while I'm afraid.. woking away from the computer for a few days :D

Captain Boh

18th May 2006, 12:47

Away... from... computer?

Madness!

Dark Angel

18th May 2006, 12:51

You said it Captain!

Samurai

18th May 2006, 21:52

now now, we all know you're really the biggest trekkie around

Nooooo! My secret is out! :p

Tobian: Plumbing, or is it another trade this time around?

*won't make jokes about the tradesman's entrance*

:p

tobian

18th May 2006, 22:53

Yep Plumbing again, yes, my secret is out, I am a closet Plumber :) and I'm really crap, so caveat emptor :D

Jairen

18th May 2006, 23:06

That station looks fantastic. Great work.

tobian

19th May 2006, 00:09

Thanks very much, and I'm already beginning to get computer withdrawal symptoms.. even though I'm sitting at one now.. but the thought.. no computer during the day for ... 2 days - AAAAEEEEEIIIIIII :D

Choo1701

19th May 2006, 07:12

Rumor has it that the Big G (from BSG) is over 10 Mil :)

The extreme, really good for close ups, OldG is actually more than that (the engine section is about 10 mil alone...)

Really like the station tobian :cool:

Completion date :eek: :p

ST-One

19th May 2006, 07:33

Ah, a new Pluto-Station-thread... now it the forums feels right again. :)

Daringer

19th May 2006, 09:47

looks like you have quite a bit of details in there....thats what we all like...lots of detail

Dark Angel

19th May 2006, 14:04

tobian

19th May 2006, 17:01

Completion date.. those words sound strangelly familiar, where have I heard them before ? Hmm? :)

Not sure I can set one, as I would have to know exactly what I am putting in it first! Like that's ever going to happen!

IRML

19th May 2006, 17:58

only I know the completion date

tobian

19th May 2006, 18:03

Do you mean you, personally, or Mr. T ? I Mean 'cause obviously Mr. T knows :D

and please don't tell me, that's like knowing when you're going to die or something! :D

Dark Angel

20th May 2006, 08:55

Keep the updates coming!:D;)

theCommander

22nd May 2006, 17:56

That's looking good! Had to refind the new thread, but it is worth it.

biotech

22nd May 2006, 18:05

Very cool.

tobian

22nd May 2006, 20:55

Cheers guys ! There will be new updates, just not for a little while as I am working on another project right now :D All will be revealed in the fullness of time... or maybe it won't ? :D

GKan

30th May 2006, 10:08

there is so much details !!! I really like the way it's going :D

:thumb: This station rocks :thumb:
keep going

tobian

30th May 2006, 13:33

Don't get excited.. no updates yet! :D

Thanks for the comments though, should be getting back on to this in a few weeks ! :D

tobian

18th Jul 2006, 03:43

Well, after what seems to be an age I have yet another update, though only the dedicated will spot the difference! :D The inner ring has finally been finished - though I may yet take off some detail, as it really is too small and too many polys hehe :D

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test86-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test86.jpg)

Glazy

18th Jul 2006, 03:47

I was young when you started this !!!!

Fantastic work !!!!!!!!!!

tobian

18th Jul 2006, 03:54

LOL, I think I was young when I started this too.. and I vuagelly remember you were one of my first respondants :D Cheers

Now 4 am is late enough - away to bed with me - if I can sleep in this heat! :D

admiral horton

18th Jul 2006, 04:02

this is a insteresting design and i hope you can do a pull back pic so we can see more of it

Glazy

18th Jul 2006, 04:21

Yeah what's a Geordie doing up so late,now if you lived in the Boro like me I could understand !!

tobian

18th Jul 2006, 13:18

I did my Degree there, so maybe living there for 3 years rubbed off on me? :D

I'm working funny hours, which currently mean I get to stay up late! Which suits me as I am a bit of a night Owl hehe... That and the fact it's boiling, and I couldn't get to sleep - which is a vicious circle as my computer was belting out it's own heat into the room! :D

lt paul

18th Jul 2006, 13:40

I know about boiling rooms and sleeping at the moment. Luckily if I decide to use a computer all I have is a laptop so I cant belt out too much heat.
The station is looking awesome. I've been following it for almost 18 months back before the crash. I know every time this thread surfaces I'll be treated to an excellent new render.

tobian

18th Jul 2006, 17:41

Laptops can be fairly hot when they are sitting on your knee.. especially on days like this ! :D

I think I've been doing the station longer than that hehe.

There are older renders on my website which show the station without the new detail.. it's quite timetaking to pull together all the different WIP layers to make an actual model, so I rarelly render the whole thing.. it's REALLY big now! :D

Just playing with an ambient Occlusuion pass, which i will multiply to the other render, but underneath all the glows and such. Thought you guys might like to see it, as it's pretty nice ! :D Shows some detail you can't see on the regular render!

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test86-occlude-pass-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test86-occlude-pass.jpg)

seanr

18th Jul 2006, 18:24

This is still one of the coolest meshes I've ever seen and the best fan-made starbase/station design by far. Nice work. I'm just prayng you'll actually finish it some day, though. ;-)

IRML

18th Jul 2006, 18:34

on the grilly thing in the bottom right of the image there's a little poly error

anyway good work :D

Glazy

18th Jul 2006, 19:34

I will go as far as to say that you're ****ing Insane !!!! :flippy:

tobian

18th Jul 2006, 23:21

hehe Cheers guys ! I am a little insane yes, but a good insane :D

Yeah that's not the only hole in the model that render showed up, sometimes it's the only way you can see em ! :D

Nevets

19th Jul 2006, 12:43

Breathtaking. I long did it take to render?

Can we see a wireframe version please and a polygon count. I would love to know how many there is. I'm guessing 500,000+

tobian

19th Jul 2006, 14:12

Both of those took a couple of hours to render - I got 3 passes within about 15 minutes or so but I let them cook to aout 25 passes each so the noise wasn't too bad! That's the downside in using montecarlo radiosity!

The longer render was actually the interior shot, because it had total internal light bounce and it was almost completelly lit by the luminous surfaces in the scene! It looks pretty but it's not the fastest or most efficient way of lighting it! :D

That scene doesn't have all of the model in it, and it's over 1 million polies! :) ordinarily a scene like that would take a country week to render in lightwave, without agressivelly optimised lighting (I use area lights and a coloured backdrop , for the radiosity schema). The reason the lighting looks so dull is because I only need the area light set to about 40% - otherwise it overblows the scheme, with all the radiosity bounces! :D

NickatNite

19th Jul 2006, 16:21

Great station. Very posable looking. Hope to see the whole thing!

homerpalooza67

24th Jul 2006, 23:23

Awesome station!! do you have a blueprint that you can show us, maybe vertical view with a cross section?

tobian

25th Jul 2006, 01:38

The closest I have to what you want is the original template I made (well with tweaks :D) http://comby.star-fleet.org/rotational-section-3b.pdf Which has all the working parts I used, though I have then tweaked the surface objects heavilly! :D

The last overall render I did was this: http://comby.star-fleet.org/test72.jpg though there is of course lots of missing detail here! :)

Ozylot

25th Jul 2006, 01:51

Fantastic! :thumb:

Tovette

25th Jul 2006, 01:59

This station has the most insane detail... lol. So ARE you ever gonna finish this beast? :p

tobian

25th Jul 2006, 02:02

LOL Cheers guys... Errrrrrrrrrr... Maybe ? :D Anyway its not IF I am going to finish it, but how long it takes to render! :D

chrono

25th Jul 2006, 02:59

Well that's what movies, dates, and drink are good for! They all pull you away from the computer. ;)

This is lovely work and something that can inspire everyone! Props!

tobian

25th Jul 2006, 03:12

Curse my damn Social life from interrupting me making this model.. well that and the occasional spat or boredom.and my other crazy ideas... and... I'm amazed i get any done hehe :D

Cheers for the compliments! :D

admiral horton

25th Jul 2006, 04:20

:thumb: very nice station:eek!:

Samurai

25th Jul 2006, 20:55

Curse my damn Social life from interrupting me making this model.. well that and the occasional spat or boredom.and my other crazy ideas... and... I'm amazed i get any done hehe

pfft *puts beer money back in his pocket* :shiner:

tobian

25th Jul 2006, 21:26

I didn't say I was going to stop! :D

Samurai

25th Jul 2006, 22:32

haha- next beer-night will have to be after my holidays anyway mate- gives you a couple of weeks to work on it. :shiner:

tobian

25th Jul 2006, 23:17

Holiday ! Bah, how dare you skip out on the drinking night we haven't pencelled in! :D

Martocticvs

26th Jul 2006, 18:45

Looking nice!

You never know... one day it might be... no, maybe not!

Vortex

27th Jul 2006, 10:46

Very impressive mate, thats the kind of work that i can aspire to :D

tobian

27th Jul 2006, 13:08

Cheers, though I recomend doing something less difficult! as your first project (and with less polies! :D)

tobian

21st Sep 2006, 23:19

Bah this forum keeps nagging me to do some posting - Sheesh cut a guy a break, I've been busy modeling :D

Seriously, I got somewhat distracted from the station when i decided to start a rigged human, he's still underway, but I decided to do some more on the station boom arms... Here's some WIP shots of what I've been getting up too! :D

Right now the poly count is high, but I am still tweaking and will remove the double polies from the seam-lines (the mesh is a quick mirror to show what it looks like, I am just working on one corner of it.

Still got to model the doors, and the recesses. The docking hatches are now the female ports instead of the male one's so the regular Engineering inspection shuttles can dock now :D - I even have a bad blocky pd ready to get built at some point, made to that scale :D I need also to fit the cieling fixtures of more light panels and some air exchange vents and of course lots more panel work needs to be done on the outside! :D

tobian

21st Sep 2006, 23:20

and one last grab I did.. because it only lets you post 5 :D

Your comments, queries and criticisms welcome :D

Ozylot

21st Sep 2006, 23:39

Still no end in sight.... :lol:

But great stuff so far... coming along amazingly!

tobian

21st Sep 2006, 23:43

I named the thread properly, it's not a misnomer! :D

Cheers. I'm thinking about pre-baking the ilumination in there, see how that works out.. it could be cool :D Fun with the surface baking cam... and radiosity... Hmmm.... :D

Ozylot

21st Sep 2006, 23:52

So can we expect an actual render soon :shiner: :D

tobian

21st Sep 2006, 23:58

Ozylot

22nd Sep 2006, 00:02

Yes.. when I've finished that section to some of my satisfaction. I don't like having to make duplicate models, and right now it is just a quarter.. and i don't want to mirror it and fix it... so tough, you will just have to wait :P

*twitches impatiently*

are we there yet? :shiner: :lol:

And I thought I was detail crazy. Great work!

tobian

22nd Sep 2006, 00:07

Oh.. you ain't seen nothing yet :D My problem is deciding where all the detail will go, and getting it all right.. I am not the slowest modeler in the world, just picky :D

Next you'll be asking for a render of the whole station - sheesh! :D

Freak

22nd Sep 2006, 08:30

Next you'll be asking for a render of the whole station - sheesh! :D

Yes please! :lol:
I throught this project was dead. glad to see you are still working on it.
keep up the good work!:thumb:

tobian

22nd Sep 2006, 09:34

What is it with you lot.. I don't post an update for a few weeks and you start ordering my tomb stone :D

and... not a chance on the full station render :D Not yet :D

Zardoz

22nd Sep 2006, 10:53

You will release the model ???

It can be interesting showing it, not finished yet, in a fan film short images about the Battle of Cheron (and Cheron is the main moon of Pluto, wich a half size of Pluto)

tobian

22nd Sep 2006, 11:00

Maybe.. but not everyone's machine will cope with the beast, it's over 1.5 million polies (and a lot of those are many sided NGONS) - I haven't tried to assemble it all in a while, while it's all strewn over 5 parts, so god knows what is now :D

Oh and Pluto's moon is Charon, not Cheron, I believe! :)

Don't expect it to be finished any time soon :D

Nevets

22nd Sep 2006, 11:59

Love the docking arm sections. Wireframe view please.

tobian

22nd Sep 2006, 12:24

Couple of wire shots :D I pretty much keep my models immaculate.. or well try too - I always miss something :D

Freak

22nd Sep 2006, 12:44

looking very cool! but it must be killing your PC.

tobian

22nd Sep 2006, 12:50

Well if I loaded the whole model in to memory all at once it would.. but I take chunks of the model and work on them as seperate files, so it's fast and easy to work on :D It's one of the advantages of the way Lightwave: I can work on the model as a number of components in modeler - and assemble them all together in layout when i need to render.. which is also the downside, because it's a huge hassle keeping track when I keep moving the layers and files round , hence I only like to do it once I have finished a particular 'model' and the layers and positions of the layers are fixed!

nico-r44

22nd Sep 2006, 12:59

I love it big time!! very very nice

Zardoz

22nd Sep 2006, 22:26

Really ****ing hard work, and heavy model !. Great Work.

Tovette

23rd Sep 2006, 01:38

This thing has been going foreverrrr. Are you just gonna keep adding and adding?

tobian

23rd Sep 2006, 12:03

It's not so much that I am gonna keep adding and adding: I am detailing sections I have already done. I don't have any intentions of adding new things to the station, just detail to what's there now :D This arm used to have a crappy map on it, and I thougt I could improve it to match the newer-detail-style parts of the station! :D

and it is pretty heavy going :D

Aresius

23rd Sep 2006, 13:22

looks nice so far...

Samurai

24th Sep 2006, 14:11

About time you posted updates. :p

tobian

24th Sep 2006, 21:09

I will do them when I am good and ready ! Sheesh! :D

More to come in the next few days as I get this sorted out a bit more! :D

Samurai

25th Sep 2006, 10:45

and when its finished, there might just be a computer on the market that can render it.... :p

Glazy

25th Sep 2006, 11:00

I don't think it will be finished otherwise I'll be upset at Tobian for calling this thread Endless !!!!!!

tobian

25th Sep 2006, 14:20

LOL don't worry, by the time I finish this, Scifi meshes could die again, and when it's wiped clean, I can just forget about the title! :D Not that it's likelly to happen twice, but, I guess it's about as likelly as me finishing me this :D

Yes, I have to future proof the station: By the time I finish it you guys will all be mocking me for how undetailed it all is :D

Glazy

25th Sep 2006, 14:25

tobian

25th Sep 2006, 14:27

Haha ! Yeah but then I will start working on the sub pixel displacement maps :D

tobian

27th Sep 2006, 12:58

Hokily dokiley - I finally bowed to pressure, and made a render.. Not the whole station, but a render of what I'm working on! :)

It proved useful as there were a couple of holes in the mesh I hadn't spotted (as well as a couple which didn't exist except as a rendering bug !). I'll get an interior one done when I've decided on how the upper vent/light thing will look! :)

I've given the doors morphs, so they can be opened.. and damn handy that is too! :D (especially when I want to open them up for interior renders!)

I need to tweak the assignment of a couple of surfaces, and I still want to add more panels to the coridoor section, but it's getting there!

Freak

27th Sep 2006, 13:07

Ooo! A render! Looking pretty sweet. Now to start to put some pressure on you do a render of the whole station! :lol:

tobian

27th Sep 2006, 13:10

The sooner you come to accept it's not going to happen, the sooner you can move on with your life! :D It's got huge great holes in it: I'm not going to show that! :D

And thanks :D

Glazy

27th Sep 2006, 13:19

Look it's taken you so long that the textures have started to go rusty !! This'll be like the Forth Road Bridge,by the time you finish it it'll need starting at the other end again !!

tobian

27th Sep 2006, 13:22

Haha! But that's the problem.. I already 'finished' this section, and had to go over it again, so it alreaady is the forth road bridge :D

Ozylot

27th Sep 2006, 20:56

Sweet great render! :thumb: Am happy now... any more? :shiner:

tobian

27th Sep 2006, 23:33

Ask and thee shall recieve, unless it's for some overall shots :P

Messed around with some depth of field... Not perfect, but it's a good start! :D

and dang, the small upload size is annoying!

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test90-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test90.jpg) http://comby.star-fleet.org/test91-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test91.jpg)

Ozylot

27th Sep 2006, 23:37

Fantastic!! So what studio is this set being built? lol

Great stuff!

Tovette

27th Sep 2006, 23:38

Um.. that looks REALLLL. Are there anytextures in there? What is your lighting set up?

tobian

28th Sep 2006, 00:05

Haha, no there are no textures at all, I just photoshopped the floor on :D I believe that scene only uses 2 textures.. a subtle brushed texture I use in the spec and diffuse chanel of the brushed metal (I've used that same material in scenes before, such as http://comby.star-fleet.org/test85.jpg and http://comby.star-fleet.org/test87.jpg) and the floor has a simple homebrew texture map for ribbed carpet in the spec/col/diff channels.

The lighting... None.. except for the exterior, and a simple gradient map for the environment, all the lighting in the scene are from the self-illuminated surfaces, and 2 radiosity bounces.. otherwise it would look black in there, with a nice view out into black space :D It's only 'cause I'm using F-prime that it's possible within realistic timeframes.. that kind of thing is normally slow (and slow on F-prime on interiors!)

Freak

28th Sep 2006, 09:49

Very nice! this does look very realistic!

tobian

28th Sep 2006, 10:12

Cheers for the nice comments guys! :D I'm glad you all think it looks so realistic! :)

Bug 2000

28th Sep 2006, 10:36

Great work.

When I frist saw them I thought they were made with Maxwell Render or V-Ray. :flippy:

I was wrong. :D

tobian

28th Sep 2006, 11:20

Haha, no, well I'm not sure I could do that in Maxwell (if I had it) as it doesn't support all of Lightwaves surfacing types, and I can't do it in Vray! :D I'm taking that as a compliment hehe :D

cirus5555

28th Sep 2006, 11:21

why are you taking photo's of my house

tobian

28th Sep 2006, 13:04

Haha! So I'm curious why you have a giant airlock in your house?! :D

I must say I like your carpet :D

Elowan

28th Sep 2006, 15:21

This criiter keeps getting bettere and better. You're really pissing me off here. :p

tobian

28th Sep 2006, 15:33

Shall I just make it worse from now on for you? :D

Well I think that's the idea.. to get better! :D

Nevets

28th Sep 2006, 16:12

Love the interior.

Glazy

28th Sep 2006, 16:15

Great pics. The DOF one doesn't really work unless you were focusing in something closer to the lens which isn't there in this pic.

tobian

28th Sep 2006, 16:20

Yeah, it would make a good backdrop shot, if there was someone standing in the foreground :D

Before I started working on this I realised I needed to get the human scale right, so i began working on a human for scale (affectionatelly known as Pink man) http://comby.star-fleet.org/pink-man-render5-6-comp.jpg I need to get back to him too, but it'd look cool if he was in the scene.. unfortunatelly he is nekked, so it'd look odd, till hes finished and clothed to put him in the scene hehe!

Samurai

29th Sep 2006, 22:41

This is without question the single most comprehensively, utterly bonkers mesh I've ever seen.

tobian

30th Sep 2006, 00:43

Haha thanks, glad you like it! :D

Ahkileez

30th Sep 2006, 02:01

I can't do anything but concur with everyone else. It's really spectacular work mate.

Wish I could go there and hang out.

Does Dominoes deliver to Pluto Station?

tobian

30th Sep 2006, 02:23

Haha, Cheers!

Well the only problem is: That coridoor is not closed at either end, and not attached to the station yet, so if he docked his delivery shuttle to it, we'd have a red smear all over our wall! On the plus side the Pizza would be cold, due to it's exposure to absolute zero of space, and a hard vacuum, so we would get another free Pizza, and if they disputed that, you could point out it was 9 years late! :D

I shall eventually get round to modeling the mushroom again. I fear it: It will be timetaking! :D But the people shall have a place to live once more! :D

tobian

16th Nov 2006, 00:13

Hi all, minor update to the surfacing, and I've settled on a vent and panel design for the roof. Unfortunately it's over-bright but that's just for the radiosity solution, I may do a double skin of lighting polygons and surfaced lights. I'm gonna add a few more panels to the walls, but otherwise that's just about done! I'm finishing this so I can steal that bit of the mesh for the back of the shuttle bay, which is going an extensive remodelling, and refining :D Well sometime, I have a few other projects on the go hehe :)

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test92-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test92.jpg)

Ozylot

16th Nov 2006, 00:40

That looks absolutely fantastic!

Tovette

16th Nov 2006, 01:32

sweet man. the texture doesn't look subtle enough imh. Sweet work!

tobian

16th Nov 2006, 01:42

It was really hard to tell how that would work out till the thing had gone through more than 10 passes - I think there was something like 35 and over 3 hours render time, because of the reflection blurring and monte-carlo radiosity! Before that all you could see was noise, and once it'd gone too far I couldn't be bothered to start it over hehe :) Yeah I think I'll knock back the reflection channel noise a little

Otherwise thanks for the compliments! :D

kaden

16th Nov 2006, 02:19

still looks great tobian, the whole thing will be so worth it when your done.

that rooms pretty shiny, the cleaners must of been going all night with the polish

Freak

16th Nov 2006, 08:34

Very nice. Tobian, if it not already it will be one of the best station out there.

tobian

16th Nov 2006, 11:46

Hehe yeah it'll be being tweaked shortly, it's tough to get the reflections right! Untill it reached a certain number of passes, it was just REALLY speckly, and it was hard to say how heavy the effect was!

tobian

17th Nov 2006, 10:45

Et voilà ! Way less shiny, and way more time to render LOL

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test93-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test93.jpg)

Freak

17th Nov 2006, 10:51

Thats it! very nice man!

Elowan

17th Nov 2006, 14:20

looks great

seanr

17th Nov 2006, 15:38

That texture on the walls really needs to me a _lot_ more subtle. Otherwise, it's looking perfect.

tobian

17th Nov 2006, 17:43

Hmm the percentages are pretty small as it is, but I will see about tweaking it :D Thanks for the nice words all!

Martocticvs

25th Nov 2006, 20:10

This is progressing really nicely. Will you ever finish it? Well you probably stand a better chance of that than I do of most of my projects! hehe

nhall

25th Nov 2006, 20:19

Looks like ENT-era trek to me, is this right, or am I just an SFM-Jackass?

Cheers,
Nick

tobian

26th Nov 2006, 00:48

No it's not quite enterprise era. Specifically it's been around since the Enterprise era, and is still around in the late 24th century (Fortunatelly left alone during most of the major engagements, due to it's tactical irelevancy! :D) So it's got hammered, battered, and upgraded over the centuries! :D

Just because I had a spare half hour to play, I decided to do an update on the external view, and leaving it to bake for a few hours it's come up really nice, even with the basic surfaces! :) Got a few bits of random white noise in the image, and I have no idea why (it's not geometry) it may be the radiosity solution or the area light.. not sure? :)

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test95-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test95.jpg)

At the moment I just don't have much time to work on it due to other commitments, so yeah it's imminent finishing is not due! :)

Ozylot

26th Nov 2006, 00:56

Wowsers!

DAve

26th Nov 2006, 16:33

I've been enjoying this thread for ages, nice to see it moving again :thumb:

Out of interest what is the radius of the lock?

DAve

Martocticvs

26th Nov 2006, 16:41

Looks much better without those horrid white specks you showed me... wonder what was causing those... All in all she's coming along nicely!

tobian

26th Nov 2006, 20:54

It's about 2.3m maximum radius, and the doorways are about 2.1m in height. I say roughly because it's not actually modelled to correct scale, I just know it's scale ratio hehe :) I did that mostly because it was the scale the templates were brought over from Illustrator as, and I keep it the same in case I decide to import more!

I tried to go closely to the dock size shown in Mr. Scott's guide, but I'm aware it's not perfect! i do intend to build my own shuttles to fit em anyway.. sometime :D

I had to paint out the white dots, no idea what was causing those?! They were massivelly minimised by the final pass, but still visible!

SnowCrash

26th Nov 2006, 22:08

I deplore the lack of a thumbnail.

Mind you, the actual work is really rather impressive

tobian

26th Nov 2006, 22:21

LOL it's the annoying way the thumbnail sorftware works (I prefered the old version) I don't have any images attached to the thread, because of the file sizes allowed (and I like to render big!) I attached a thumb image just show it would show :D

and thanks Snowcrash!

mikala

26th Nov 2006, 23:42

That is some extremely fine work.
I'm heaven forbid not really into all the trek stuff, but this is just amazing.

Tovette

26th Nov 2006, 23:56

This thing is badass. I love it :thumb:

tobian

27th Nov 2006, 02:05

Well it may be 'trek stuff' but the saucer is missing right now hehe :D

Nice to have the support of some fellow 'wavers hehe :) Cheers guys!

mikala

27th Nov 2006, 02:08

The world isn't Maxed out yet!

mattc

27th Nov 2006, 03:55

Mercutio_JB

27th Nov 2006, 04:00

Plus it seems that texture is in the diffuse slot (unless I'm mistaken?) I think if it's just a specular map, it would be just about right.

tobian

27th Nov 2006, 10:06

The textures you can see are in the diffuse and reflection channel - they are in the specular chanel, but since specular are 'fake' highlights, and they need actual lights to work, you can't see anything, that is on the interior. On the exterior, the surfaces also have specular maps, but again, because there is only 1 actual real light, because all but the sun-light is from the environment image (See attached) they don't show any 'specularity' because specularity only responds lights in the scene, not image based lighting from radiosity.

Please do share any tricks to speed it up Matt! :D However, the way I have been working on this is 1 quadrant of it (1 interior layer and one exterior), then exporting it all to a seperate model, mirroring it in the X and Z and cloning it for test-rendering, which was a bit timetaking! I've finished the main clone object now so I could bake in a map, but I didn't want to till I had finished. I am not sure if baked maps, for the station, could be prohibitive in memory, with the number of polies overall. While for the segment I am working on it'd be fine, once the whole object was loaded I would need like 16 gig of ram or something LOL. I did consider baking vertices, but that's not always satisfactory :(

Freak

27th Nov 2006, 11:03

Man this just Looks awesome, I wish you would show us the whole station.

Yar I know, not until it finished, but a block can wish! :D

mattc

27th Nov 2006, 11:14

tobian

27th Nov 2006, 12:35

mattc

27th Nov 2006, 12:48

Freak :fishslap: ! I'm not spending several hours re-composing the whole model just to show a bunch of gaps and holes! :)

thanks Matt! LW64 could be the only way to do it at present, and I can only take my present motherboard to 4gig! So it's almost not worth the hassle! I need a fast pipe to a render-farm :D Otherwise my super poster of the station will take as long as making it took :D

Like I said, there are other ways :)

Freak

27th Nov 2006, 13:15

Freak :fishslap: ! I'm not spending several hours re-composing the whole model just to show a bunch of gaps and holes! :)

Owww my first fishslap! :shiner:

tobian

27th Nov 2006, 14:19

Aww really? I got one of those within days of joining the forum! off Samurai as I recall, but all that stuff was lost in the old forum :) Of course asking for a new picture of the whole station should deserve a bigger fish, a whale maybe, or a Kraken? :D

Cheers Matt! :)

homerpalooza67

27th Nov 2006, 16:21

tobian

27th Nov 2006, 16:38

Yeah so I'd only then have the problem of transfering a model and maps weighting in at a few hundred megabytes... to hundreds of PC's which all need at least 2 gig or more of memory :D Could be timetaking, and costly hehe :D

tobian

28th Nov 2006, 15:07

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test96-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test96.jpg)

........... and another 9 hours later another test render finished :D Blurred reflections and radiosity are time taking to play with :D Pretty happy with them now, and the lights have a little more depth, though it's hard to see anything of the texture I used as they are 200% bright and oversaturated!

Freak

28th Nov 2006, 15:16

Kick ass man!

Martocticvs

28th Nov 2006, 18:22

Definitely looking better!

Glazy

28th Nov 2006, 20:20

This thread has gone on for so long I can't remember what this actually is anymore :) Superb looking interior though !

tobian

28th Nov 2006, 20:23

Haha! Is that an old joke? You're older! *runs* :D

For the hard of remembering, it's a space station :)

Melak

29th Nov 2006, 00:05

Woah! Your Station kicks serious a$$!! I don't think I've ever seen anyone doing such detailed interiors (ok there's IRML)! By the way, you said there's just one light..could you post a screenshot of the radiosity settinigs? (could be quite possible someone already asked you that, I'll look through the whole thread later..so If you already posted something like that, don't bother doing it again.)
One question though..How do you make those lamps illuminate the surrounding walls? is that a part of the Radiosity solution and are they just self illuminating? Could someone point me to the godly secret of these results?

Oh and tobian, don't forget to render us a little fly-through animation of the corridors :shiner:

tobian

29th Nov 2006, 00:27

9 hours a frame.. Hmm give me 5 years :D The corridor is not finished per say, just a simple clone set.. I have to build either end to it first, which will be a project for another day hehe :D

The radiosity solution it's self is really simple. I am using a plugin renderer for Lightwave known as F-prime (http://www.worley.com/fprime.html) which gives back semi-realtime rendering, and does progressive rendering for it's output renderer module. With things like this it's still fairly slow hehe! Basically the setup is ... press Tick box for radiosity in the F-prime settings box :D Seriously though... the 'light' surfaces simply have 'luminosity' - they self illuminate, and as with most other radiosity renderers, that means they give out light, as well as recieve, but they are set to 200% because self illuminated polygons just don't give out as much 'light' as a 100% bright light source. Of course because they give out light accross their surface, it results in very pleasing soft shadows (like having a few hundred area lights - with the resulting rendering hit!). As Matt has said I should probably bake a UV of the luminosity but I will wait till I am done modeling it, I may remove some of those handrails, as they are really poly heavy and eating too much ram ! hehe.

The radiosity type is montecarlo, which results in it's grainy appearance and there are faster ways of doing it, but for now, because I don't want to have to bake maps for a model which is unfinished, it's the best way to 'do it on the fly' !

TheGreatRaja

29th Nov 2006, 00:43

needs more cow bell :)

Looks awesome dude

tobian

29th Nov 2006, 16:33

Cow Bell? haha! Cheers Roger! :)

Sanderlee

29th Nov 2006, 16:37

This thread has gone on for so long I can't remember what this actually is anymore :) Superb looking interior though !

When it looks this good does it really matter what it is??!?

<golf clap>

Sanderlee.
... who thinks we need a golf clap smilie or emoticon ... :D

Glazy

29th Nov 2006, 18:02

When this is finished you'll all be wearing gold plated diapers !!!

tobian

29th Nov 2006, 18:08

So SFM readers will all be rich in the future? And very americanised apparently :P

Or are you trying to say it's never going to get finished? Which to be fair the title does imply (though as precedent I point to the Never ending story, which wasn't even particularly long :D)

Freak

30th Nov 2006, 08:45

^ I hear they are making another Never Ending Story movie, I think its part 6 or something like that.

tobian

30th Nov 2006, 10:15

No. 6?! There must have been 2 straight to video as I've only ever heard of 3! :)

And so I don't think it's not appreciated, thanks for your compliments Sanderlee, I forgot to say so while I was ragging on Glazy... for mocking me :P

JeffrySG

30th Nov 2006, 19:14

Great work on the station! the paneling work and the interiors are are really nicely done!

seanr

30th Nov 2006, 20:29

That is pretty freakin hot, though I expect no less of you, Tobian. Nice work.

mattc

1st Dec 2006, 01:36

The radiosity solution it's self is really simple. I am using a plugin renderer for Lightwave known as F-prime (http://www.worley.com/fprime.html) which gives back semi-realtime rendering, and does progressive rendering for it's output renderer module.

If you want, I can probably do a radiosity bake using KRay. Shouldn't take too long. Though not as fast as FPrime.

M

tobian

1st Dec 2006, 10:21

Thanks Jeffrey SG and SeanR, kind words! Glad you all like it!

Thanks mattc, I may yet take you up on that, it could be a good way to solve some problems with rendering it. I'm not all that familiar with KRay and what it's capable of, but it does sound good ! :D

scifieric

1st Dec 2006, 18:14

Neat station! I love all the detail!

Tovette

1st Dec 2006, 18:58

dang... fprime is fricking expensive... :\

I'm in love with this station :D

mattc

2nd Dec 2006, 04:12

dang... fprime is fricking expensive... :\

I'm in love with this station :D

worth every penny.

M

tobian

2nd Dec 2006, 09:48

F-prime is definatelly worth it! and to those who aren't familiar with it, it's not really capable of much more than Lightwave, though it's motionblur (till 9.2 which has better motion blur) is superior, as is it's DOF - oh and it's FASTER - and you can preview :)

Cheers for the nice comments guys! :)

Tovette

2nd Dec 2006, 17:55

How much faster is it?

JeffrySG

2nd Dec 2006, 22:19

How much faster is it?

Yeah, it would really be cool to see a scene rendered in LW9 radiosity and then the the same scene rendered with fPrime's radiosity and see what the time and quality differences are!

Maybe after you finish up the station and all the animations! :shiner:

and I just finished going through the whole thread, just WOW on all the great work! :thumb: :thumb:

mattc

3rd Dec 2006, 02:50

How much faster is it?

A 10 pass monte carlo radiosity rendering with 5 bounces of JDR's Y Wing takes about 1 minute on my dual core laptop.

It's quite frightening.

The same thing in LW would take an hour or so. Probably longer. Though expect changes on the LW side of the house as the LW 9.x cycle rolls along.

M.

Tovette

3rd Dec 2006, 02:54

A 10 pass monte carlo radiosity rendering with 5 bounces of JDR's Y Wing takes about 1 minute on my dual core laptop.

It's quite frightening.

The same thing in LW would take an hour or so. Probably longer. Though expect changes on the LW side of the house as the LW 9.x cycle rolls along.

M.

A minute? As in 60 seconds? Holy crapola.

mattc

3rd Dec 2006, 03:13

A minute? As in 60 seconds? Holy crapola.

There aretradeoffs mind you. No nodes, no post process filters, no shaders (apart from procedural) and scenes takes double the memory to render in FPrime that they do with LW.

M

JeffrySG

3rd Dec 2006, 05:32

There aretradeoffs mind you. No nodes, no post process filters, no shaders (apart from procedural) and scenes takes double the memory to render in FPrime that they do with LW.

M

so you can't use any image based textures with fPrime? or did I missunderstand that? and one minute for a 5 bounce rayd. render???? hooolllyyyeeee...

chrono

3rd Dec 2006, 06:06

dang... fprime is fricking expensive... :\

Well..... DUH!

Your paying for production designed software, not intended for none commerical use. Besides if someone can drop 650-1100 dollars on buying LW then they can get Fprime.

I just wish it was more standalone rather then being tyed to LW or a freaking dongle!

tobian keep chugging away! :thumb:

mattc

3rd Dec 2006, 22:25

so you can't use any image based textures with fPrime? or did I missunderstand that? and one minute for a 5 bounce rayd. render???? hooolllyyyeeee...

Yes, you can. Textures and Shaders in LW are different things. Nodes in 9.x can't be rendered yet either since the LW 9.x SDK doesn't allow interactive preview of nodal surfaces. Yet.

M.

tobian

3rd Dec 2006, 22:59

Dallidas

3rd Dec 2006, 23:14

Yes, you can. Textures and Shaders in LW are different things. Nodes in 9.x can't be rendered yet either since the LW 9.x SDK doesn't allow interactive preview of nodal surfaces. Yet.

M.

thats wierd...blender is beatig an expensive package at something!:D :D

tobian

3rd Dec 2006, 23:31

Uhm no - of course LIGHTWAVE can render it's own Nodes ! :P This is F-prime we're talking about, which is an external rendering application (albeit seamlessly integrated into Lightwave!) it's no different than all the other software which has problems integrating to third party renderers, unles ssomeone works long and hard trying to translate their shader and surface building code from one to the other.

Cheers for all your nice words guys ! :D

mattc

4th Dec 2006, 00:10

thats wierd...blender is beatig an expensive package at something!:D :D

Don't make me beat you.

M.

JeffrySG

4th Dec 2006, 00:36

Yeah basically to reiterate what matt said; The way you surface in lightwave is to build up textures, gradients and procedurals in your texture chanels (or plain values) and you can further suplement them with 'special effects' called Shaders. F-prime can access all of the basic surfacing properties as listed, except shaders, as is it is still an external programme and it can't fully access all of Lightwave's information. The node shading system is likewise closed to it, but Newtek and Worley are both working towards getting it to work. Since I never used shaders in the LW 8 + Version, everything works fine for the 9 version. I did have a play with the nodes on my surfaces, adding ambient occlusion, but it was so much slower to render it in lightwave's native renderer, compared to F-prime!

I would also like it if they built a standalone renderer, and a network renderer for it too, as it could change a lot of things: I'm surprised it hasn't been done to be honest!

OK, that makes much more sense! thx for the explanation on that!
I know fPrime is a lot faster but what type of speed gain are we talking about? Is the fPrime render 20min and the LW render 4hrs? just curious.

cheers!! and looking forward to some more sweet wip renders!

ps. yeah it would make sense to me that Newtek and Worley would get LW9 talking much better with fPrime... maybe by the time the UB Mac version comes out? who knows....

mattc

4th Dec 2006, 04:58

I know fPrime is a lot faster but what type of speed gain are we talking about? Is the fPrime render 20min and the LW render 4hrs? just curious.

Yes.

The problem with nodes currently is that you can't interactively preview them via the SDK the way you can with normal textures. It has to do with the way FPrime works. A hack, but a very ingenious hack.

M.

mikala

4th Dec 2006, 05:06

I'm hoping they get super ingenious over at Worley.
The combination of FPrime and nodes will be amazing result/time wise!

tobian

4th Dec 2006, 10:23

It's hard to say how much faster F-prime is really. It's not always faster, just on things like Radiosity and refraction it's a lot faster. Basically F-prime has two parts, - and interactive previewer and a renderer module.

The interactive previewer basically is what it sounds like - you launch it and it shows the current camera in a window, and progressivelly refines the image. For simple scenes and surfaces you can get almost instant feedback, for heavy scenes it can take a while to refresh. You can zoom in on areas (real-time) and check to see if you've got any problems with your model or composition etc. You can actually have several of these windows open, if you have the CPU strength to do it, each set to different cameras etc. Any time you alter something in the scene, a texture, surface, add a new object, light etc, the preview refreshes, and you see it as a preview again! Very handy if you want to test lighting set-ups and surface properties!

The render module outputs a file, rather than show you a preview, however every time it reaches a 'pass' it outputs an image file (of your choice) - so you can see what you are going to get, albeit grainier and less resolved than if you let it baked on.. However what's great about that is you can see what the render is going to look like (roughly) within a few minutes usually. To bake off a highly finished super-smooth render it can take hours and hours, maybe no faster than Lightwave? But the point is all the way along you know it's going to be fine.... there's nothing worse than to hit render, and come back 5-6 hours later only to discover you had a non-planar polygon, or your specular value wasn't high enough. Another cool trick (and this does work!) is you can take the files to another computer (F-prime creates a render output cache file) and then continue baking it!!.. You can stop and start as you like.

Ok so ends the Worley Advert, enough to say it rocks! :)

And yes, everyone who uses it wants it to work with Nodes!

tobian

24th Feb 2007, 09:09

Well believe it or not guys, I have actually done an update! WOO!

This is the shuttle-bay, without the connecting arms, but I am sure you can work out where they attach :) There's still quite a bit to do on here.. I've got to put a control desk in in the observation room, add a few more wires and cupboards and such to the walls of the interior. The exterior requires quite a bit more work too, adding more panels and updating the greeble puts (only one of which is done, as you can see).

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test97-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test97.jpg)http://comby.star-fleet.org/test98-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test98.jpg)http://comby.star-fleet.org/test99-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test99.jpg)

Gah it's a lot of work! :)

Pyrocitor

24th Feb 2007, 10:03

That is one GORGEOUS station man, it honestly looks like it could be real, the detail is amazing :thumb:

Oh and you might want to consider changing your sig now :)

Dannage

24th Feb 2007, 11:25

I always wondered what the sound of my jaw -actually- hitting the floor would sound like... Ouch...

Tovette

24th Feb 2007, 11:28

That is so awesome it's retarded. Lovin' it!

tobian

24th Feb 2007, 12:11

Haha cheers guys ! I could probably have went with a render-cheaper surface on that brushed metal, as unlike in the docking tube you can hardly see the subtle reflections, but it does help.. it just takes ages to get un-speckly :)

and I left the sig there, because it was funny, and I know Samurai IRL. I asked him to change my title, because it annoyed me and that was the best he could do :D

Aresius

24th Feb 2007, 12:34

lol... A flying module...

but looks nice...

Ozylot

24th Feb 2007, 12:52

Thats amazing.... simply amazing.

tobian

24th Feb 2007, 14:40

Cheers Ozylot. Any ideas and suggestions welcome.. I'm constantly running out of ideas haha :)

Elowan

24th Feb 2007, 15:50

Cheers Ozylot. Any ideas and suggestions welcome.. I'm constantly running out of ideas haha :)

Sure you are and I'm green with three heads.:p

tobian

24th Feb 2007, 15:57

Haha that's why I hang out here, to steal other peoples ideas :D

I have lots more to do! :)

Basill

24th Feb 2007, 16:07

Awesome stuff. :D

Dannage

24th Feb 2007, 16:22

Cheers Ozylot. Any ideas and suggestions welcome.. I'm constantly running out of ideas haha :)

I have an idea, be my modelling slave!

Haha that's why I hang out here, to steal other peoples ideas :D

Yeah.. er.. see, he finally comes clean. I er.. built this model and he's stealing my genius-ness.. Honest.. It's all my work... :p

tobian

24th Feb 2007, 16:41

Haha Yeah watch me blur as I make 3 or 4 polygons a week ! :D Watch my renders fly out as I find the slowest most CPU intensive method to render anything! :D

Thanks for your comments guys, glad you liked it! :D

Dannage

24th Feb 2007, 16:43

If it looks that good it's worth the wait!

Zardoz

25th Feb 2007, 00:57

Hell! I get really amazed by your work ! Your are doing a uber detailed station !!!

Jedilaw

25th Feb 2007, 01:31

Tobian, this is great stuff.

Would it be possible to get a hi-res shot of the entire station?

Thanks,

JL

JeffrySG

25th Feb 2007, 08:05

very sweet looking updates tobian!!! the renders look great!!

and I'll ask along with Jedilaw - any chance we can see a overall shot of the station?

cheers!

captainkirk

25th Feb 2007, 13:31

Really great! Does it have a modeled interior?

JDR

25th Feb 2007, 13:38

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test99-icon.jpg

What do you call that???

Dann-O

25th Feb 2007, 14:41

Some cool stuff. Excellent renders there too. So you need to have a render with a floor buffer there because the floors are so shiny I know someone has to go out and buff them every day.:o

nhall

25th Feb 2007, 15:29

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test99-icon.jpg

What do you call that???

I think he may be asking if the insides and the outsides are one model or separate models.... It's the only thing I can think of, because if that's not the case, I dunno how that question could have been asked, either.

Hellsgate

25th Feb 2007, 20:53

I'd like to see what the "Bridge" looks like on this one.

tobian

26th Feb 2007, 00:42

To help clear up any confusion, here is some older renders of the shuttlebay... http://comby.star-fleet.org/test63.jpg http://comby.star-fleet.org/test62.jpg - Yes it is one complete model of the shuttlebay inside and out, and with all floors modeled as a complete thing.. hence it is taking me a while to do, as it's very complex to do it all together! :D As you can also see that's a slightly less-detailed incarnation of the bay, which I am re-jigging slightly cleaning up and refining old detail (some of which I don't like as much anymore. Hopefully I will have some other views of the shuttlebay from different angles soon.

I may model the rest of the interiors, but in terms of poly-count it would be impractical to render untill I got some sort fo uber-128 bit multi-teraflop super computer to render it on.. as it is, my computer struggles with what I have haha :)

And to Jedilaw and JeffreySG, yes, you can ask! :D I have explained countless times, it would have large holes, bits missing and old bits which would look horrific next to the new and shiny bits with spanking detail! :) I render stuff when it's close to completion. As it is I had to pull together dozens of modeling layers, multiple times to pull that together for a render.. it's too much pain to do it for the whole station which exists across multiple model files. It's a big beast! :)

Freak

26th Feb 2007, 09:27

Wow Very nice tobian, that is a great update!

*cross fingers and hopes that day come soon, when get to see the whole station*

Dannage

26th Feb 2007, 17:54

You know, if you were my slave, I'd give you occasional PC updates. :D

Jedilaw

26th Feb 2007, 20:22

And to Jedilaw and JeffreySG, yes, you can ask! :D I have explained countless times, it would have large holes, bits missing and old bits which would look horrific next to the new and shiny bits with spanking detail! :) I render stuff when it's close to completion. As it is I had to pull together dozens of modeling layers, multiple times to pull that together for a render.. it's too much pain to do it for the whole station which exists across multiple model files. It's a big beast! :)

Yikes, sounds nasty! Well, how about the largest beauty shot you can give us of the best-looking part of the exterior?

tobian

21st Mar 2007, 23:43

Oh look a full station render!!!!

... with the rest of the station cloaked! :D

http://comby.star-fleet.org/test100-icon.jpg (http://comby.star-fleet.org/test100.jpg)

Been working on the top of the docking bay and I got the urge to render, as I was nearly finished, to see how it all was looking. Apart from a few weightmap errors, and the dreaded white speckles appearing again, I think it's working out pretty good! :D

Aresius

21st Mar 2007, 23:46

indeed... looks very good...

Martocticvs

21st Mar 2007, 23:47

A likely story! Looking good though - although you missed a load of white speckles around the edge...

Dallidas

22nd Mar 2007, 00:09

damn, i was hoping for an uncloaked shot...o well...

looks great! what are these specks you speak of?

tobian

22nd Mar 2007, 00:15

I painted them out in photoshop.. it seems to be a curious bug in fprime that if there's an area light in the scene, sometimes, speckles appear on the reverse-lit seams of the model. Annoying! :) With enough baking they were almost gone, but there is nothing in it to explain why they were there at all haha

Cheers for the compliments guys, oh and Martocticititus was talking about the stars :P