In my quest to come up with a recognizably Star Trek ship that isn't just another rehash of the Enterprise, I've been futzing around with the following design. This is just a concept model, so it's extremely basic. Any comments or critiques are most welcome.

Guy

Maybe do a new function for a trek ship. Like try a modular design with different shaped modules for different missions or a carrier. Good start.

The wit of a misplaced ex-patriot.
I cheated on my metaphysics exam by looking into the soul of the person next to me.

My latest progress. I think I like this version enough that I may start working on the details now. Let me know what you think.

My goal with this design was to come up with a design that fit somewhere between the NX-01 and the NCC-1701, without being yet another kitbash of either one.  I haven't seen any fan-designed ship that has the twin nacelles vertically aligned, nor with the two pylons per nacelle arrangement.

 I also wanted to follow, or at least not seriously break, Gene Roddenberry's rules on starship design. I moved the bridge unit forward; it's the only part of the ship that really defies Roddenberry's rules. (Well, the nacelles are slightly obstructed from the front view, but not completely.) I rationalize that the bridge sits in the center of the oil drum, if not the saucer itself.  Since this is a sort of experimental design from the early days of starship design, I figure the rules might not have been too well established.

The little box at the back of the dark wedge shape is a placeholder for the shuttlecraft hangar.

Roddenberry's starship design rules, incidentally, are at http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/articles/design.htm

It is starting to come togather :)

I like the nacell setup. 

Dyslexia: creatively misspelling won word at a time even with a spell checker.

Canon is for those lacking imagination. The star fleet engineers would still be building NX 01's if they were made up of people insisting on things being canon.

I love seeing something different. Keep up the good work.

Oh, I'm not even trying for anything canonical; I really just want something interesting-looking. Thanks for the compliment!

Guy

Looking really good! I like how you're refining the mesh and details. I agree with Cyba. In this case "Canon" could be a crutch for a person with lesser imagination. It definitely is "interesting looking".:)

I haven't had much time this week to work on it, but I should add some more refinements tonight, especially to the nacelles.

If those drive supporting members were slanted back they'd be better able to withstand and transmit acceleration forces when the drive is on.

A good point pearce, I think a V might look cool (one slanting forward one backward,)

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Toolset: Blender, GIMP, Indigo Render, LuxRender, TopMod, Knotplot, Ivy Gen, Plant Studio.

I considered that, but a couple of things made me go with the current shape: 1) I'm still pretty new at this, and the straight pylons were easier than the slanted pylons. 2) I'm sort of using the Christopher Pike-era as a starting point and working backwards from there; my current thought is that this ship predates the NCC-1701 by a couple of decades, so the straight pylons make more sense.  (Yeah, I know, the NX-01 and numerous fan-designed pre-TOS ships shoot a hole in that argument, but I'm following my muse here.)

When I have time to sit down and work on the pylons seriously, I'll try it out and see what I can do with the slanted pylons. Thanks for the suggestion!

Guy

Actually it always seemed to me that having the drives offset from the centreline of the ship would cause it to pitch downward under acceleration, and go in circles LOL.  But you can't get too bogged down in technical reality or you lose the fantasy element, so follow your muse by all means :)

They have all sorts of impossible stuff anyway.

Been working on the nacelles.

Nice looking nacelles. starting to shape up there.

The wit of a misplaced ex-patriot.
I cheated on my metaphysics exam by looking into the soul of the person next to me.

Very productive work late last night. I added or changed a number of things. The "outer saucer" now has a chunk of "pie" cut out and visible from the front, exposing the navigational deflector as well as the "inner saucer".

I added a horizontal central cylinder to house the navigational deflectors (fore) and the hangar (aft). 12 lights serve to guide approaching ships to the rectangular hangar door.

There are 3 single-mount phasers on the top of the "drum", and 3 more on the bottom. There are 2 more rear-mounted phasers above and below the hangar entrance, but that's just because I couldn't figure out a better placement at this time. Comments are welcome.

I don't have any photon torpedo launcers set up at this time, and I'm not sure where I want to place them. To port and starboard of the navigational deflector, maybe?

I wanted the impulse engines to look relatively antiquated (compared to the 1701), so I made them big and boxy, and gave them circular exhaust vents (as opposed to the standard square ones).

I played around with the nacelles a bit more, adding an illuminated cylinder for the blue "warp glow" effect. I know this wasn't a TOS feature, but heck, if the NX-01 has it, why not this ship, too?

Comments, as always, are appreciated.

Guy

Now for some size comparisons with the NCC-1701.

I had to fiddle around with the scale a bit to get the size right. The impression I'm going for is that my ship is a bit antiquated next to the Connie.  How do you think it stacks up?

I scaled it up some more. This is amore what I had in mind.Guy

Startign to look really good. A bit more with teh textures and it will be set. Maybe ready for a fan film.

The wit of a misplaced ex-patriot.
I cheated on my metaphysics exam by looking into the soul of the person next to me.

Looking good. One thing that looks a liitle odd is the arc of the antenna dish, there's a huge difference between yours and the connie, makes it look alittle odd when side by side

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Toolset: Blender, GIMP, Indigo Render, LuxRender, TopMod, Knotplot, Ivy Gen, Plant Studio.

Looks very ST-universe inspired regardless of what some people claim for conventions. Who says it can't be an "alien" adaptation of warp drive technology, then it doesn't have to abide by the Federation "conventions" of spaceship design. If I didn't know any better, I'd swear there was a Ferengi vessel in one STNG episode that almost looked like what you put together.

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Quote - Looking good. One thing that looks a liitle odd is the arc of the antenna dish, there's a huge difference between yours and the connie, makes it look alittle odd when side by side

 

Thanks! Of course, this is intended to be an older ship than the connie, so various details would be different.

Guy