Star Trek Stuff

[scifidude79]

"Jean-Luc, if I may ask, how many people are there on board?"
"One thousand fourteen, including your guest, Dr. Quaice."
"Is there something wrong with that count?"
"No, that's the exact number there should be."

-Episode "Remember Me"

So, I guess the 1,014 does include the civilians.

Assuming there are only 200 (at most) civilians on board, that would put the officers and crew at a little over 800. Given the size of the ship, that actually strengthens my statement about increased automation. The ship I'm doing is from roughly 20 years prior to the launch of the Enterprise-D, and the Enterprise-D was the most advanced ship in the fleet at launch, so that means it would likely have the best of everything, including automation systems.

[Freak]

I would put the Civilians a little higher than that. Don't forget that there are Civilians who worked on the ship that where not members of Starfleet and where not there because of a spouse. Keiko and Guinan are prime example of this.
There also the episode where Worf takes Alexander to school and their where about 20 kids in it. Though I can't remember if that was a mix age class or not. If was not then there would be more classes but some of them would be mixed aged groups due to the number of kids aboard close to that age.

But yes I agree the Enterprise is the most automation ship to that point.

[scifidude79]

Yeah, it's really unclear. I'm still shooting for 350 for the crew of my ship. It's a good number. This type of ship, being a smaller ship of the time, would likely do missions mainly inside of Federation space. Those missions would vary, so they'd need a variety of personnel aboard.

[scifidude79]

I bought another computer. This one is a refurbished Dell laptop. It's been totally refurbished, cleaned up and it looks like they maybe upgraded things like the hard drive, RAM and WIFI adapter. They also put a brand new copy of Windows 10 Pro on it. That means I can once again run Windows only software, such as Lightwave. So, I'm determined to finish this ship.

Unfortunately, while I had the project files and blueprints backed up, I didn't have the files to align the blueprints with the background. So, I had to line them back up. They're not perfect, but they're close enough. If I was after the perfect version of the TOS Enterprise, it may be more of a concern. But, that ship sailed when I started adding stuff to the model that wasn't on the original. So, close enough will do. Anyway, I added the deflector and planetary sensor, before I got into dorking around with materials.









This is after playing around with materials:



Lightwave 2018 uses newer materials than Lightwave 10, the last version I had before purchasing the upgrade last year. It uses Principled BSDF materials, which is also what Blender uses with its Cycles render engine. I had been cheating in Lightwave and using the old style "Standard" materials, which were only left in there so that you didn't have to redo the materials on older models that you imported. (unlike Blender) But, I decided to switch over to the Principled BSDF instead. Really, it has so many improvements over the older style materials that I can see why it's the standard now.

Anywho, it's nice using Lightwave again. I don't know what this means as far as my work in Blender. Buying this computer was a spur of the moment decision because the other laptop I have is terrible and I know people in the Linux community who swear by these Latitude E series laptops. But, it's also not the speediest thing for rendering. It gets the job done, though. I also may purchase Windows 10 for my desktop computer, but the jury is out on that one. There are still things I like better about Lightwave than Blender, and that will never change. And, it's not like I can't either import that ship I'm working on or just rebuild it. (rebuilding it will probably be easier)

[scifieric]

Really stellar work, Chris.  Outstanding!

[Prime_8]

looks, good man.

I ditched all my old 3d tools almost now. I can do all the my stuff in blender 2.8 now. yep I think I can do all I usually do in  B2.8

to me, Blender 2.8+ is nothing like its earlier incarnation the 2.7-. The new UI just makes more sense to me. But you can use its tolls to make the UI mostly like teh old 2.7 , however, the lead dev has said they will not be moving in that direction in the future.


lol don't buy win 10, just instal and never activate. it will only nag you.
see this video when you get a chance. https://youtu.be/Xzbrhbrejqo
NOAB  he's  good for us low bucks guys

[scifidude79]

Thanks guys.

The things I don't like about Blender have nothing to do with the UI. I've never really had a problem with Blender's UI. In fact, I mainly know where things are in 2.79b. The issues I have are with some of the tools and how they work VS how they work in Lightwave. I just prefer Lightwave. I also paid $400 for the upgrade from LW10 to LW2018, so I might as well use it some more.

I also don't watch YouTube videos, with very few excpetions. I do know what you're talking about, though. You get that "Windows isn't activated" thing in the bottom of your screen and you can't use account services.

[Freak]

Looking Good Chris.

I hope you finish the other ship in Blender instead of moving it over to / start over in LW.

[scifidude79]

Thanks Dean. We'll see.

[Prime_8]

lol , i have a valid copy and i do have a MS account but it's not active on this rig . i have local Admin account and a local super user. I do all my daily grind in superuser.

Also, there is a registry hack that removes that watermark.

Also i knwo what you mean about being familiar with the tool. I was totally 3ds Max &  and then 9  and then F' them  LOL
i had some other tools from various  Humble bundle deals.  Then Max changed stuff, and well it was or felt like total fucker with the  UI and tools.

I gotta say im glad i never fully learned Blender under the old UI, so it's actually easier for me to pick up.

I hope you get some good mesh smiting outta the new rig.

[scifidude79]

I was looking at Microsoft's website this morning and it looks like all I have to do to put Windows 10 on another computer is download a utility to my laptop and create installation media from that. All I need is a licensed copy of Windows, a flash drive and that utility.

[Prime_8]

I was looking at Microsoft's website this morning and it looks like all I have to do to put Windows 10 on another computer is download a utility to my laptop and create installation media from that. All I need is a licensed copy of Windows, a flash drive and that utility.

Yep .
it quite automated ..  i knwo you hate videos but you might wanna watch one or read as how to skip the simpler telemetry stuff. There are a few things you cna pick during a clean install.

[scifidude79]

I don't hate videos, I hate YouTube. I'm honestly not that fond of Google in general right now. But, I'm too invested in their services and have an Android phone, so there's no backing out at present.

[scifidude79]

I'm still thinking of at least purchasing a Home license for my desktop. After all, it's my money. I get paid on Thursday and Amazon can have it to me the next day. I might as well use those Prime benefits now, I canceled and my Prime membership expires on July 11th.

I'm playing with ideas for the bussard collectors. It took trying out a few different things to get to this point.





The light spill on the hull is there, but not as high as I'd like it to be, but I think I know the setting to change on my glass material. I'm using a Dielectric shader for the glass, as it's supposed to more accurately simulate glass than Principled BSDF does.

Since those renders, I've further tweaked the bussards and increased the luminous setting on my impulse engine glow.

[scifieric]

You could always record the front of the warp engines and then project the light from the recording onto the saucer hull.  It's cheating, but if you're not cheating, you're not trying hard enough!

Actually, it looks terrific, Chris!  Great job!