humm... shows promise but I'm not sure about a few things.
Crits:
Design and planning seem to be your enemies, but with practice you'll be able to work those into the beginning stages and avoid a lot of rework.
- It seems like a lot of your detail is just tossed on to fill empty spaces and doesnt' really provide function. While that's a hallmark of Sci-Fi (particularity bad sci-fi) it can help to think about function which will give birth to all kinds of details. You have to consider who is going to build this craft, probably a military, they ever build for style only function why spend money on an easy chairs when a few cheap poles and some canvas will do the job.
- The engines don't rotate. Because this is a drop ship it needs to be a VTOL (Vertical Take-Off and Landing). With the fixed engines, its a CTOL (Conventional Take-off and Landing) which is vastly inferior to VTOL in terms of being able to drop people in tough places as it requires a runway. It's a lesson the military of today have already discovered so why take a step back in the future? It would also mean creating hinges and joints (detail) in an area that's pretty blocking and uninteresting.
- I don't think you need to model each fan blade or even the inside of the engines. That seems like details you can do with straight texture?
- There doesn't seem to be any real way to see outside. I think the metal plates on the top might be windows, but they face up, not forward and there doesn't seem to be any way to look down where you're landing. Traditionally helicopters are used to drop troops off in places and the pilots have a lot of visibility.
- The landing feet being right under the center of gravity make it pretty likely that it could tip over. Maybe the legs should have a joint that allows them to unfold farther away.
- The edge flow and unwrap are a little sloppy, some of the straight seams are wavy and distorted.
- All of the gun ports face forward, take a page from some other gunships like the AC 130 or some bombers like the B-17, or the B-52. You want to provide as safe a place and defend the ship while its coming and going.
- There seems to be a lot of damage and chipped paint. A very small part of most military vehicles life span is spent in combat, the rest of the time they're being maintained and stored, things like battle damage or chipped paint are signs of lazy maintenance crews and those people that fail to properly maintain the vehicles, are disciplined. So most equipment will look brand new unless it has just been damaged.
Ahh yea I missed those, I went from the first post to the last, probably should of read the whole thing.
With the Cicada (done by 3point, Perna I think?) the fans are hinged and rotate.
With the Helghast Dropship (modeled by Chris Edmod who posts here) they solved the vertical take off issues much like a hairier does with directional vents. It has a mechanical explanation for the transition from vertical to horizontal thrust which is something I think might of helped to design in, but now I'm not sure you need to go back and rework it, just keep in mind that design and function can heavily influence detail. Also notice the highly detailed under side of the helghast which contrasts with the outer "shell". It leads people to think this area is more delicate and needs to be protected like an insect's under body.
Replies
Crits:
Design and planning seem to be your enemies, but with practice you'll be able to work those into the beginning stages and avoid a lot of rework.
- It seems like a lot of your detail is just tossed on to fill empty spaces and doesnt' really provide function. While that's a hallmark of Sci-Fi (particularity bad sci-fi) it can help to think about function which will give birth to all kinds of details. You have to consider who is going to build this craft, probably a military, they ever build for style only function why spend money on an easy chairs when a few cheap poles and some canvas will do the job.
- The engines don't rotate. Because this is a drop ship it needs to be a VTOL (Vertical Take-Off and Landing). With the fixed engines, its a CTOL (Conventional Take-off and Landing) which is vastly inferior to VTOL in terms of being able to drop people in tough places as it requires a runway. It's a lesson the military of today have already discovered so why take a step back in the future? It would also mean creating hinges and joints (detail) in an area that's pretty blocking and uninteresting.
- I don't think you need to model each fan blade or even the inside of the engines. That seems like details you can do with straight texture?
- There doesn't seem to be any real way to see outside. I think the metal plates on the top might be windows, but they face up, not forward and there doesn't seem to be any way to look down where you're landing. Traditionally helicopters are used to drop troops off in places and the pilots have a lot of visibility.
- The landing feet being right under the center of gravity make it pretty likely that it could tip over. Maybe the legs should have a joint that allows them to unfold farther away.
- The edge flow and unwrap are a little sloppy, some of the straight seams are wavy and distorted.
- All of the gun ports face forward, take a page from some other gunships like the AC 130 or some bombers like the B-17, or the B-52. You want to provide as safe a place and defend the ship while its coming and going.
- The ports themselves are un-aerodynamic and would attract FOD in areas you do not want it. You probably want to create webbing or some kind of flexible cover or shield to fix that problem or just do open ports.
- There seems to be a lot of damage and chipped paint. A very small part of most military vehicles life span is spent in combat, the rest of the time they're being maintained and stored, things like battle damage or chipped paint are signs of lazy maintenance crews and those people that fail to properly maintain the vehicles, are disciplined. So most equipment will look brand new unless it has just been damaged.
With the Cicada (done by 3point, Perna I think?) the fans are hinged and rotate.
With the Helghast Dropship (modeled by Chris Edmod who posts here) they solved the vertical take off issues much like a hairier does with directional vents. It has a mechanical explanation for the transition from vertical to horizontal thrust which is something I think might of helped to design in, but now I'm not sure you need to go back and rework it, just keep in mind that design and function can heavily influence detail. Also notice the highly detailed under side of the helghast which contrasts with the outer "shell". It leads people to think this area is more delicate and needs to be protected like an insect's under body.