USS CYGNUS---has anyone ever built it?
- Thread starter Deacon
- Start date
Dave, my pleasure. I'd suggest starting a new thread in the "General modeling" section when you get to the stage of having anything to show, I guess.
Here's a couple of renders showing the underside structure of the central module and its control compartment, and the inboard structure where it joins the main corridor/spine. These modules were built "wild" so there is some framing along the joining faces. I haven't added in the landing gear units and the armature housings onto which the module slid as yet.
Structures were built as drawn for gross details and outline but finer details vary a lot. For example, the 'hub' at the bottom of the control compartment was supposed to be festooned with antennae, but they never added these.
Here's a couple of renders showing the underside structure of the central module and its control compartment, and the inboard structure where it joins the main corridor/spine. These modules were built "wild" so there is some framing along the joining faces. I haven't added in the landing gear units and the armature housings onto which the module slid as yet.
Structures were built as drawn for gross details and outline but finer details vary a lot. For example, the 'hub' at the bottom of the control compartment was supposed to be festooned with antennae, but they never added these.
PrimitiveDave
Active Member
Cool pics Martyn! They are really starting to take shape!
I should be getting a few more pieces back soon. I will start a new thread in General Modeling to post them.
I should be getting a few more pieces back soon. I will start a new thread in General Modeling to post them.
Some intermodule connectors. These were originally intended to be the mount points for an extra network of travel tubes running along the tops and sides of the centre modules.
Some of these tubes entered the hull at the trapezoids under the lower half of the "hexagon" details - which were built as drawn, but the production either removed the extra tube network, or never built it.
Some of these tubes entered the hull at the trapezoids under the lower half of the "hexagon" details - which were built as drawn, but the production either removed the extra tube network, or never built it.
PrimitiveDave
Active Member
The new pics are awesome Martyn! I figured the landing gear looked something like that, but it's really hard to tell from the one screen cap I have, and even when viewing the movie the shadows disguise the shape.
Cheers Dave. Have PMd you about some orthos etc. Not the final ones, just stuff I had lying around. Still adding too many elements right now. Will be ready in the next couple of days though. Here are a few more recent ones.
To answer your question on tweaks, the smaller X-braces at each end on the upper face are still not quite right. They don't go underneath the "railing" which surrounds the top face, instead they're simply *smaller* fore-and-aft than the other eight bays. IIRC there were other things too but that's what sticks in memory - I'll have to have another look, not logged into that email at present.
Oh, this is officially "Fuel Module A", by the way.
Lots of stuff still to go in; it has walkways, doors, pressurized buildings inside the framework and a full face of framing, front and rear.
To answer your question on tweaks, the smaller X-braces at each end on the upper face are still not quite right. They don't go underneath the "railing" which surrounds the top face, instead they're simply *smaller* fore-and-aft than the other eight bays. IIRC there were other things too but that's what sticks in memory - I'll have to have another look, not logged into that email at present.
Oh, this is officially "Fuel Module A", by the way.
Lots of stuff still to go in; it has walkways, doors, pressurized buildings inside the framework and a full face of framing, front and rear.PrimitiveDave
Active Member
Cool Martyn! I have to think about these sections a bit. I don't know whether it will be better to make the tanks out of more traditional materials like plastic tubing and hemispheres or to render them. I guess I'll have to upload the complete version and see what they want to charge me for them...
PrimitiveDave
Active Member
Thanks Martyn -- these should help me finish up my outboard module. Then I can send off for test parts!
Pleasure, Dave. Can't wait to see.
Ohhhhh...holy effing carp, I just had a revelation. Thirty-three years and I'm still having bloody obvious insights I should have spotted as a kid. Gorblimey. Tonight's was this - was just going through my screencaps for the first time in a while. Look:
It's green! Always thought the structure was painted - grey more or less. Lots of weathering, shabby aging with washes, etc. It's not, is it? It's all chemical. They soldered the thing up out of brass and copper and then sprayed it with ammonium chloride and it's all verdigrised and patinated. Yeah?
D'OH!!!! :lol
This actually makes it twice as beautiful, to me; I've got a totally inordinate love of copper oxides. Half my house is done in faux verdrigris.
Ohhhhh...holy effing carp, I just had a revelation. Thirty-three years and I'm still having bloody obvious insights I should have spotted as a kid. Gorblimey. Tonight's was this - was just going through my screencaps for the first time in a while. Look:
It's green! Always thought the structure was painted - grey more or less. Lots of weathering, shabby aging with washes, etc. It's not, is it? It's all chemical. They soldered the thing up out of brass and copper and then sprayed it with ammonium chloride and it's all verdigrised and patinated. Yeah?
D'OH!!!! :lol
This actually makes it twice as beautiful, to me; I've got a totally inordinate love of copper oxides. Half my house is done in faux verdrigris.
Last edited:
Whatever you guys decide to make your replicas out of, I hope you take into consideration what happened to the original shooting miniature!
I swear --- I think the toughest shooting miniature I've ever heard of was the 8-foot Enterprise from Star Trek The Motion Picture! It survived multiple special effects companies (including a DP who wanted to blow it up for real!), rewiring, repaints, storage, and display around the world.
Compare that to stories about other models that just haven't held up all that well over the years or disintegrated in cases over time... Sure, the Enterprise was restored and repainted a few times but the basic structure has held up very well.
Surely, there's got to be something lightweight yet much stronger now that will hold up better than the material the original Cygnus miniature was made of...
(Now that I think about it, that miniature really does kind of look like the Eiffel Tower with all the criss-crossing girders right down to a similar "crown" on the highest spire! Creepy-looking, too. A real ghost ship... The end of The Black Hole gave me nightmares when I was younger...)
I swear --- I think the toughest shooting miniature I've ever heard of was the 8-foot Enterprise from Star Trek The Motion Picture! It survived multiple special effects companies (including a DP who wanted to blow it up for real!), rewiring, repaints, storage, and display around the world.
Compare that to stories about other models that just haven't held up all that well over the years or disintegrated in cases over time... Sure, the Enterprise was restored and repainted a few times but the basic structure has held up very well.
Surely, there's got to be something lightweight yet much stronger now that will hold up better than the material the original Cygnus miniature was made of...
(Now that I think about it, that miniature really does kind of look like the Eiffel Tower with all the criss-crossing girders right down to a similar "crown" on the highest spire! Creepy-looking, too. A real ghost ship... The end of The Black Hole gave me nightmares when I was younger...)
Similar threads
