Gal Trek™: The Delta Flyer

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The Delta Flyer

(Click thumbnail images for larger version)

Polygon Count (triangles): 25,875. A little high for a "tiny" model, but what the hell!
Defuse Mapping: Yep!
Light Mapping: Check.
Normal Mapping: Not this time.
Ship Builder Hardware Mounts: As always.
Hours of my life, lost forever: Oh, I would say about 7.

At a higher poly count then I was shooting for, here is the Delta Flyer, from Voyager.  This hull will most likely fall under the “Tiny” class in GalCiv2. Performance is O.K. I had 10 of these things in the scene and still pushed 20fps.   This will definitely be a model pack for those with reasonable systems.

Notice the light mapping in unlit areas.  I am still looking for a good way to render this detail in max, but right now my only solution is to turn all the ambient lights off in the scene, “Render To Texture” a second time, and then Photoshop up a subset of those textures to make light maps. For me, this involves getting more intimate with Curves in Photoshop then I had originally intended to.  This is ok if I am only doing one or two ships, but having to process light maps for more then 10 hulls gets a little tedious.

Remember that I display all my models here using the “large” ship hull, so some of these (the Delta Flyer included) will actually be smaller hulls when the pack is finished. Again, any ship suggestions, or advice for which ship should be in which class would be appreciated, so let me know. Here is the updated tentative list so far:

Cargo: Oberth (120m)
Tiny: Shuttle (<10m) [Finished. link to my thread],
Delta Flyer (~10m) [Finished.]
Small: ? <prayer> please god, no more ships </prayer>
Medium:

Magellan (?m) [Finished. link to my thread] - I might scap this one and redo it.
NX (225m),
Miranda (Reliant) (243m),
Defiant (120m) [Finished.link to my thread]
Large: Intrepid (344m) [WIP],
Excelsior (467m) [WIP],
Prometheus (414m),
Huge: Galaxy (643m),
Sovereign (685m),

If you are interested in using this model pack, please post a reply to this thread so that I know what kind of user base to expect.

Cheers.

-Brian
[email protected]

19,349 views 21 replies
Reply #1 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Hells yes! Bumping for brilliance. I definately want to whoop the Drengin with these
Star Control: Origins
Reply #3 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Awesome, you sir rock!

And maybe a steam runner for cargo/small class?
Reply #4 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Pretty as hell, but all of these are just way too high poly count. Looking at the wireframe, you're modeling the shape of the cockpit window frame - why not do that in texture map instead of geometry? I just see tons of places where you could get by with 1/4 the triangles, and if you did so, you'd make the models accessable to many more users (as well as making your portfolio much more impressive to anyone looking for game modelers rather than movie modelers, incidentally).
Reply #5 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Contact me at [email protected], I can help with the PhotoShop work and maybe some other things, except MAX, as I use Maya exclusively.
Reply #8 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Absolutely. . . and then to suck more hours of your life away. . .you can move on to othe groups in the Federation and outside the Federation. . .Andorians, Cardassians. . . .oh the hours of life that will be sucked away. . ..
Reply #9 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
What, no star base designs?

(runs and hides under a log in Elk Snout, Tn)
Reply #10 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Hey I have a request.

Can you make a couple of generic saucer models in small/large/huge that we can hook stuff onto to make our own?

These look good I will try them. Thanks.
Reply #14 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
I know that you don't want to move the Defiant to Small because you want it to have more hitpoints, but it may be a good idea to move it there.
Reply #15 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
coool ... I'd definetly use these ... I agree with the poly count though, never hurts to optimize and use a texture map when it will let you reduce poly count.
Reply #16 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
im in for sure!!!!!!....this is some aewsome work!!!!!...how about a romulan warbird??????
Reply #17 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Droooooooling.

Please upload them ASAP. I want them.
Reply #18 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
awesome work spleeze, i had missed this one until seeing your reply to that latest star trek thread, nicely done this looks great.
Reply #19 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
Very nice work!
Reply #21 from GalCiv2 Forums Top
This one might get re-done. I would like to see the poly count < 10k. I am already taking another shot at the magallan

-Brian