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It could work, but for now, speaking for myself, I kind of picture the ring being about half way between the ship and the balloon with a more secure rope and netting arrangement. I'm thinking something like what is shown in the image below... only with one less ring and with rope netting in place of the clothe balloon sheath. Ever seen the airship in the movie "Island at the Top of the World"? The airship in that film had rope netting similar to what I am imaging if I remember correctly.
I think I know what you mean ... This example has some really cool properties. Have some fun with it :D
Hmmmm... good pickup 7thStone... I was just incrementally modelling things as they came.
Aidana - below is a sample of where I'd probably mount the balloon and ring. Do you think it looks okay? (I'm not sure what this does to the scale of the boat... purely "eyeing it" for now). Anyway, the point is that the balloon ends up being a little offset from where the football was - mainly in order to fit the ring in. I can rework the rigging pattern if needed (though I'd prefer not to <(^_^)), if the balloon absolutely needs to be as in the photo.</p>
EDIT: reading back through the commentary so far, I see I was mistaken. The _hull_ is indeed 70'... which means the balloon is some 90-100' long, and therefore my ring is proportionally too large. I rather like it that way though <(^_^)...</p>
Staring at the design, that ring turns out to be rather problematic (from a "balance" perspective)... if it wasn't there, then the guy ropes could run straight up from the ship to the balloon, and I think 7thStone's concerns about load distribution might be allayed a bit. Then again, since the Author did explicitly specify a ring was involved, perhaps that's a plot point in one of the books... I can see there being a lot of swinging back and forth in turbulent air though... with the ring point as a pivot *insert seasick emoticon* ;-)
I sent the author an email and some of the latest drafts, mentioning some of the issues. He's pretty good about getting back to me, so hopefully we'll have a response soon.
We have some wiggle room, guys ... My email to the author:
Me:
Running into physics problems ...
Following your specs, we see a few design flaws ...
I get why the ring is needed, but as small as it is in relation to the balloon, it would make a definite pivot point, casing the ship to swing a lot in the slightest wind. See the attached drafts ... (I shared MFMs drafts)
Note in the final pic, the ring directing the ropes is much larger, nestling the balloon and allowing the ropes to be further apart. (7's example)
Author:
Ah, I see. Brilliant! I have not included this ring in any stories, so you can do pretty much anything with it and it stays canon. I like the setup in your color picture. Is that the one you favor? (I showed him how the balloon is contained in 7's example)
I had been considering using it as a platform, like a crow's nest, but haven't found the right time for that, because, what the hell do they need a crow's nest for, they live in a crow's nest! If the color picture is the way you want to portray it, I'm right there with you, and thanks for pointing this out.
Me:
Awesome :D ... So the only part that's really detailed in the text already is the boat itself. Right? The rest, other than the fins and football shape, is pretty much free to play with. Right?
Author:
That is correct. The fins have been mentioned, and the shape of the gasbag has been hinted at, but not really stated as football-shaped. That's the way I visualize it, and while the shape is very portly, it gets the most gas into a semi-streamlined shape.
MFM ... What if we make that ring large enough to cradle the balloon, like a bubble wand holds a bubble in it's ring? then any netting can go through minor rings on the main ring, and have a much broader base to go from to the attachments on the boat. This would also allow for a more intricate netting design, leading to the cradle ring, without necessarily needing more ropes going to the boat. Wouldn't it?
If we make the cradle ring double as a platform, handy for in-air repairs, that would be cool ...
Like this?
(the magenta is the proposed "platform" with guard-rail and no risers yet... I'm not sure what that "feels" like it would do to aerodynamics...).
Certainly the larger ring (and the correspondingly wider anchorage to the hull) fixes the "pivotting" of the previous (narrow, 10' ring) design (^_^)d.
(the orthogonal "netting" was easiest to do - I can probably do an "X"-shaped net similar to 7thStone's example (at the edges), but that'll require considerably more fiddling... I also have half a mind to make the balloon "bulge" a little between the ropes... which again is easiest to do with this arrangement...).
(I also want to convert the ring from the rectangular cross-section that it is now, to at least octagonal, so that there's less stress on the "minor rings"... and project the ties (currently in line with the ropes X) to be radiating from centre (rather than all parallel to each other)...).
Okay _that_ was a lot easier than initially thought... :D.
Nice work MFM! Aidana should really put you on the payroll.
This is looking awesome, M. :D
I've been telling M for some time now, FSM, that the models made for my covers would definitely sell at rendo or here. Don't you think?
And although I always make it clear I am willing to compensate, this one DEFINITELY will need reward :D
Nice job M F M. ;-)
The diagonal X shaped netting adds interest and character to the airship design doesn't it. At least I think it does, :coolsmile:
Making the balloon bulge a little between the ropes is exactly what I intended to do. Great minds thinking alike and all that. lol
:red:
... improved the "platform" section of the ring, and added proper mounting points for the balloon stays... can I get back down to the deck now Aidana? (^/\^)
Airship is looking great, M F M.
Aidana:
Sent you the finished dagger. Check your mail. Let me know if you did not receive it.
Thanks DaremoK3, and your hiltwork looks impressive - thats all displacement mapping there?
... looks like she won't be needing a letter opener to open her mail... ;-).
Some further cabin work...
From the point of view of airship weight, I'm wondering if that railing around the deck wouldn't be made of posts with ropes running between them, rather than the solid white "fence" that appears in the reference photos (`.`)> (and is a solid grey slab below)...
I should be posting images of the airship model this weekend...
In the meantime... More airship questions while keeping in mind that 100% accuracy is not required as stated by the author...
~~~
Balloon Rigging Hook Beams:
-- I was wondering if the vertical hook beams on the side of the ship, five to a side, are described in the books and therefore should be kept as shown in the images and as described? To be honest, I think there are better ways to attach the balloon's rigging to the ship's hull, but I do like the look of the vertical beams on the ship's sides. The hook atop each vertical beam bothers me aesthetically and functionally, though, and the images don't really show what the hooks should look like. If this hook structure is describe in the books can a passage describing them be shared to give a better idea of how they should be designed and the rigging attached?
-- Should the vertical hook beams be attached to the side of the ship's hull in a particular way? For example, the beams look like they may only be attached to a single horizontal beam running along each side of the ship, with smaller blocks either side of the vertical beams. Is there a functional purpose to the smaller blocks?
-- There appears to be thick padding (shown in brown in the photos) around the center of each vertical hook beam. Is this indeed padding, which serves a similar purpose to the tires seen strung along the sides of normal tugboats?
~~~
Docking and Landing:
-- Is the airship supposed to be capable of landing on dry land as well as water, or otherwise capable of aerial docking? The answers to this question could have significant impact on the airship's features and design.
~~~
Color, Materials, Markings and Style...
-- Very little has been said about the styling of the airship or even if it should have any style beyond the look of a late 19th century or early 20th century tugboat. Are there any Steampunk, Fantasy, Sic-fi, Industrial, Victorian, etc. styling ques that should be paid attention to when designing the airship? Is the airship painted a particular color or does it have a particular color scheme and any markings?
~~~
Balloon Structure:
-- Is the entire balloon, including fins, intended to be a soft structure, which keeps its form due to the cut of its clothe and the gas inflating it? Or, do parts of the balloon, especially its fins, have an underlying frame or ridged structure that defines its shape?
~~~
Condenser:
-- I was wondering if a little more could be said about the structure, size and positioning of the steam to water condenser amid ship, on the left (port) side of the airship? (I had an idea for placing the radiator like condenser on an open frame like structure directly over the mid ship water tank.)
~~~
Portholes:
-- Why are the portholes on the side of the airship's hull so low? If there is generally one level below decks then the portholes would be at about foot level if positioned as shown. If there are two levels below deck, which there really isn't room for, then the portholes would fall mid way between levels.
~~~
Interior:
-- I'm considering modeling the interior of the airship and with that thought I would be interested in any additional information describing the layout of the ship below deck, beyond what has already been provided?
~~~
Sorry for all the questions... Normally, when working on a job like this or illustrating a story I either read the story or passages from it first, to figure out what I should be doing and what I can and cannot take artistic liberties with. :)
Excellent job on the dagger DaremoK3. :coolsmile:
Thank you, M F M, and 7thStone.
Yes, M F M, all displacement mapping. Took a little longer than intended, because I had to re-create the displacement maps by hand in Inkscape due to erroring in the sculpt bakes.
Looking forward to seeing both of you guys' finished models. Loving your progress, M F M. Waiting with bated breath for your WIP images, 7thStone... Keep up the good work!
I'm curious to see the response to 7thStone's queries above about the "Balloon Rigging Hook Beams" (and the other queries, truth be told ^_^)... and I presume the hawsers would be monstrous things, to be able to bear the weight of the entire ship (like, of similar diameter to the thickness of the Hook Beam?). They would loop around the hook? or be attached directly to the wrapped section? (sample quicky attachment pic below). Also looking forward to seeing his model WIPs too -- feeling a bit like I'm singlehandedly spamming the thread here >_<.</p>
What sort of error did you end up with, with the sculpt bakes DaremoK3? too much pixellation? can you post some examples of before and after and your settings? whatever you ended up doing, the result is _very_ "ooh shiny (*_*)" ;-).
Hey M F M...
The errors I was getting ranged from inaccurate base color (all non-displacement at 128, 128, 128), stair-stepping artifacting, overhanging objects shading artifacting, facet artifacting (face edges showing up in the maps), and white-noise "fireflies".
This was even with 4096x4096 32-bit float, no compression, 260 MB EXR files with stepping being as bad as 8-bit "posterized" outputs.
I tried for a solid week trying every variable, and following every tutorial I could get my hands on. I even tried converting normal bakes, but was not happy with the results. The normal bakes were as expected, just not usable in this instance.
In the settings screen-cap below, you can see the settings I ended up using to solve the base displacement issue. At those settings I was able to achieve base median displacement color.
In the end, I just used the baked maps as templates for recreating them in Inkscape. They ended up cleaner without any artifacting. The shiny-shiny is due to the shaders I created. Just using a custom reflection map in conjunction with the other maps, and shader settings.
Below are some images showing the differences, and a render showing the final seal with the dagger:
Hmm... this is what I got when I used a simple cube (with multires modifier), some random sculpting, baked displacement using Blender Internal to a 2048x2048, and rendered with DS using the AoA shader... (scaled down to meet forum limitations)...
... I did notice some unexpected noise in the flat (zero displacement) section when baking to a normal image, but switching to 32-bit Float (but still saving as PNG 16-bit) seems to have removed that... maybe I'll try a "high-detail object -> low-detail object" bake next...
EDIT: and a cylinder... (with a three-curve twisted displacement bake on it...).
Ack! I received no notices of anyone posting. I'll go back through and comment on all of this wonderful work :D
A lot of questions, lol.
Are all of these still relevant, or do you still want me to ask the author?
I'd like to see the answers to at least "Balloon Rigging Hook Beams", "Color, Materials, Markings and Style", and "Portholes" please (^_^).
With an additional question about the size of the balloon hawsers and how they actually connect to those hook beams (if they have some specific sort of knot that's been mentioned? - sample render with black hawsers above, for discussion ;-).
You can ignore my questions about displacement mapping with DaremoK3 - that's just to see if I can add extra detail (such as making the balloon hawser strands stand out) without making a multi-million poly model <(^_^).</p>
Yup... All the questions are still relevant.
Trying to get some images posted today. I want to get a little more done and/or roughed out first. :red:
Not a small project and I want it to be store quality at the very minimum. :-P
OK ... I emailed the author the whole list, lol.
Yup... All the questions are still relevant.
Trying to get some images posted today. I want to get a little more done and/or roughed out first. :red:
Not a small project and I want it to be store quality at the very minimum. :-P
Absolutely. I think both of you should use any requests I have as potential inspiration for products y'all can sell in a marketplace. NOTHING I ask to be made needs to be exclusive to me.
The author has the question list. I'll post it as soon as I hear back :D
Hey M F M...
Good examples. That's how I expected the results to be. I tried every possible variable; Half-float, full-float, PNG, 32-bit, 16-bit, etc., etc., etc....
After further research, I think it boils down to Blender units. You are working with standard cube (and cylinder, I suppose), so you are getting expected results.
I was working from DAZ Studio real world measurements (DS units) where I created a 12 inch cube (DS units), and used that for modeling reference inside Blender, so exports back to DS were correct DS world size. I think not working from Blender default units is where the issues arised.
Responses from the author ...
Rigging hooks and beams -
They have been described, though not in detail. I'll attach that passage.
Basically, they bought an old river lighter, cheap because it was no longer seaworthy, probably half-sunk on a riverbank when they first saw it. They are attached at the taffrail, that white runner along the side of the hull, with heavy bolts all the way through. The taffrail spreads out any pressure against it (as when they're tied to a dock) instead of all of it striking one point. It also gives some space between the risers and the hull. There is a second attachment above that at the edge of the deck, and then a third through the rail from the inside. The little blocks on each side are guides for the model builder to ensure each riser is in exactly the right place. You may ignore them, or if you like them, I'll assume they are to resist lateral shifts of the risers. Either way, no story has mentioned them, and probably won't. What looks like padding is pieces of heavy rope wrapped around the risers to avoid chafing. The cargo docks in the cities consist of a raised platform which the airships tie up to with their decks at the same level. There's a ramp down from the other side for moving cargo. As the ship would "work" in any sort of wind, the ropes keep the dock from abrading the hull.
The attachments of the shrouds are not as visually pronounced as in your model. An eye grommet is placed over the top of the riser, then the shroud wire is spliced around it (attachment).
On to the next thing...
Plus two attachments ... One the pic and an excerpt, which I can email to either of you :D
More from the author:
Docking and landing ~
The airship was formerly a boat. It docks by snuggling the right side up against a purpose-built platform even with the deck and tying herself firmly in place with heavy ropes. Only three towns have aerodromes, so everything else is done rough. The basic method is to get very low, virtually scraping the ground, and drop an anchor from a hatch under the bow. The anchor consists of a big grappling hook which a crewman then goes down to the ground and attaches to a firm anchor point. She could survive a water landing, which I don't envision at this point, but dipping the electric motors in a river would be death for their power plant.
Aerial docking (and also aerial piracy) are rendered impossible because the balloons are so much fatter than the hulls under them that they would bounce off of each other long before the gondolas came into contact. Pirates would need a catapult to shoot boarders across. Might be a hoot if I was writing comedy!
Color, marking, etc ~
Color is about what you see. Not many markings. "Kestrel" across the railing at the stern, and those two boards on top of the pilot house where you see it in the pictures. It would be neat, but hand-lettered. This is a no-frills kind of group, gritty, working for a living. Not much time, nor dock time, for embellishments. This is also why Patience hasn't painted a big smiley sun on the sides of the gasbag, either.
To get the steampunk feel, metal trim should just show bits of brass, copper, and bronze. I really think subtle will sell it. The only thing missing on the model would be a pipe up the gasbag from the rear, lower part of the pilot house, left side to line up with the control on the console, that sends the hydrogen up from the generator. Brass or copper here would be a standout, and possibly on the motors. I'll leave those embellishments to your artistic eye, but those are the only really large surfaces to "steampunk up." These people aren't thinking, "We're in a steampunk world, and need to look the part," they're just trying to get through the day.
On the color, hull and deck are brown, the deck natural wood, and the hull probably stained for preservative. Vertical surfaces are white. Not very dramatic, but I'm trying to keep their little ship... This is something they cobbled together, and work on constantly just to keep it airborne. Not much time for decoration, even if they were the sort to go in for that. The gasbag probably started white or off-white, but would by now be stained with tans and grays.
Balloon structure ~
Kestrel is a classic blimp, an aftermarket accessory added to a boat! The fins have a rigid internal cruciform structure that maintains their relationship to each other, but if the gas pressure gets low, they would tend to sag as a unit, like the tail of a dead fish in a market. I hadn't considered this, but it might be aesthetically pleasing to have about eight battens running from the point of the nose back about 10% of the length to preserve the aerodynamic shape under less than optimum conditions (attachment).
Again, everything simplified for easy field maintenance.
Condenser ~
This again I haven't brought into the story. The condenser is a tube that returns used steam, already partially water, from the turbine back to wait its turn to be re-boiled and used again. It exits the hull just below the large hawse-hole at the rear of the left side, follows the line of the hull, and reenters just behind the motor room hatch. There are two ways it could look, examples shown in attachments. I kind of favor the fin-type, but if you can do more artistically with the tube-type, by all means, have at it.
Portholes and interiors ~
The portholes are at that level because I didn't put much thought into measuring them. Never thinking that anyone else would ever see this model, the measurements were made in regard to the spacing along the hull. They were intended to be low, so that crew and passengers could lay on their beds and look downward, but beyond that, there was no detailed input. There is a below-deck plan that I think I sent you (request that if I didn't). That's all the interior detail I have at the moment. The rooms are little more than closets, having been added after the boat was turned into an airship. You would step in the door, which is on one side of the long, narrow corridor wall, and opposite is the couch/bed. Let me try this again.
You open a door, and you are on the left side of a wall that is 5 feet wide. To your left is a wall 10-12 feet long that ends in a curved wall that is the inside of the hull. Against that wall is a table built like a shelf so you can get your feet under it. It's about a foot deep, and if you take the working surface off, there is a sink underneath. A short fabric & rubber hose would feed the water into it from above, and it would drain over the side. To your right is a padded bench, 6 feet long or so, that also serves as a single bed. The porthole is at the end of the bed, and low in the curved wall that an occupant of the couch or bed can enjoy the view downward.
This is very Spartan, but remember the conditions in a stagecoach that you were in for weeks crossing the American west. Most air trips between the Kenyan cities take 9 hours or less, and much of the trip will be spent on deck or in the mess room, so this is really the lap of luxury for a frontier traveler in that time.
The motor room layout is on the diagram also. I drew the boat with a transom stern, but in the modeling, it became rounded, what is called a "double-ender." Consider the model correct, which makes the refrigeration space under the stern more of a cubby hole than a meat locker.