Bridge Commander Central
BC Forums => BC Modding => Topic started by: henrie85 on May 12, 2008, 11:19:59 AM
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1 strange ideas is the dyson spere from star trek tng s06e04 Relics. i think it would be another good mod for bridge commander. dont know if anyone has tried to make this mod yet or what
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I'm not sure you could make anything that big in BC. It'd probably start to cry and then go find someone else to play with.
DQP guys, how big is the Borg transwarp hub? Maybe it's possible.
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maybe it can be scaled, to just a-bit larger, than the biggest starship, cuase like DJ said a full sized dyson, would possible cause troubles for BC.
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Do a search for it, this subject has been discussed in length on this forum with all the challenges with it.
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but at that point mleo, I guess no one knew that the unicomplex is realisable for BC, did they?
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i fail to see the point of such a thing for BC tho?
besides, anyone who is capable of making it are all backlogged with their own projects at the moment... most people that can mod for BC generally dont really take requests...
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This COULD be possible; After all, the guys over at JL didn't think a hub would work, either, 'till I gave em' what for and told JB to try anyways. :P And would ya know it? Poof. Works. Just make it as a planet with an interrior or something; doesn't need to be high-poly or nothin', just some nice textures and a star in the center, and you're golden, methinks. :)
On the other hand, DJ could be right. BC may scream and cry and go find another play mate who's not quite as mean. :P But, you never know until you try. Assuming faliure will only ever hold you back.
But, in the end, Jimmy really drives it home, so to speak; most people are just too busy with their own projects, anyways.
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I'm not sure you could make anything that big in BC. It'd probably start to cry and then go find someone else to play with.
DQP guys, how big is the Borg transwarp hub? Maybe it's possible.
Yup that scale is definitely possible, if one of the conduits on the transwarp hub can easily fit a 3000m cube in, this dysons sphere shouldnt be a problem.
~Jb06
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There is a Death Star II for BC that is massive in size....
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but, again - what would be the point of a mod like this? to go to the door, have tractor beams pull you in, and then what? fly around inside until youre bored and then leave? am i missing something?
i dont mean to sound sour, but i just dont see why someone would go thru all the effort, when it seems to have almost no real point for BC...
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POTD and scene reinactment... otherwise, you're right for the most part... not much point, really.
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but, again - what would be the point of a mod like this? to go to the door, have tractor beams pull you in, and then what? fly around inside until youre bored and then leave? am i missing something?
i dont mean to sound sour, but i just dont see why someone would go thru all the effort, when it seems to have almost no real point for BC...
Umm...since the big cry out I've seen on these mods is for immersion and warping back and forth and exploring, and all...
Wouldn't this pretty much be heaven for the BC player who wants immersion? Basically all QB is these days is flying around until you get bored.
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It's not exactly the size that matters, it's how you use it, it's that you have to fly into it, not navigate around the various tendrils.
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but at that point mleo, I guess no one knew that the unicomplex is realisable for BC, did they?
They did, I made one years ago. Never felt the need to port it, tho.
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pics or it didnt happen ;) :P
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It's a great idea but there is no way to get it working in game as I already tried to make Halo ring and it was a loooot bigger than any object available for BC even than Borg Transwarp Hub or Uni Complex, the result was that BC crashed every time I tried to load it in QB, the biggest I managed to get in BC was about 1.5 times bigger than the biggest planet/sun in game which is not big enough tho we don't even have real scaled planets so I guess such objects don't have to be strictly up to scale ;)
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pics or it didnt happen ;) :P
There you go, this dates back to Oct, 26, 2005:
(http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e182/blaXXer/twh_screenie1.jpg)
(http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e182/blaXXer/twh_screenie2.jpg)
(http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e182/blaXXer/twh_screenie3.jpg)
I even made a transwarp corridor:
(http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e182/blaXXer/transwarp_corridor.jpg)
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Well, you could get an extremely large object like that in there. The trouble is, will it be damagable?
I could try to see how big I can get a planet to be, while keeping a low vox file. Who knows, I'll try it for the heck of it. lol :D
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Looks like we're getting things on the go! :D *holds hopes*
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Let me tell you again, a Dyson sphere is far more diffrent than the Hub.
The Hub is essentially flat, the sphere is just that, a sphere, and a hollow one at that, meaning that it needs to be bigger to be usable in BC.
Don't forget that flying through the hole will be very, very difficult, remember, you all flew against the starbase instead of through it on your first attempt without letting the AI do it!
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Just consider how vast a dyson sphere is, its not the size of a planet or a sun, or even a borg transwarp hub.
Its the size of the earth's orbit around the sun, although there's no reason it couldn't be bigger.
This is thousands if not millions of times bigger than a transwarp hub!
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An idea would be to use the sphere as a system backdrop and then, where the entrance ought to me, have some kind of an invisible 'wormhole' a la DS9 FX that transports you into yet another system whose starscape is essentially a inside-the-sphere texture...
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Thats an idea, or we could just use a planet and make everything else in the game really small =P
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Blaxxer, nice idea...
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Blaxxers idea is the only one that could possibly work.
And making everything small doesn't help, not much anyway, you still hit the same restriction problems (as in, how can you place everything at such vast differences without loosing precision).
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i honestly think the time to build and texture a sphere plus all the scripting you would have to do is a lot of effort for something people would get sick of using maybe once or twice.
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i honestly think the time to build and texture a sphere plus all the scripting you would have to do is a lot of effort for something people would get sick of using maybe once or twice.
a sad but true point there
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that's what my thoughts were about it... it would be cool and all, i guess; but the effort factor far outweighs the cool factor in this instance, IMO...
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i honestly think the time to build and texture a sphere plus all the scripting you would have to do is a lot of effort for something people would get sick of using maybe once or twice.
Meh, with face-mapping and some tileable textures you could do it in no time, actually.
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Lol, I was curious...
It's Earth...but 11 million kilometers away. :D
Edit:
I forgot, it's 1.2 million times bigger then the original model I made for it.
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So how big does that make it?
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So how big does that make it?
Somewhere around 144,000 kilometer diameter. I hope I got the math right...maybe...maybe not.
Edit:
Made a mistake in my math. lol It's corrected.
Edit #2:
He he he. I made it to 3.36 billion km diameter. I tried doubling that but then bc wouldn't load the system. No crashing, just won't load the system. Okay, I think my curiosity is fullfilled. :D
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mleo why are you spoiling their fun? impracticalities aside, whos to say they shouldnt try? everything in BC is underscaled anyway...
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Just did the math. What cord managed to get in then was a little under the distance from the Sun to Neptune, meaning that a Dyson Sphere is do-able!
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:shock:That is a big planet.
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:shock: That is a big planet.
Agreed, overpopulation is history.
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i honestly think the time to build and texture a sphere plus all the scripting you would have to do is a lot of effort for something people would get sick of using maybe once or twice.
Meh, with face-mapping and some tileable textures you could do it in no time, actually.
maybe i wasn't clear enough, Mapping and texturing would take some effort if you didn't want it to look like a poorly done borg cube with severely repetitive textures when you got at a close distance to it, :lol:
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i honestly think the time to build and texture a sphere plus all the scripting you would have to do is a lot of effort for something people would get sick of using maybe once or twice.
Not really, only for the area where the entrance is supposed to be located ;)
Meh, with face-mapping and some tileable textures you could do it in no time, actually.
maybe i wasn't clear enough, Mapping and texturing would take some effort if you didn't want it to look like a poorly done borg cube with severely repetitive textures when you got at a close distance to it, :lol:
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Cord, you just solved the problem of over-population, make Earth bigger to get more land mass. :P
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Just consider how vast a dyson sphere is, its not the size of a planet or a sun, or even a borg transwarp hub.
Its the size of the earth's orbit around the sun, although there's no reason it couldn't be bigger.
This is thousands if not millions of times bigger than a transwarp hub!
its size would be about earth orbit around the sun
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Lol, I rest my case.
But something this big, you wouldn't see the curve on it anyway, so why not just make it a flat plain the length of a system map and script some sort of loop so if you fly off one end you appear on the other?
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Lol, that's what I was just thinking of.
More like...when you arrive there, you're far away from it so you can see that it's a dysons sphere. But you have to warp, in order to get to it. But that would require a new model to be flat with the door. And a new setting for the inside.
Besides, it would take forever to get to the dysons sphere at 11.3 billion km away. :D
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[snip]
More like...when you arrive there, you're far away from it so you can see that it's a dysons sphere. But you have to warp, in order to get to it. But that would require a new model to be flat with the door. And a new setting for the inside.
[snip]
which is exactly what I was suggesting back on page 2 :P
That said, all that can be done with the DS9FX framework^^
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That Dyson Sphere makes no sense. Everything on the inside surface would just fall inwards into the star.
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Suppose we posit that its spinning, wouldn't centrfugal force more than compensate?
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Besides, it would take forever to get to the dysons sphere at 11.3 billion km away. :D
Isn't it possible to increase the speed of the in-system warp from Galaxy Charts?
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Suppose we posit that its spinning, wouldn't centrfugal force more than compensate?
Only around the equator, and it would pull anything not exactly on the equator sideways.
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what about excaliber has a sp mission and seeing that a new graphic engine is being made. think it migth be possible for there instead in bridge commander now ?
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what about excaliber has a sp mission and seeing that a new graphic engine is being made. think it migth be possible for there instead in bridge commander now ?
The basic problem persists - the enormous size.
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Reallife issue's asside, the only way this could work in BC would be the outer and inner Dyson system sets.
As for scaling in BC, there are quite a few problems, everywhere, not just BC when it comes to scaling. The first game to get this right was Elite, but that is a special case, only recently have games managed to get this right, mainly by not allowing to get close to them. :P
And the game in development called Infinity: Search for Earth, only manages to do so in a similar way as Elite did, which certainly isn't the BC way.
In BC you only get a set of 3 coordinates, x, y and z, which are limited to a certain range (actually floating range, but the problem persists) we currently can't even store the entire size of a planet on those coordinates and allow small scale movement (the definition of floating range, either we get really big numbers with with bad precision, or really small numbers with with high precision, and anything in between where each point is a tradeoff).
In fact, 1.0 - 0.1 does not even have to be 0.9 in BC when it comes to coordinates.
However, there is something that we can use to "fake" the vast distances better.
There is this function:
App.UtopiaModule_SetGameUnitConversionFactorWe don't know (we can't know) the original factor but we can set it to something else.
Try this in the console:
App.UtopiaModule_SetGameUnitConversionFactor(2)and see what that does to the numbers in BC.
mleo why are you spoiling their fun? impracticalities aside, whos to say they shouldnt try? everything in BC is underscaled anyway...
I'm not spoiling their fun. I'm merely giving my pragmatist view on this particular case, with all my experience (and experiments) and the limitations of BC.
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You know what game would have probably been able to make this work... Independence War 2. The scaling in that game was true to life, planets and stars were simply massive.
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Umm guys i found the Dyson sphere and bcfiles heres the link i am going to give it a try.
http://bridgecommander.filefront.com/file/TNG_Dyson_Sphere;76279
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If you'd please direct your attention to the disclaimer...
* * * DISCLAIMER * * *
IS ORIGINAL MAP IS "NOT" A FINISHED PRODUCT. WITH PERMISSION FROM MADJOHN, THIS WORK IN PROGRESS
IS BEING RELEASED TO THE PUBLIC. IF YOU WISH TO IMPROVE UPON THE MAP? PERMISSION IS GIVEN. AS LONG
AS PROPER CREDITS ARE GIVEN.
* * THIS MAP IS RECOMMENDED FOR "EXPERIENCED" MODDERS AND SCRIPTERS * *
Yeah, it's not done. Neat find, though. Perhaps it'll give ya something to work from.
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Umm guys i found the Dyson sphere and bcfiles heres the link i am going to give it a try.
http://bridgecommander.filefront.com/file/TNG_Dyson_Sphere;76279
If you can pull it off, hats off to you, sir. If not, one should try the method I mentioned a few pages back ;)
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Hey, cool find. Downloading it now. :D No screenshots but I'm downloading it anyway, to see what it looks like. Very interesting in my small little world. lol
Edit:
Just a bit of fun...
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Whoa, that looks dull. Plus the detailing is incorrect ;)
Looks like someone just took an insanely huge sphere/planet with facemapping ;)
Okay, I just had a look at those meshes...kinda undetailed stuff.
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Okay, someone order a dyson sphere? I'll be providing this modder's resource as-is, meaning the mesh in *.MAX format (standing at a spectacular 6805 polies) diffuse and specular maps in *.png format at a size of 4096 by 4096 pixels.
Now for the pics:
(http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e182/blaXXer/dyson1.jpg)
(http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e182/blaXXer/dyson2.jpg)
Grab the file here: click! (http://bc-central.net/forums/index.php?topic=3406.0)
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Wow, Gotta get my hands on this :p
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Very nice. It's not cannon either but it sure is a lot better then my quick make. :D
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Don't tell me this works in game :shock:
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Na, i think he's just put up the source files for one of u lot to put ingame
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Don't tell me this works in game :shock:
Not yet.
mesh in *.MAX format (standing at a spectacular 6805 polies) diffuse and specular maps in *.png format at a size of 4096 by 4096 pixels.
It's certainly not gonna work as it is now...
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it work but after about an hour i still was too raf to do anything it needs some scripting fixes but it dose work sort of lol i need a ship that dose warp 11 to get to it fast . ......
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Don't tell me this works in game :shock:
does anyone read my posts these days?
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Don't tell me this works in game :shock:
does anyone read my posts these days?
As a matter of a fact, I did:
Don't tell me this works in game :shock:
Not yet.
mesh in *.MAX format (standing at a spectacular 6805 polies) diffuse and specular maps in *.png format at a size of 4096 by 4096 pixels.
It's certainly not gonna work as it is now...
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it work but after about an hour i still was too raf to do anything it needs some scripting fixes but it dose work sort of lol i need a ship that dose warp 11 to get to it fast . ......
And I still think, you're doing it wrong.
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Don't tell me this works in game :shock:
does anyone read my posts these days?
As a matter of a fact, I did:
Don't tell me this works in game :shock:
Not yet.
mesh in *.MAX format (standing at a spectacular 6805 polies) diffuse and specular maps in *.png format at a size of 4096 by 4096 pixels.
It's certainly not gonna work as it is now...
:lol: I meant will model of this size work in game without any complications, I know it has to be converted first :P
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Well, wasn't that answered a few pages back?
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Yeah I've just noticed that :D
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That Dyson Sphere makes no sense. Everything on the inside surface would just fall inwards into the star.
Actually, the whole basis of a Dyson Sphere is that it's big enough to compensate for this.
If I remember correctly, because of it's size, and the thickness of the hull, things on the interior surface are held to it. The best I can think of (And I can swear I remember my teacher explaining it like this):
Think of it as Earth, only bigger, and inside out. The star still generates it's gravitational pull, as you can't change the laws of the universe, but the near-outer layer of the hull is much like the core of Earth, generating it's own pull. The size of the sphere is purpose-built so that the balance of forces are equal. You will not "fall" up to the star.
Failing that explanation. Artificial Gravity systems would always do the trick, and if you can build something that large, surely you'd have discovered such a technical feat. Humans surely passed it, as you can walk around your starship, rather than float, so... It would've been something the race discovered long ago I assume.
Sorry, just something I had to put my nose in.
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That Dyson Sphere makes no sense. Everything on the inside surface would just fall inwards into the star.
Actually, the whole basis of a Dyson Sphere is that it's big enough to compensate for this.
If I remember correctly, because of it's size, and the thickness of the hull, things on the interior surface are held to it. The best I can think of (And I can swear I remember my teacher explaining it like this):
Think of it as Earth, only bigger, and inside out. The star still generates it's gravitational pull, as you can't change the laws of the universe, but the near-outer layer of the hull is much like the core of Earth, generating it's own pull. The size of the sphere is purpose-built so that the balance of forces are equal. You will not "fall" up to the star.
Failing that explanation. Artificial Gravity systems would always do the trick, and if you can build something that large, surely you'd have discovered such a technical feat. Humans surely passed it, as you can walk around your starship, rather than float, so... It would've been something the race discovered long ago I assume.
Sorry, just something I had to put my nose in.
The problem with a Dyson sphere isn't one of technology so much as production scale.
So technically speaking we wouldn't need to be advanced enough to have artificial gravity in order to build one.
Best thing to do is have a read through the wikkipedia article on the subject, the sphere has many of the same properties (and problems) as a Niven Ring.
Truth be told for a scifi universe, none of these physics problems are really a big deal.
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The problem with a Dyson sphere isn't one of technology so much as production scale.
So technically speaking we wouldn't need to be advanced enough to have artificial gravity in order to build one.
Best thing to do is have a read through the wikkipedia article on the subject, the sphere has many of the same properties (and problems) as a Niven Ring.
Truth be told for a scifi universe, none of these physics problems are really a big deal.
Of course not. But on the way to producing such a gigantic structure, surely you'd want pick up something like gravity generators on the way, or it would be something you'd invest in as a precautionary measure. But we're kinda getting off topic. I apologize, just -had- to speak.
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Well, I took a second crack at it. :D
I do plan to redo the textures to give it more variance. This new model does have the 4 tractor beam emitters and a space for where the door is going to go. Still more to do...
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Looks good right there, mate. I'm assuming that the sphere's shell is actually just one flat panel, right? I won't need to learn how to re-fly the "trench"? :P Keep up the good work!
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shweet :-) you obviously put more time in it than I did with mine ;-)
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Looks excellent, but we need a few more tractors on the rest of the surface.
Not sure if it was in the Ep, but in the book it mentions tractors cover all the surface to ferry approaching ships to the entrance(s) (It was conjectured there'd be more than one)
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@ USS Prime
Ya Other then the doors, it's all a flat panel. At that range, you're way too close to see the curve of a sphere of that size.
@ Blaxxer
I sure did. :D I went back and redid the textures after a close look at the screencaps and decided to make the aperature as well. I'm continuing to work on the textures to try and get my textures closer to the look of the one used in the episode.
@ Elminster
More tractors, it can be done. :D I haven't seen it in the episode and I haven't read the book. My brother has it but I don't know where it is in his house. lol It's messy.
Extra Info:
So far, there's only 1 texture which is 1024x1024 and is repeated many times. And the model is only 3.1k Polys.
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How long and tall is it?
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i think i deserve a cookie :D
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The only thing that would complete this now would be the crashed USS Jenolin (sp?) on the surface of the Sphere. But alas, we can't have everything. Excellent work.
*Hoping this will kill off my dying PC so that I have justification to buy a brand new super high spec one, lol*
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Next up, Death Star. :P
Dyson Sphere looks awesome Cord.
Or is it Dyson slab now? :P
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Looks excellent from the shots I have seen Cord, I love the effort you have put into designing this well... set piece I think of it like, this thing will look fantastic on many many wallpapers and banners I am sure :D
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i think i deserve a cookie :D
Nope, but cordanilus does. Have a cookie, cord.
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i think i deserve a cookie :D
Nope, but cordanilus does. Have a cookie, cord.
I gave him a cookie anyway. :D This was in my list of projects but henrie85 was the one that got it kick-started by making this thread in the first place.
And thanks Blaxxer. :D Cookie, yum yum.
Edit:
No double posting for me tonight. :D
I've added a couple of pictures. They are 1280x1024 so it may be a bit large for some and not larger enough for others. lol
The dyson sphere (slab) is in BC and it takes about 10 minutes to fly across the entire width of the thing with DJ's Galaxy. 7874 kph to be exact.
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loving the textures on the surface, hating the stretched textures on the entrance...
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im still not understanding... what do you do with this tho? go to the entrance, get pulled inside, and then.... fly around until youre bored and leave? do you get damaged if you decide to crash into it? will enemy AI recognize it as a solid surface and avoid it? is there going to be a planetary system inside or something?
i mean dont get me wrong - it looks great and this is something never before done (so that within itself is awesome! :D)
but for practical purposes, other than POTDs and screenshots and such - is there something more to it that im not getting?
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is there something more to it that im not getting?
Not really. I just feel like making the dyson sphere...and it's a chance to practice more of my skillz. At least, improve on my skillz. :D That's about all.
will enemy AI recognize it as a solid surface and avoid it?
I can't use In-System warp on it. Well, you can but it'll try to go around first though. :D
hating the stretched textures on the entrance...
All the more reason for me to practice. :D
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did you unwrap it?
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Are you talking about the inside of the doors or the bumpy circle just on the outside of the doors?
I UnWrapped them both but the texture (for the bumpy circle on the outside of the doors) I'm currently using is just a base hull texture. (Using Polar Coordinates thingy in photoshop.) I'm still looking closely at how that part actually looks in the episode so it will be changed eventually.
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kk
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There's a deathstar model also so I think the size is unlimited. The problem is putting a sun inside and not having it throw the planet around but it seems some creative minds are resolving that ;). Alternately, it could be constructed from several pieces which would be put together as one planet by making a new space zone I'd think.
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is there something more to it that im not getting?
Not really. I just feel like making the dyson sphere...and it's a chance to practice more of my skillz. At least, improve on my skillz. :D That's about all.
right on - i have great respect for that :) and the project is turning out awesome indeed! youre progressing nicely!!
i didnt mean my earlier post to sound as though i was suggesting the project was pointless, i might have given off that impression lol
but it is impressive because this is something never before done and i think it is really cool youre doing it :)
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There's a deathstar model also so I think the size is unlimited. The problem is putting a sun inside and not having it throw the planet around but it seems some creative minds are resolving that ;). Alternately, it could be constructed from several pieces which would be put together as one planet by making a new space zone I'd think.
Size is never unlimited.
And I somehow doubt that the deathstar model you are talking about is as huge as a Dyson sphere (remember, a moon, not the size of the orbit of the Earth around the Sun, as a sphere, way, way, way, bigger than a mere moon).
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is there something more to it that im not getting?
Not really. I just feel like making the dyson sphere...and it's a chance to practice more of my skillz. At least, improve on my skillz. :D That's about all.
right on - i have great respect for that :) and the project is turning out awesome indeed! youre progressing nicely!!
i didnt mean my earlier post to sound as though i was suggesting the project was pointless, i might have given off that impression lol
but it is impressive because this is something never before done and i think it is really cool youre doing it :)
I'm totally with Jimmy on this one, dude. Keep up the excellent work, you're doing great! Practice makes perfect, does it not? :) Cookie for Jimmy; taking the words outta my... err... keyboard.