Presenting the Rlaan...

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DancesWithProtons
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Presenting the Rlaan...

Post by DancesWithProtons »

Well, I downloaded wings (and blender, but still figuring it out), and have been playing around with it. Made a few ships then thought I'd try something a little more... challenging. And so, per the description in the WIKI, I present my version of the Rlaan.


Image


Please tell me what you think and if anything needs to be changed. I'm still figuring out how to do the colors and textures (hints would be helpful), and when I get that figured out I'll post it here too. I've learned how to do material colors, but is there a way to do textures too? Haven't really gotten into UV mapping either, so still exploring.

The "arms" or manipulating appendages are double-jointed, being able to swing almost 180 degrees in the prime elbow, secondary elbow and wrist. The Prime knee is single-jointed, but the secondary knee has a bit of outward movement also. The base of both the arms and legs are ball-and-socket type joints. I figure they've got some kind of tough yet flexible covering surrounding the joints to give mobility yet seal them up. The model even has some wrinkles that show this! Not that it's visible and could probably have been done with greebles, but hey, whatever.

There are four, four-part beak-like mandibles around the lower portion and I've got eight openings in the top (to be shown with color/texture) indicating respiritory holes. Wondering if there should be a waste hole in the bottom of the lower carapace or ?? I figure they have a thick piece there because it's their primary seating surface.
It's got twin Repulsor beams, twin Ion beams, almost 400 Hail and Killerbee rounds, autotracking, gun cooler, Isometal armor, second hull, double ablative coating, Mult thrust, speed and turn, AB/overdrive, dual secondary thrusters, jump drive, ZX-86 radar, ECM3, max shields, max reactor, an R2 unit and a cloaking device. I mean it's a Llama and all, but...

Current fleet: Llama, Plowshare, Mule, Progeny Admonisher, Pacifier.

Current kills: 192
DancesWithProtons
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Post by DancesWithProtons »

Something interesting that caught my eye while creating this beastie. In the WIKI, on Rlaan writing, it has this to say:
Writing

Rlaan written language appears as a sequence of characters consisting of one to four radial slashes in each of four quadrants formed by a pair of crossed lines.
Kinda interesting when you look at the Rlaan from up top...

Image
It's got twin Repulsor beams, twin Ion beams, almost 400 Hail and Killerbee rounds, autotracking, gun cooler, Isometal armor, second hull, double ablative coating, Mult thrust, speed and turn, AB/overdrive, dual secondary thrusters, jump drive, ZX-86 radar, ECM3, max shields, max reactor, an R2 unit and a cloaking device. I mean it's a Llama and all, but...

Current fleet: Llama, Plowshare, Mule, Progeny Admonisher, Pacifier.

Current kills: 192
DancesWithProtons
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Post by DancesWithProtons »

Here's a pic giving a view of the front, showing the symmetry of the species.

Image

I took the description in the WIKI and the general look of the current Rlaan ships when I made this critter, and I wonder if there is some way, maybe the distinction between the Rlaan and the Rlaan-Brinn, that I could incorporate those fin things seen on the ships. Not sure how it would keep quadralateral symmetry, but I'm willing to give it a shot.
It's got twin Repulsor beams, twin Ion beams, almost 400 Hail and Killerbee rounds, autotracking, gun cooler, Isometal armor, second hull, double ablative coating, Mult thrust, speed and turn, AB/overdrive, dual secondary thrusters, jump drive, ZX-86 radar, ECM3, max shields, max reactor, an R2 unit and a cloaking device. I mean it's a Llama and all, but...

Current fleet: Llama, Plowshare, Mule, Progeny Admonisher, Pacifier.

Current kills: 192
DancesWithProtons
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Post by DancesWithProtons »

Alright, that was interesting. Someone mentioned that those Rlaan fins on the ships were tough to model, and they were indeed. But I got 'em done (I think). Check this out and let me know how this is for a Rlaan-Briin.

Image

I figure with all the different configurations of the ships, maybe the fin things could be voluntarily controlled, so they could close them and open them at will, sort of a temperature regulation mechanism. This would be one of the species distinctions between the warrior and worker, in that the workers need them when they are working to dump excess heat, but the warriors biology circumvents the need for them.

I'm looking for the textures that were used on the ships if anybody has them. I know the original creator has not been around for a while, but if anybody has copies, I would greatly appreciate having them. I figured I might texture the body with the one with all the circles, to be a type of marking that was done in the exoskeleton. These would be personalized markings that would tell class/religion/etc, sort of like we use tattoos, only with them it is an extremely important facet of their lives.

I figure it makes a sort-of sense that the Rlaan and their ships look alike. Most likely their ships are grown in tanks, using genetic manipulation of something analogous to shell or coral.

From the WIKI:
Rlaan science is more advanced in the fields of chemistry and genetic manipulation than any of the other space-faring races. The Rlaan are also quite knowledgeable about materials science and the advances in the latter are often related to the former... In particular, the Rlaan are rather behind humanity in their exploration of both artificial intelligence and tightly integrated biomechanical systems, having sufficed with loosely coupled designer organisms.
Makes sense that if they are less "technological" that they would use more biological means. Plus those ships just look grown.
It's got twin Repulsor beams, twin Ion beams, almost 400 Hail and Killerbee rounds, autotracking, gun cooler, Isometal armor, second hull, double ablative coating, Mult thrust, speed and turn, AB/overdrive, dual secondary thrusters, jump drive, ZX-86 radar, ECM3, max shields, max reactor, an R2 unit and a cloaking device. I mean it's a Llama and all, but...

Current fleet: Llama, Plowshare, Mule, Progeny Admonisher, Pacifier.

Current kills: 192
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Post by Kangaroo »

Man, you should really try harder to work with Blender. I know that it's hard, I've tasted that feel too, but the result is of much higher quality. Take a look at my station thread here, Chuck has posted there everything a Blender newbie needs to know. :wink:

How much have you smoothed the model? seems that it has a lot of polys.
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Post by hurleybird »

Or try Silo. Cheap (only about 100 dollars), fast, proffesional, and similar to wings.
jackS
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Post by jackS »

I have a number of comments to make, but insufficient time to make them at this juncture (I need to spend time preparing for a research meeting tomorrow, among other things).

Please bear with the delay.
DancesWithProtons
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Post by DancesWithProtons »

I look forward to hearing from you JackS.

As for the wings vs blender issue, I've got experience in several CAD/CAM programs so it's more an issue of getting into the interface. Wings is sort of the 3d modelling version of "Paint", in that it is easy to use (albeit powerful), while blender is more like Paint Shop Pro- maybe a little complicated at first, but with many more useful features (and neither one are Photoshop, i.e. Maya, S3d). Believe me, I WILL eventually use blender, but for now, wings is easy and if I have an idea I can whip it together quickly. I only wish wings had more drafting features like snapping (to vertices, grid etc, not uv snapping) and other standard CAD stuff. There are ways to work around it of course, with dummy blocks and working planes, but it's nice to have right there as a feature. How is blender in this regard? Are there typical CAD drafting options to manipulate stuff (snap, trim, extend, chamfer, fillet, copy multiple/array, etc etc)??
It's got twin Repulsor beams, twin Ion beams, almost 400 Hail and Killerbee rounds, autotracking, gun cooler, Isometal armor, second hull, double ablative coating, Mult thrust, speed and turn, AB/overdrive, dual secondary thrusters, jump drive, ZX-86 radar, ECM3, max shields, max reactor, an R2 unit and a cloaking device. I mean it's a Llama and all, but...

Current fleet: Llama, Plowshare, Mule, Progeny Admonisher, Pacifier.

Current kills: 192
Oblivion
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Post by Oblivion »

:D Yay! More help with aliens! Tha rlaans were segmented I think. And the body clearly defined into 4 radial segments.

The fin things would probably not be part of Rlaan morphology. As they are shield generators/heat sinks(?) of their ships, and not based on their physical form. Much like how we don't put fingers on our fighter's wings. hehe.

And the Rlaan briin are indistinguishible from other Rlaans, except that they have a penchant for trying out human forms to interact with humans. ;)

At least that's how I interpreted it. JackS could clarify any mistakes. :)
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jackS
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Post by jackS »

Oblivion wrote::D Yay! More help with aliens! Tha rlaans were segmented I think. And the body clearly defined into 4 radial segments.

The fin things would probably not be part of Rlaan morphology. As they are shield generators/heat sinks(?) of their ships, and not based on their physical form. Much like how we don't put fingers on our fighter's wings. hehe.

And the Rlaan briin are indistinguishible from other Rlaans, except that they have a penchant for trying out human forms to interact with humans. ;)

At least that's how I interpreted it. JackS could clarify any mistakes. :)
Yes.

Yes.

Yes but only sort of (the Rlaan-Briin, being a cultural distinction rather than a biological one, are not innately discernable from other Rlaan, but those that opt to go the "bucket-head" route are clearly discernable from other Rlaan in the same sense that humans who opt for Mechanist style body replacement can become readily distinguishable from other humans, if not always from avant garde furniture)

erm... more apologies. Still time-short, and I'd much rather give belated, but meaningful feedback than quick, but likely useless/confusing feedback.

If you're game to wait a bit longer (sorry) and the following sounds conducive to you, then this is what I'd most prefer to do:

Oblivion has shown a remarkable talent for processing my blocks of obtuse text and accompanying chicken-scratch drawings into wonderfully tangible artistic constructions, and he's willing to lend his talents towards working with me to produce some sketches of the Rlaan - these could then serve as both an easier to translate and more complete basis from which to proceed with your modeling work than the exisiting text describing their physical nature.

Please let me know if this is an acceptable arrangement. If you have other preferences, please feel free to let me know that too.

/me goes off to naptime.
DancesWithProtons
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Post by DancesWithProtons »

No sweat. I am here to contribute! :D I just think it's fun to be learning a whole new field. I tried using Solidworks and Autocad Inventor a few years ago and couldn't make heads or tails out of em, and now that I no longer have the "demonstration" copies, learning Wings and Blender is fun. My only question is if Blender has a better CAD style mode, with object snap and such?

Whatever you guys want, I shall provide. I'm working on some ships right now, one that has less than 300 poly's but looks pretty cool. Now to figure out how to do the darn UV mapping thing and get some greebles on it. That and learn Blender of course.
It's got twin Repulsor beams, twin Ion beams, almost 400 Hail and Killerbee rounds, autotracking, gun cooler, Isometal armor, second hull, double ablative coating, Mult thrust, speed and turn, AB/overdrive, dual secondary thrusters, jump drive, ZX-86 radar, ECM3, max shields, max reactor, an R2 unit and a cloaking device. I mean it's a Llama and all, but...

Current fleet: Llama, Plowshare, Mule, Progeny Admonisher, Pacifier.

Current kills: 192
Oblivion
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Post by Oblivion »

Oblivion has shown a remarkable talent for processing my blocks of obtuse text and accompanying chicken-scratch drawings into wonderfully tangible artistic constructions
Aww shucks. :wink: :oops:

DWP: Sorry, I know nothing of wings or blender. ;) I use 3dsmax 5.1.

Alien 3d renders would not be as demanding as ship modelling probably. The only requirement is ofr it too look correct after rendering. Problems with making 3d fixers would come later when 3dbases gets implemented. I'll send you over sketches of Rlaans as soon as I can finish them and JackS approves them, ok? Thanks for the interest. I'm horrible at 3d. :wink:
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Songs of thoughts only I can hear,
Leave me be to sleep forever,
To dream my dreams,
And sing my hymns,
Of things that will never be...
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Post by Wisq »

DancesWithProtons wrote:I only wish wings had more drafting features like snapping (to vertices, grid etc, not uv snapping) and other standard CAD stuff. [. . .] How is blender in this regard? Are there typical CAD drafting options to manipulate stuff (snap, trim, extend, chamfer, fillet, copy multiple/array, etc etc)??
Don't know about the rest of the stuff, but I seem to recall Blender has snap-to-grid. I don't think it can be made automatic (like the Gimp -- "snap to grid" means all operations occur on grid intersections), but you can select anything and snap it, or just snap the 3D cursor.
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