Nick Stevens Graphics

The Energia rocket family – Vulkan

The Energia rocket was part of a family, apart from Buran and Polyus, no other versions flew. Energia-M was a cut down version, which got as far as a weight model – the colours and shape of my mesh are based on this.

But the original plan was to include a MUCH heavier rocket, the VULKAN.

This would have had eight of the boosters, and a second core stage that was basically an Energia-M.

I am working on this at the moment, though information is limited. The parachute packs on the boosters came after the Vulkan was cut down to become Energia, but I have done a version which includes these packs on the boosters. Seems VERY likely to me as the engines were designed to be reusable.

The boosters later underwent separate development, and evolved into the highly successful “Zenit”.

Continue reading “The Energia rocket family – Vulkan”

Render of Daedalus by Graham Gazzard

My good friend Graham Gazzard has done some renders of my Daedalus mesh, and the results are really impressive, as I think you can see!

Some day I hope to get the hang of the ‘firework smoke in space’ look.

Nick

Daedalus Update

Two new images showing the BIS Daedalus interstellar design. These will be used in a book by Michael Carroll, to be published later this year.

One image shows the immense size of the unmanned craft, with the two stages separated, and a Saturn V rocket beside it for comparison. This is in the header.

The second shows the whole thing assembled, below, against a backdrop of stars. Click for a larger view.

Planet X

This was inspired by the announcement from Prof Mike Brown that he was on the trail of a new ice giant planet, way, way beyond Pluto.

This was revealled by some unusual allignments on the orbits of several Kuiper Belt objects.

For the art, the challenge was to show something clearly, while giving an impression of almost total darkness. Here’s what I came up with:

Planet X — Artists impressionof the possible giant planet in the far outer solar system.

The rich star background is there to imply a very long exposure.

I gave the planet a ring. While the material that far out is sparse, the planets gravity would be completely dominant, while the influence of the Sun would be tiny. For the same reason, I would expect it to have many small moon’s, (not shown).

Nick

The Frost Giant

A finished piece, with fairly heavy use of photoshop, to combine the different elements. Shadow for the figure was scribbled in manually.

Landscape and sky were rendered separately, everything in Lightwave 3d as usual. I’m not used to working sith such a restricted colour pallette, but I am very pleased with the results!

The planet object is available for full users of Foundation 3d, in Lightwave format.

Hedrick Fusion Rocket

Here’s a design for a seriously large fusion rocket.

I started with information for on the always excellent Project Rho site, by Winchell Chung. This refers to an earlier NASA paper.

Continue reading “Hedrick Fusion Rocket”

Soyuz Capsule Mesh

No updates for a while, but there are some new one to go in!

I recently bought a Russian Soyuz capsule mesh on TurboSquid. The textures didn’t really come in at all, (not unusual in my experience), but it was fairly straightforward to apply new ones, as surfaces were sensibly named. I was also really pleased to see that the orange seams were done with geometry!

Here are a couple of new renders, where I composited the mesh over Earth, using NASA photos taken from the ISS.

As usual, all of this is done in Lightwave 3D.

Continue reading “Soyuz Capsule Mesh”

Mercury Redstone Rocket – Nearly done?

After some work on the base, (thanks to better references), cutting details into the lower hull, and adding a reflection gradient on the paint, I think this one may be done… The Mercury Redstone definitely fills a gap in my historic rockets line up.

It feels like I am on a bit of a roll with the rockets recently!

Now I just need to make some final renders to wrap things up.

Redstone Rocket

Continue reading “Mercury Redstone Rocket – Nearly done?”

Cosmonauts exhibition at the London Science Museum

Various photos…

Here’s a selection of photos from the “Cosmonauts” exhibition at the London Science Museum.

Laika

This shows the arrangement used for for the ‘space dog’ Laika. Laika (meaning “little woofer”), was a stray found on the streets of Moscow. The scientists later said that what they learned was not worth the life of a dog.

Spacesuits

spacesuits

On the left is the suit proposed for exploring Mars, and on the right the “Orlan” EVA space suit. Continue reading “Cosmonauts exhibition at the London Science Museum”

Lunokhod at the London Science Museum

Apart from the LK Lander, it was also hugely impressive to see an actual Lunokhod. For those who are not familiar, Lunokhods were the first robot probes to explore another world, the Moon.

They were also intended to provide support for the Soviet manned lunar program. A lunokhod would survey the landing area to ensure it was safe, and also act as a beacon top guide the manned lander to the correct location.

A spare lander would be in the immediate area, and there were plans for a Lunokhod version with a footplate, so it could transport the cosmonaut there in the event of an emergency.