A selection of recent work

Twelve New Works

I’ve not made a proper post here in a long time, and decided to fix that with a selection of my relatively recent work.

However, if you want something more frequently updated, I post most days on Blue Sky and Mastodon. (Gave up on Twitter a long time ago). Also I publish fairly regularly on my Soviet Space Substack, covering Soviet Space History as well as my visualisations, and restored archive material.

The Red Star

Red Star CGI Starship, Illustration style

This design was based on a small illustration from the Soviet era. There was plenty of room for ad lib-ing the details, and I incorporated ideas from a Tsiolkovsky station, Daedalus Nuclear Pulse , and other elements. I’m really pleased with how this came out.

FREA pulse class ship at Proxima Centauri.

FREA Pulse class ship in front of a Red Dwarf.

As you may have noticed if you see me on other Social media, I’ve been doing a LOT of work for the Enzmann Archive AKA FREA, and this is one of my favourites. Continue reading “A selection of recent work”

Krafft Ehricke’s Hyperion, a manned nuclear Mars mission

This is not the Hyperion by Phil Bono, (which you can read about here), but an earlier design from Krafft Ehricke, dating all the way back to the 1950’s. It’s for a manned mission to Mars, (no landing), and a fleet of 3 or 4 ships would be sent for mutual support. I got the information on this project from the always excellent “Atomic Rockets” site, including this plan, which is the basis for my mesh:

Continue reading “Krafft Ehricke’s Hyperion, a manned nuclear Mars mission”

Vue scenes of Mars

I’m still experiementing with Vue, and I’m begining to feel like I am getting somewhere. And somewhere a bit more interesting than just a bunch of CGI sunsets!

Mind you, this one started as a sunset with an interesting terrain. It was when I figured the scene was rather Mars-like, that I got the idea for what else to include beyond the terrain and the sky.

So I dug out my old “Mars Habitat” and “Mars Explorer” from Daz, and loaded them in.Now the habitat had some odd rendering issues in Lightwave, but seems OK in Vue, at least once I had turned off glare.

It’s also become clear that Vue does a MUCH better job of preserving halfway decent surface settings when importing from OBJ format than from an LWO format. (For some reason Lightwave 3d surfaces only seem to respond to ambient light, the diffuse does nothing?!)

Explorer walking at dusk on a Mars like world.

Continue reading “Vue scenes of Mars”

The Lightbulb Ship

This was based on an image I found, taken from the cover of the March 1961 episode of the Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.

Magazine of F and SF, March 1961 — Cover of Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, March 1961

A really unusual shape, making the whole thing look like a cross between a lightbulb and a thermos flask. I suspect it’s meant to be nuclear , which makes standing around the engine area somewhat adventurous.

Continue reading “The Lightbulb Ship”

Mars Nuclear Thermal Spacecraft

I recently realised that I hadn’t blogged this design, which I did a few years ago. I realised this after seeing an image I had provided of it for a board game had been bodged onto a new background, and looked awful. So I figured I should get my version online ASAP!

This is a serious NASA design for a nuclear craft capable of reaching Mars.

Continue reading “Mars Nuclear Thermal Spacecraft”

NASA PRANDTL Flying Wing – finished renders

Some finished renders of the flying wing design. See previous posts for the work in progress, and sample reference images.

The sky was the most difficult part here. I was compositing onto panoramic photos, and had to make my own sky. I really liked the dark greyish green, but it’s not very realistic.

Continue reading “NASA PRANDTL Flying Wing – finished renders”

NASA – PRANDTL Flying Wing for Mars

This concept is a flying wing, or bodyless plane, currently being tested for a possible flight to prove the concept. It is intended to work well in the thin atmosphere of the planet Mars, and would be tested at very high altitude on Earth, where the pressure is similar.

You can find out more about the project here:

https://www.nasa.gov/centers/armstrong/features/mars_airplane.html

Here’s the current state of my quickie project, I’m still very unsure on what to do on the bottom of the craft.

Mars flying wing WIP - Front on — Mars flying wing WIP – Front on

Continue reading “NASA – PRANDTL Flying Wing for Mars”

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”