Sculpter for Hire

As I mentioned in my previous post I have been doing things, just not posting about them.

Here is one of those things:

In January, what we may refer to as "the before time", I was contact on Shapeways by a fan (!) who wanted to know if I could sculpt a ship for them.  In this case, they wanted a board-game scale model of the ISS Charon from the show Star Trek Discovery. 

If you have seen the show, the ship in question is VERY large, and fairly complicated.  The original designers suggested that they wanted to make the ship look like it was made from whale bones, so aside from its complicated shape, it is also covered in various ribbing.

Here is my simplified design of it:



 The client approved of the design, and ordered it from Shapeways.  Very graciously, they sent me a picture of the final ship "in action" on their game board.

After a bit of reflection, the client decided that the ship was a bit smaller than they wanted, and that it would be ideally printed in red so that the ball of energy in the middle would be easier to paint (by essentially not painting it)

I doubled the size of the ship, but transferring it to another material presented a lot of challenges with the details, and also with the pointy tip portions of the ship (dual prow?  Rams?  Warp field stabilizers?).  Despite being twice as thick in all dimensions, the material standards were so different that it took a lot of re-engineering to get something that was at all printable, and even then Shapeways kicked it back during final review for another re-engineering step.

Annotated figure from Shapeways detailing where the problems were

 In the end though, the client was happy, and that is what is important.

In game shot of the larger red version

In the end this was an interesting process, and it was certainly a challenge to make this ship.

Excuses

So... yeah, it has been a while.  I have not blogged for three months, and I have not even been keeping up with your lovely blogs for the last month plus. 

List of excuses in no particular order:

   Inefficiency of work from home

   Complicated work project sucking up all my energy

   Unexpected death of my Father-in-Law

   Trying to educate two kids in the six week absence of their teachers (thanks unions and school district!)

   Spring slow down as yard-work ramps up

   Desire to have some separation between work/home

and of course the cause for most of the above, what else but the Corona Virus. 

Excuses for why I have not been blogging are many, but I have been doing hobby stuff, just not had the time/energy to share it. Here are a few things:

   3d sculpted a miniature by request. Picture of the miniature in game

   Terrain mat, nearly finished, looking quite good.  Pictures taken

   Painting miniatures with the kids. Pictures taken

   Painting 15mm Germans.

   Converting and painting a figure straightaway. Pictures taken

   Sculpting.

   Scratch-building a pair of engines for a space ship. Many pictures taken

   Playing 40k with my kid, using the starter set he painted (he must get that from his mom)

Still not sure when I can get back to blogging proper (and more importantly reading your blogs) , but hopefully soon. 

Hope you are all well, and staying healthy.