Corvette Winter

We introduced you to Tyrel Lohr last month, an artist who has been recreating early Wing Commander ships and offering them for 3D printing through Cults. Now they're hard at work on not just one but two Kamekh-class corvettes!

A Kilrathi Kamekh Corvette from WingCommander WC2. It's not a perfect rendition, but it captures the essence of the original. It's intended to be printed at about 25mm long, which is why some details get exaggerated. The forward nose fins and wings may need to be thicker to make them print better

And here's a quick version of the Privateer Kamekh II WingCommander. Again, a pretty basic model with chunky details, because it's going to be 3dprinted at around 20-25mm, so you have to exaggerate the details quite a bit to make it readable as a gaming miniature.

Some more #3dprinting prototypes... Unfortunately, part of my build plate failed due to temperature issues (65 degrees F, which is iffy with how cold it is this time of year). But the parts that did print turned out well.

The Shiraak turned out pretty nice, but I wonder if it is a bit too big at the current print size -- I can shrink it down a bit if I needed to, though.

With the Shok'lars, I debated keeping the guns that are supposed to be mounted, but I couldn't get them to not look odd at that size.

I typically end up working off of three views of ships (or existing 3d models, if decent three views don't exist). Then I pin those into my top/right/front viewports in Rhinoceros and try to get the basic shape and figure out what details I can keep and which I have to work around to be printable.

Here's what my workspace looks like for the Kamekh-I. I took screenshots of the three views from WC News and mounted them as backgrounds, got them roughly lined up on the X/Y/Z axes, and then started getting the basic shapes before refining them.

But wait, there's more! Now they're moving on to a Snakeir... which you may know was originally designed for Super Wing Commander by simply removing the 'wings' from the Privateer Kamekh model.

Blocking out the Kilrathi Shiraak light carrier. After banditloaf pointed out the similarities to the Kamekh, I decided it would be an interesting next step. The engines need reworked to match the original, and lots of hull panel cuts left to do, but the basic form is taking shape.

Some more progress shots. Having to finish up detailing and panelizing, but it's getting closer. A few more hull cuts on the nose, and some on the rounded cross beams on the top of the ship, and then I think it's probably going to be "good enough" for what it's intended to be.

I think this is the final modifications to the Shiraak prior to test printing. As always, it's a case of trying to maintain most of the core details of the ship while still making it printable and survive use as a gaming miniature. Which is why the models end up a bit chunkier with deeper details.

Breaking addition: the fleet building continues! He has a Sartha...

Kilrathi Sartha light fighter

This fighter was a pain because I had to slice up the model to get the red stripes separated out as distinct elements to color them in Rhinoceros. Ugh.

Not sure if the guns will survive printing, or if I still need to snub them off.

... and a Ferret!

And to give the kitties something to shoot at, my rendition of the Confed Ferret patrol fighter

This isn't perfect, but it should be readable on the table as a ferret once its 3dprinted -- which is really the goal with my models, especailly since they print at 10-15mm.

Meanwhile, Justice has continued his adventure printing Lohr's models for gaming! Here's the progress:

Threw up a silly rough video of me playing with my ships. Actual minis appear about 50 seconds in. I might need to think about how to do that kind of video with A Billion Suns, which is played simultaneously across 2-4 tables (with jump points).

Rounding out my fleet of WC1 confed fighters now, plus a couple corvettes (extra wrong color cat stations in there to absorb flushed filament for less waste - they'll be useful for various things in games, whether I paint them or not). Might add red with paint where appropriate for the fighters... I didn't want to add another bunch of filament switching/wastage for the little bits of red on these here and there.

Print complete. I've got a migraine, so I doubt I'll get them put together tonight, not to mention paint. Should have set the Ventures to standard supports instead of leaving it on the default of tree supports. Their cannons got bent up (mostly straightened out though) and have green bits I don't think I can get off without breaking them (I'll probably paint over those).

A few red details added, touched up bad support colors where I could. These are fairly messy prints though up close, I might have gone too far reducing nozzle priming, or maybe I need to dry my filament again.