Commissions Update!
over 6 years ago – Fri, Dec 15, 2017 at 06:38:09 PM

So I am back again with some pics of the commissions! I have gotten through a big chunk of them, as you can see.

So far, we have a lot of damaged tiles, and combined modules for easy printing. We have a 2x2 window which you can put a walkway past, some larger 4x4 base tiles, and damage states, stalagmites...

This is a microfighter inspired by Battlestations! It is very small (less than 3 metres - I guess you lie in it), but scale it up to twice the size and you have... well, still a microfighter, but maybe a serviceable snub!

The stalagmites will be provided loose, so you can place them on existing tiles if your print tiles allow for it. I'll also throw some in already on fixed tiles.

So, there's still quite a bit to do - next week there will be just a few more damaged tiles, and the big one - the gunship! 

I still am waiting to hear back from two of the admirals about what they want done though, so I may well move on after that to finishing the detail pass.

That's all for this week!

Commissions time!
over 6 years ago – Mon, Dec 11, 2017 at 07:20:26 AM

So, last week I finally got the rest of the add ons out to you guys - the space fighter took some serious creative thinking to plan out - all in the name of making it as easy for you guys to print as possible!

The only thing I am not pleased with is the fact that it couldn't be done without relying on glue for the thruster clusters on the wings - you can of course try and print them together, but they will need a lot of supports.

So now that all of the complex stuff is out of the way, it is finally time to move onto the commissions! So I thought I would give you commanders a heads up of what to expect!

The Generous Admiral

One of our admirals has generously donated their commission time to the other commissioners. The remaining admirals get an extra hour and the captains each get an additional 3 hours! Very generous Admiral!

Damaged and Aged Tiles

One of our admirals is a big fan of Metamorphosis Alpha, an old school TSR campaign that takes place on a generation ship, only something's gone wrong and the inhabitants have devolved. The admiral has provided a long list in order of priorities, we will see how far we get, but we should get at least the first 5 out of his hours!

• A corridor with a door in the middle of a 4x4 tile in a "H" shape
• A corridor with a door in a "T" shape
• A tile that has wires sticking out
• A tile with a broken hole in it
• A floor panel with a large crack or broken hole (4x4 sized)
• A tile with a removable panel
• Rooms or panels with stalagmites/calcification; it could be mineralization caked on the wall or sides.
• Tiles with missing panels as you mentioned
• Broken or exploded machinery
• A cryo chamber (where people hibernate) that has been broken open or dilapidated in some way
• Something like exposed wires, a computer that may have broken and laid on its side, a broken chair or even a door that is half missing. Stuff like that... 
• A robot that may be run down or broken in some fashion

Battlestations!

One of our captains wants some custom tiles for playing Battlestations: Second Edition. 

• A "+" base tile that is 5×5 wide that can fit four 2×2 tiles
• If there is time over, a very simple microfighter 2×2 in size, so very small (since this is only a 3 metre fighter)

Gunship!

Finally (for now), one of our admirals has called for the production of a new gunship! It is to be inspired by the Hammerhead and Tau from Warhammer 40K. This is going to be a biggie, although probably not as complex as the space fighter. It will probably be built to fit on a 4×4 tile scale.

Additional Commissions

Beyond these, there are another 22 hours of commissions to account for, but I have had trouble contacting the respective admirals and captains. If you are one of them, check your kickstarter messages and lets get the ball rolling!

Next Update

My goal is to get as much of the commissions I have ready to model done this week. If I don't hear back from the other commissioners this week, I will move on to the detail pass (floor tiles mostly, the walls are pretty much done).

In any case, I will send out an update with pics of the commissions if not some release files by Friday!

Another Friday Update!
over 6 years ago – Fri, Dec 01, 2017 at 02:40:18 PM

Well, it is Friday, and I think I owe you all an update!

The good news this week is that although the Stretch Goals are still not fully complete (they won't be anyway until last with the detail pass and the Opes Rapiunt anyway), we managed to get out version 1.0 to all our backers that have completed their backer kits (there are still around 10 of you left yet to fill your backerkits, so if you are one of them, please get in touch with me!).

I have had some very positive feedback so far with happy backers, which is great to see (don't forget to show me pics of your prints and paints)!

The only remaining stretch goals are:

• Curved corridor floors
• Curved engineering floors
• Base porthole walls
• Corridor porthole walls
• Engineering porthole walls
• The detail pass
• The Opes Rapiunt itself

The curved tiles have been a real bitch to model and have caused huge delays (along with a prolonged illness - it's that time of the year), but I finally got the walls done. I honestly am struggling with the floors, as the engineering and corridor tiles were not designed for curves.

Here you can see the weeks progress:

Shown here, the three curved walls, two remaining diagonals (and floors), floor airlocks, and the large engine is ready for printing. 

Also completed are the windows for engineering and the corridors, and even better yet - the corners for all three types! I had to go out a bit with the corridor version because there wasn't enough room for the joints.

Guargantuan Drive

I have been working today on the conversion of the gargantuan drives! They are 95% done now, but I will have to work on them a bit on Monday when I am back in the office and can do some test prints. They are so large that I have had to divide them up into sections. I've tried to be clever and think about how they most effectively can be printed, although some parts are going to be a challenge no matter what.

I anticipate it should become available at the beginning of next week! Perhaps as early as Monday!

The Space Fighter

Once that is done, I will be shifting focus to the space fighter. My goal is to get it done in the first part of next week so that I can get it out and get started on the commissions!

That's all for now folks, stay tuned!

Progress Report & Incoming Stretch Goals!
over 6 years ago – Thu, Nov 23, 2017 at 05:56:32 PM

Well, it's been a little over a week since the initial release ten days ago. It has been exciting to see the first images of peoples prints so far and most of the issues people have had have been minor and perhaps a lack of clarification on my part.

Not Finding the Files?

If you think you should have received your files by now, you may have, and you may have missed them.

Check your junk folder in your mail program. The mails should have been sent out from [email protected].

If you filled out your backer kit survey after the deadline, or have ordered since then, your name is on a list ready to send out. This will likely be done on Monday.

If you have still not filled out your backer kit survey, you can login at https://starship.backerkit.com. You will not receive your files until it is completed. As it stands there are approximately 15 of you who have not done this.

Also, a brief reminder that not everything has been released yet - we are still working on stretch goals and some add-ons, as well as commissions.

Stretch Goals Update

The last few days I have been somewhat stopped by a nasty head cold and am struggling with converting some of the more complex tiles. Today I've spent a good amount of time trying to get the engineering curved walls together, and it's taking longer than expected to make these unusually shaped tiles fit with the original patterns in a satisfying way.

Here are the following completed Stretch Goals:

• Control Panel 1 (I Floor)  
• Control Panel 2 (I Floor) 
• Control Panel 3 (I Floor) 
• Engineering Ladder Well (E Floor) 
• Wall Ladder (IA Wall) 
• Corridor Ladder Well (E Floor) 
• Base Ladder Well (E Floor) 
• Ladder Insert (Special ) 
• Engineering Half Wall (IA Wall) 
• Engineering Half Wall (A Wall) 
• Corridor Half Wall (IA Wall) 
• Corridor Half Wall (A Wall) 
• Base Half Wall (IA Wall) 
• Base Half Wall (A Wall) 
• Lift Frame (E Floor) 
• 2×2×2 Lift 
• Lift Frame (3x3 Floor) 
• 3×3×2 Lift 
• Transporter (E Floor) 
• Transporter (I Floor) 
• Transporter (3x3 Floor) 
• Ramp (E Floor) 
• 1/4 Ramp Support (E Floor) 
• 1/2 Ramp Support (E Floor) 
• 3/4 Ramp Support (E Floor) 
• Ramp (S Floor) 
• 1/4 Ramp Support (S Floor) 
• 1/2 Ramp Support (S Floor) 
• 3/4 Ramp Support (S Floor) 
• Stairs (E Floor) 
• Stairs (Special Floor) 
• Stairs (Special Floor) 
• Diagonal Corridor (P Wall) 
• Diagonal Corridor (O Floor) 
• Diagonal Engineering (P Wall) 
• Diagonal Engineering (O Floor) 
• Diagonal Base (P Wall) 
• Diagonal Base (O Floor) 
• Curved Corridor (F Floor) 
• Curved Corridor (G Wall) 
• Floor Hatch (E Floor) 
• Floor Cargo Airlock (3x3 Floor) 
• Engine Block (2x4 Special) 
• Engine Block (3x6 Special) 
• Corridor Window (A Wall) 
• Engineering Terminator (S Floor) 
• Corridor Terminator (S Floor) 
• Double Room Variant (E+A Room) 
• Single Room Variant (E+A Room) 
• Bunk Room Variant (E+A Room)

The remaining Stretch Goals (Italics need rethinking/discussion, bold is almost complete):

• Lift Shaft (2x2 ) 
• Lift Shaft (3x3 ) 
• Half Ramp (S Floor) 
• Half Ramp (E Floor)
• Curved Engineering (G Wall)
• Curved Engineering (F Floor)
• Curved Base (G Wall)
• Curved Base (F Floor)
• Floor Airlock (E Floor)
• Corridor Porthole (A )
• Engineering Porthole (A )
• Engineering Window (A )
• Base Window (A )
• Base Porthole (A )
• Corridor Corner (L )
• Engineering Corner (L )
• Base Corner (L )
• Detail Pass on all base tiles (base tiles and engineering walls done)
• Opes Rapiunt Model

Wow, that's a lot!

So, for some clarification, items in italic haven't worked in practice how I would have hoped. The lift/elevators I was hoping to do an 'empty' lift shaft, but the problem is the room that the bottom of the OpenLOCK tiles needed to fit side clips won't allow for an empty shaft.

The only solution I can think of is to only use the front row of clips, although it will still be problematic. 

As for the ramps, I felt that a 45 degree angle was just too impractical. 22.5 degrees is already quite steep for putting minis down on.

The corners are also problematic.

Basically, while I think the corners look cool seamless, I can't make them completely conformable to the rest of the walls due to how much I have gone in on them. So I need to rethink these parts a little. I have saved this kind of stuff for later and would welcome suggestions.

Of course the detail pass and the opes rapiunt come later, after the commissions are done.

Stretch Goal Release

Since it is taking a long time with the stretch goals, my current plan is to release what is available and then update 

So tomorrow, I will take a break from the modelling and switch to converting all of the pieces to the latest OpenLOCK format and checking them for print issues. Hopefully they will be ready for release Monday or sooner. At this time I will also send out the files to those people who have finally filled out their backer kit in the interim.

Commissions

I have taken down requests from almost all of our commissioners and hope to get started soon. Obviously I need to get the stretch goals and add-ons sorted first.

Anyway, I will update again soon when the stretch goals are prepared and released sometime at the beginning of next week!

Time to release!
over 6 years ago – Mon, Nov 13, 2017 at 12:25:50 AM

The twelfth has come and gone, and so now it's finally time to release the sets!

If all goes according to plan, by the end of the day, most of you should be getting links to DriveThruRPG for your original pledges. Then as they are completed, we will also mail out links to your add-ons and stretch goals.

I understand that the 3D printer is a fickle mistress, and that despite all of the testing I have done myself, there may always be problems. Feel free to use the kickstarter messages to get in touch with me. If your problem is mesh-related, I will do what I can to address structural problems and update the DriveThruRPG files an iterative manner.

All files are tested for manifolds and have passed all checks in Maya and Simplify3D. Your program may behave differently, but shouldn't be much different.

Stretch Goals  

The first delivery beyond the original will be the bulk of the Stretch Goals. I anticipate that these could be released as early as next week, as most of them are just variants of existing stretch goals that were modelled during the campaign. They will come as one bulk DriveThruRPG product that will get updated.

If there is a desire for it, I may release what is already completed early and just do updates as more gets completed. Let me know if you would prefer this!

Add-Ons

Once the stretch goals are done, I will be doing the add-ons.

The exception is the Bridge set. I will probably do this one ASAP simply because there is very little work to do on them - just switching out the bases to OpenLOCK 7.x.

The gargantuan drive and fighter are much more difficult to prepare, for their odd shapes. The gargantuan drive will be printed in tiers. I will probably include OpenLOCK clip holes to join them together. The smaller version is almost complete already, so will only take a few more hours. The larger version will take half a day to convert.

The fighter still needs its landing gear modelled, and I won't release it without significant test printing, although I suspect it will be less complicated than the battlemover, which had to be articulated. I would allow a few days to be sure.

Commissions   

Provided that I get timely instructions once I get in touch with the commissioners, the commissions should be next. I already have a good bit of feedback from several of them on what they want done, and just have to get back in touch and narrow down the field.

I can say that one of our generous commissioners has donated their commission time to the other commissioners. This will mean that the remaining commissioners will be allotted additional hours for their commissions, allowing me to add additional detail or increase the amount produced.

In total, we have 54 hours of commissions to get through. This will probably be done on a part time basis, purely due to the nature of back and forth feedback.

So far I can say that you should expect to see some damaged items. The rest will remain a surprise!

Detail Passes

Detail passes will be provided through updates to the original files. As a reminder, only the original sets you pledged for will be updated to have detail versions. These will be extra files, not replacements. These will be done after the commissions are completed. 

Opes Rapiunt

The conversion of the Opes Rapiunt will be the final delivery on this project. The base mesh is relatively simple, but needs to be cut up into pieces to print nicely. This one is going to take several days to make.

Missed the Deadline?

For those who did not complete the Survey, your delivery may be delayed slightly. There is only about 25 of you though, so it should be fairly easy to sort out. I believe it is just a case of me going in manually and matching your pledges to kickstarter, but I'll get in touch if there are any issues. 

I should know more by the end of the day.

Happy printing!

Well, that's it for me! I have plenty of work left to do, but hope to have it all to you by the end of the year - just in time to start preparations on the next campaign for after you have all recovered from Christmas! In the meantime, you should have plenty to get started printing!