bmckain
6th June 2011, 08:05 PM
Entries
Starfury by Escelce Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-06-412284_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-06-412284.jpg)
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-06-412310_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-06-412310.jpg)
XORR Class Vree Saucer by Starbase1 Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-18-400071_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-18-400071.jpg)
Zagros VII by Starbase1 Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-19-495672_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-19-495672.jpg)
WarlockDestroyer by scott2753 Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/07/2-03-725440_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/07/2-03-725440.jpg)
Narn G'Quan by rustythe1 Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-03-409845_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-03-409845.jpg)
Shadow Battle Crab Reboot by HawkHart Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-06-6481592_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-06-6481592.jpg) http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-06-6481591_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-06-6481591.jpg)
Whitestar Prototype Hybrid Fighter by Amras Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-27-164032_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-27-164032.jpg)
Narn Frazi by Madkoifish Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429447_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429447.jpg)
Badger Class by Crook Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429566_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429566.jpg)
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429797_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429797.jpg)
Centauri Vorchan by Madkoifish Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-436162_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-436162.jpg)
Centauri Sentri Medium Fighter by Madkoifish Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/10/2-01-473898_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/10/2-01-473898.jpg)
Well, if you can believe this. We have three judges who have sent us their voting sheets and their comments. I want to say how much I appreciate these guys stepping up and being willing to help. Two of the judges have worked on B5 either in the beginning or in the more recent series. They are Jack Nichols aka JackN and Fabio Passaro aka Fabio. We had hoped to have three other judges who worked on the series submit their votes, however in the end work and time issues got in the way. So we looked to a stand-in, Rhys Salcombe aka Meurig. While swamped at work he graciously agreed to step in and be the third judge. While not involved with Babylon 5 his work on films such as Harry Potter and the recent Batman films provide plenty of professional background. The combined expertise between all three judges provide a balanced and objective view at each and every model. While all judges used the same criteria judges did not discuss their thoughts or votes with each other. In fact once posted this will be the first time they have seen the results from the other judges.
The criteria used for were as follows:
1. Originality 10%
2. Poly flow and distribution 40%
3. Texture and Surfacing 40%
4. general Look and Feel 10%
That gave each entry a max of 100. To arrive at the final rating the aggregate score was divided by three giving a final average score which was then compared to the other entries for placement. Placement being 1st, 2nd, 3rd and so on.
Comments are included for each entry if provided. Comments are those of the judges and do not necessarily reflect the views of Foundation 3D or it's staff. They are however provided in the hopes they will provide constructive feedback which the artists can befit from.
Putting your work out there for a panel of judges to rip apart is not for the feint of heart or the thin skinned. Everyone who has presented their work for review is to be commended. It's a brave, bold step you have taken and I believe it shows a level of confidence. Bravo!
And Finally, Congratulations to Amras and MKF! Amras took first place and MFK took second and third! As you will see from the stats it was a tough decision for the judges so congratulations to everyone!
Now to the voting:
Grand Winners
First - Whitestar Prototype Hybrid Fighter by Amras - 91
Second - Narn Frazi by Madkoifish - 90
Third - Centauri Vorchan by Madkoifish - 82
Field Placement
WarlockDestroyer by scott2753 - 80
Narn G'Quan by rustythe1 - 80
Zagros VII - 77
Centauri Sentri Medium Fighter by Madkoifish - 76
Badger Class by Crook - 71
Starfury by Escelce - 65
XORR Class Vree Saucer by Starbase1 - 59
Shadow Battle Crab Reboot by HawkHart - 52
Rankings by Judge
Jack Nichols
Tie -First - WarlockDestroyer by scott2753
Tie -First - Centauri Vorchan by Madkoifish
Third - Narn Frazi by Madkoifish
Fabio Passaro
First - Whitestar Prototype by Amras
Second - Narn Frazi by Madkoifish
Third - Narn G'Quan by rustythe1
Rhys Salcombe
First - Whitestar Prototype by Amras
Second - Centauri Vorchan by Madkoifish
Third - Narn Frazi by Madkoifish
Jack Nichols
Model/Author (O) (PF&D) (T&S) (L&F) Total (100)
__________________________________________________ _________________
Starfury 9 37 37 9 92
Escelce
Badger Class 9 37 37 8 91
Crook
XORR Class
Vree Saucer 9 38 33 8 88
Starbase1
Zagros VII 8 35 35 9 87
Starbase1
WarlockDestroyer 9 40 38 10 97
scott2753
Narn G'Quan 8 38 38 9 93
rustythe1
Shadow Battle 8 32 32 6 78
Crab Reboot
HawkHart
Whitestar Prototype 10 38 38 9 95
Hybrid Fighter
Amras
Narn Frazi 9 39 38 10 96
Madkoifish
Centauri Vorchan 9 40 39 9 97
Madkoifish
Centauri Sentri 9 39 38 9 95
Medium Fighter
Madkoifish
Fabio Passaro
Model/Author (O) (PF&D) (T&S) (L&F) Total (100)
__________________________________________________ _________________
Starfury 5 7 20 3 35
Escelce
Badger Class 7 34 15 7 63
Crook
XORR Class
Vree Saucer 5 31 18 6 60
Starbase1
Zagros VII 8 29 28 8 73
Starbase1
WarlockDestroyer 6 35 22 8 71
scott2753
Narn G'Quan 8 47 27 10 92
rustythe1
Shadow Battle 6 27 10 5 48
Crab Reboot
HawkHart
Whitestar Prototype 10 48 28 9 95
Hybrid Fighter
Amras
Narn Frazi 10 47 28 9 94
Madkoifish
Centauri Vorchan 9 34 18 9 70
Madkoifish
Centauri Sentri 8 33 15 8 64
Medium Fighter
Madkoifish
Battlecrab& swarmer
Originality
Although departed from the original I feel that some of the organic nature has been lost as it is predominantly blocky in appearance with rounded edges rather than a more wholly organic feel with more rounded and chaotic cross sections. A lot could have been done with this but it feels like it’s development has been left wanting. I liked the addition of the eye like pieces on the top but again these could have been developed much more.
6/10
Polyflow
Poly flow is nice and tidy but definitely shows the box modelled genesis of the model as a whole. More could have been done to tweak the overall shaping rather than just extrude sections of the original base object in nurbs mode. One point I would make is that the object has been frozen. The crab is an organic object and probably able to manipulate it’s shape – it may have been a better idea to have left it as a nurbs object for this purpose.
12/20
Texturing
A standard LW vein procedural and some noise has been used – it’s been done well – but whole lot more could have been used here to make the surfaces pop. Like for instance a duplication of the same procedural but smaller underneath the larger veining .
15/30
Surfacing
Surfacing settings are pretty basic – no additional tweaks such as colour highlighting etc..
10/30
General Look and feel
Looks nice but for me not a true development and evolution of the original. The original was more organic and menacing for me and this version is more square and blocky with the addition of a few surface extrusions.
5/10
Total: 48/100
Warlock Destroyer
Originality
An obvious development of the original but with much more attention to detail and some development of original concepts.
6/10
Polyflow
Poly flow is nice and tidy and very efficient but with over 1.6 million polygonsthere has been perhaps too much attention to detail in small areas that will likely never be seen very close up and so some restraint could have been shown in those areas...I managed to shave off 150K polygons without affecting any detail anywhere. Care must be taken to ensure that polygons that are not necessary are culled- like extraneous divisions along straight pieces of pipework for example.
15/20
Texturing
Pretty good but the map used is not particularly to my liking – the panels look haphazard and like there has been many repairs done over a long time with the effect of panels on top of panels on top of panels - like patchwork repairs over a long term – I would rather have seen more time devoted to selecting a more suitable military style panel map. That said that’s the only real fault I can find; the map itself has been used well.
20/30
Surfacing
Attention to surface characteristics has been done here and the maps have been used well with good surface settings – I would have liked to have seen maybe some more in-depth detailed work done with spec and diff highlighting in specific areas.
22/30
General Look and feel
Anice take on the original with some additional well placed detailing. There was room though for more development of the concept.
8/10
Total:71/100
Badger Starfury
Originality
It’s original you can’t argue with that as it was aconcept from the original series. It’s been developed well and overall I think it works nicely..
7/10
Polyflow
Construction is nice and neat and tidy – however I would have liked to have seen more detail employed in the cockpit area as it is entirely feasible that the cockpit having been developed to the extent that it has; renderers would definitely employ an in-cockpit view at some point and the lack of detail and divisions here would certainly show. Overall the model could have benefited from much more detail – it’s a sort of digital economies of scale. Large ships need little polygonal detail in the smaller detailing as you never get that close however small fighters like this certainly benefit from the other extreme. I would have preferred to have seen more detailing employed in the polygons as opposed to the bump mapping in this instance. Also the lack of polygonal divisions shows up most when you get close and view the bump. Bump maps are handy but definitely show their weaknesses on small ships up close unless employed and prepared properly.
14/20
Texturing
Not a bad job . Work has obviously been put into developing the texturing and good use of UV’s has been employed and done well. However the maps are lacking in some areas – the bump for instance should strictly have been devoid of all surface weathering effects for example. Very nice but could have been better.
20/30
Surfacing
Surfacing has been applied well but things like diffuse maps were sadly lacking on many areas. Smaller ancillary object surfacing was pretty basic and no textures employed. More thought should have been put into advanced settings and proper synergy of diff spec and gloss settings. Surface smoothing was employed well. Oddly the cockpit glass was not showing as transparent & I could not see into the cockpit area – all settings seemed correct but replacement with a new glass surface sorted that out. Little things like the dirt weathering ( a surface dirt characteristic ) – was seen as a bump effect on the panelling – a no-no really..
15/30
General Look and feel
Very nice – I liked it – could definitely see it being employed in the B5 universe.
7/10
Total: 63/100
Centauri Sentri
Originality
I really liked this one. Lots of development of the original with new and unique twists and variations and well thought out design additions. Very nice for a fighter just the right blend of detail mixed with blank areas.
8/10
Polyflow
A very well built model. The only thing I can find fault with is that maybe some areas could have done with just a tad more detailing and chamfered edges..
18/20
Texturing
Sadly for me the texturing has been let down by a fairly blasé and bland panel map as a base – this model could have really shone and stood out with some custom mapping done for it and a bit more attention to detail.
15/30
Surfacing
Basic surface settings with some tweaking again leaves it look a tad bland. Some thought in this area would have really made the ship stand out and look great. It’s just too clean – every shiny “clean” modern military aircraft have subtle surface variations and these surfaces are suffering from the squeaky clean CGI look. Surface names and setup has been well thought out and applied.
15/30
General Look and feel
Overall I really liked the development of this fighter – it looks great – with a bit more attention to the mapping it would be a stunner.
8/10
Total: 64/100
Centauri Vorchan
Originality
I really liked this one. It’s obviously a Vorchan yet nothing like a Vorchan! Very nice work. This is the kind of design that gets me excited and would have incited a slight “wow” had I seen it in the show akin to the reaction I had when I first clapped eyes on the Whitestar for the first time. It does however need further development– the vertical wings for instance are much too bland at the moment being totally devoid of any detailing at all..
9/10
Polyflow
A very well built model. The only thing I can find fault with is that maybe some areas could have done with just a tad more detailing and chamfered edges.. There are areas that have an excellent amount of detailing and are slightly hidden away and yet others that are lacking any detail whatsoever and could have really done with it as they are out in the open – it feels slightly “unfinished”. The modelling itself however is almost exemplary – I would have no issues putting my name to this standard of work myself.
19/20
Texturing
Sadly for me the texturing has been let down by a fairly blasé and bland panel map as a base – this kind of panel map I’d only use for really large vessels as a subtle spec map to break up the surfaces of larger more dominant panel maps – it doesn’t really have a place on a smaller vessel like this. This model could have really shone and stood out with some custom mapping done for it and a bit more attention to detail. This model is crying out for some high quality custom maps and detailing work!
15/30
Surfacing
Basic surface settings with some tweaking again leaves it look a tad bland. Some thought in this area would have really made the ship stand out and look great. It’s just too clean – every shiny “clean” modern military aircraft have subtle surface variations and these surfaces are suffering from the squeaky clean CGI look. Surface names and setup has been well thought out and applied.
18/30
General Look and feel
I really like it – aside from the maps issue this is something that I really would want the author to develop further in the mapping area to make it shine!
9/10
Total: 70/100
STARFURY
Originality
Taking the original design concept and modernising it a bit makes it look a little more up to date and I like what the author has done here. Although little to no time has been spent on the cockpit interior which is a shame.
5/10
Polyflow
Oh dear – apologies in advance to the author but you’re going to get a bit of a lecture here so brace yourself.
The basic modelling techniques and polygon flow are quite good – as is a good understanding ofnurbs and how to use and manipulate them – sadly however there some things about nurbs that the author obviously knows VERY LITTLE about or simply has chosen to ignore.
When I first loaded this object it brought my computer to its knees – I could literally hear it screaming out “no more” – I have a quad core Athlon with 4 gb of ram running 64 bit OS and LW1064 bit – it required 1.8 gb – 2.8 Gb of memory and the screen blanked out with the GRFX card screaming for mercy also a Radeon 5400HD with 1gb on board ram.
How on earth was a Starfurydoing this? I wondered – But being experienced I sort of guessed why – after rebooting the computer –required cos my OS froze – I set the sub div levels in both catmull and normal to just 1 and loaded up again and there was my answer: 720,626 polygons set as NURBS!
Now the average level for nurbs in modeller to workwith effectively is about 4 and the vast majority work with a minimum of 6 (myself included) and some scenes 8, but let me break it down to you like this:
At the varying levels of sub d divisions you will end up with the following polygon counts when frozen ( and they get frozen whenever they are rendered and worse yet they even all get tripled if you know ANYTHING about nurbs in LW you know this to be true) Crucially however the grafx card will try and display the figure when frozen before tripling – anyway this is how it breaks down.
• Sub d level 2 - resultant polygon count = 2,882,504 and when tripled: 5,765,008
• Sub d level 3 - resultant polygon count = 6,485,634 and when tripled: 12,971,268
• Sub d level 4 - resultant polygon count = 11,530,016 and when tripled: 23,060,032
• Sub d level 5 - resultant polygon count = 18,015,650 and when tripled: 36,031,300
• Sub d level 6 - resultant polygon count = 25,942,536 and when tripled: 51,885,072
I’m sure you can work out for yourself what the figures are at levels of 7 and 8 which themselves are quite normal for modeller to be set to for most modellers. So as you can see my modeller apps was trying to display a model comprising of more than 26 million polygons! Frankly for a small fighter this is bloody ludicrous.
What annoyed me even more was that some pieces that were set as nurbs had themselves looked like they had already been frozen from a nurbs object and then set to nurbs yet again – which quite frankly is bloody lunacy!!
I can only ascertain the cause of this to be a few things:
• The author has a personal computer that is capable of running a Starfleet vessel and has no consideration for how the rest of the world may be able to use the mesh.
• The author has done this on purpose toshowoff the power of his equipment with no consideration for others – a sort of ‘look at what my pc can handle’ move.
• The author has no real understanding of the implications of using nurbs for hard bodied objects without the resultant freezing and optimising that should follow afterwards –
NOW – I can understand that the author may have wanted to use nurbs in order to prepare scenes that offered the model in various levels of detail for various camera shots – but realistically this is not the way to do it. Personally I would have asked for separate meshes for this use. The asset would have had to be planned wisely so that the original nurbs objects could then be frozen out at various sub d levels – optimised and provided for final use as a variety of different LOD objects – this would have been far more economical useof resources and time than to have an object that would vary from 6 to 25 million polygons when loaded.
But you know you can and could have used nurbs exclusively for this ship but it would have required much more wise use of them to keep the resultant resources required to use the mesh to a minimum – to cite examples - there are many fine car meshes out there that authors have left as nurbs and their resultant polygon resources are quite acceptable because they have been designed and planned well – this sadly has not.
Imagine for 1 second that I am a TD wanting to put 10 of these space fighters into a shot? Go on imagine what I would be shouting in that studio then……
7/20
Texturing
Very little in the way of texture maps have actually been employed with just a custom colour map for the top wing decal and this craft requires some dedicated custom maps to make it ultimately shine. Settings are mainly basic and procedural in nature.
10/30
Surfacing
Surface settings – a bit more work is needed to layout the correct surfacing of the mesh for final mapping.
10/30
General Look and feel
This could have been so good with more attention to the points already mentioned - sadly though even though this version hasmore detailing added which in itself looks good – the original version from over 20 years ago – looks better.
3/10
Total: 35/100
NarnFrazi
Originality
This is a classic case of a little goes a long way. There’s not much you can do to expand on the little frog – or is there? Subtle additions and design changes with completely new things added here and there have certainly made major inroads to update this classic little ship’s design. This actually ticked all the boxes for me, I could actually envisage this as a real world design.
10/10
Polyflow
As seems to be the trend with this particular author – good modelling ethics and well thought out and planned modelling strategies have been employed.
19/20
Texturing
Aah texturing that actually does the mesh justice – there are lots of little things in these maps that go along way to make the model believable, I would have liked to have seen a little bit more to actually sell the mesh totally – think modern day fighter jets and all the little markings here and there that we don’t ‘see’ but in actuality we do that sells the thing as a whole.
28/30
Surfacing
I really liked the way that a lot of thought has gone into the surfacing attributes of this mesh it really does look like a painted little fighter with a few battle scars and weathering here and there – a well-used and faded gloss paint cover. More work I felt was necessary on the small ancillary details of the metal work but overall excellent effort!
28/30
General Look and feel
I really liked this one an excellent version of the little frog fighter – with a little bit more fine detail work on the maps as mentioned this would be top notch!
9/10
Total: 94/100
Vree Saucer
Originality
A valiant attempt to enhance the classic Vree design has been made here but for me it felt like the development had been cut short and an opportunity to really modernise this puppy was missed.
There’s a lot more that could have been done with the lower and bottom hub sections and the guns felt just too “1950’s” and overly simplistic for my liking.
5/10
Polyflow
Good clean polygon work and good use of divisions levels for the nature of the object. Some areas needed more tweaking and development
16/20
Texturing
A lot more could have been done with this texturing. The ship was just way too clean – even if the vree were into polishing their ships every sunny Sunday there would be indications of wear and tear here and there – surface scratches and heat crazing for example – it wouldhave sold the ship a heck of a lot more..
15/30
Surfacing
Some parts come across as far too glossy and showroom shiny but this could have been down to a 3rd party plugin being required that was missing this end – which is why I prefer things like gloss to be handled with textures most of the time especially if the mesh is to become cross platform in nature.
18/30
General Look and feel
I’ve always been a fan of the Vree saucers and I feel that this could have been enhanced a lot further and it would have really looked spot on then.
6/10
Total: 60/100
Zagros
Originality
It’s very difficult to evaluate a planet fairly I feel when compared to things like spacecraft which really are a world apart – scuse the pun – and keep the scoring criteria fair. However in the old days the planet maps were nothing special and didn’t really come across that great even on screen. The author has done a great job to bring the planet more upto date with some additions and a more accurate scientifically based approach to its construction.
8/10
Polyflow
It’s a planet – you can’t really go wrong with making them! It’s an excellent job of modelling one but the score given reflects the relative ease of required skill to make the objects required when compared to the amount of work required for the other meshes submitted.
5/20
Texturing
Textures make and break planets and these have been thought out selected , created & modified and applied well – I’ve got to give some high marks here even though the maps are not as hard to place on a planet as opposed to spacecraft.
24/30
Surfacing
Give no thought to proper surfacing and a planet looks like a marble – the surfacing has been well thought out and applied very nicely – especially on the rings – high marks here!
28/30
General Look and feel
Well it’s a planet – it looks good – but then in the last 15 years the planets coming out in the 3d scene have all come of age – so it comes down to the maps at the end of the day , the rings work very well and the map –which I can tell is a custom one and made well – could have been a bit better truth be told.
8/10
Total: 73/100
NarnG’Quan
Originality
How do you develop such an Iconic ship – the only areas that you can really approach is the detailing – there is scope for Imperialising this ship. Where the original used texture maps for a majority of the details this author has relished the opportunity to add the further detailing as modelled areas and it pays off well – the addition of the turret and countermeasure systems was very pleasing to see as an evolution of the design.
8/10
Polyflow
On first load the first thing I notice is the polygon count of nearly 1.8 million polygons – so the first thing I set about doing is to see if this figure is justified. I was happy to see that yes it was entirely justified – polygons where they would not be necessary have been culled and they have been used very wisely indeed in the areas where they would be needed and not overly so. I’m happy to report that for me the polygon flow and modelling ethics in this model are top notch – an excellent job by the author in this regard. Dare I say it?? Top Marks!
20/20
Texturing
The author has taken the time to craft some really nice custom maps for this ship and the effort has paid off. My only point of contention is that I do not have a preference for the panelling map or the style the author employed as I would have preferred to have seen a much better effort made here – that said though the effect does still work well. Again High marks here!
27/30
Surfacing
The surfacing has been applied very nicely – the mesh has been broken up into a nice system of surfaces and the maps have been applied with care and attention. On the whole not enough attention has been paid to the spec and gloss channels. With slight tweaking this ship would really blossom as right now it has the ‘too much gloss’ look and feel to it as opposed to the militaristic feel and more “matt” effect in general which IMHO would suit it much more.
27/30
General Look and feel
An absolutely excellent effort here with only minor issues of contention. The addition of a nicely crafted scene file for end users is a bonus that will be much appreciated.
10/10
Total: 92/100
Whitestar Fighter
Originality
I can’t give this anything other than top marks for originality. It’s like nothing ever seen before in the B5 universe and yet the author has done well to make various design methods apparent as precursors for the Whitestar that was to come. The only other fan made mesh that I considered as original as this for a Min-Vorlon design was N.Goksu’s advanced Whitestar from a few years back. Well done!!
10/10
Polyflow
A very well designed and constructed mesh with just enough detail to pull off the excellent textures that are employed.
20/20
Texturing
Excellent use of UV maps in the nurbs stage has led to a beautiful job on the texturing. I’ve had a crack at this Minbari stuff myself in the past and it’s not easy – I really like how this author approached the textures for this type of hull – Nice work! Top marks nearly came here but I felt that the bump mapping could have done with a touch more work to get the organic grown effect to be more vein like in cross section rather than rising to a flat plateau if you get my drift – it’s a bit more like an organic bevelled edge rather than an organic fleshy veiny feel.
28/30
Surfacing
Bump mapping – specular and diff has all been employed very well indeed – along with some nice transparency effects and other effects that really just mesh together synergistically to sell the ship as a whole.
28/30
General Look and feel
Looks great – you’re only not getting top marks because you didn’t finish off that cockpit interior! ;)
9/10
Total: 95/100
Rhys Salcombe
Model/Author (O) (PF&D) (T&S) (L&F) Total (100)
__________________________________________________ _________________
Starfury 5 20 35 8 68
Escelce
Badger Class 6 20 25 7 58
Crook
XORR Class
Vree Saucer 3 15 15 5 30
Starbase1
Zagros VII 3 25 35 8 71
Starbase1
WarlockDestroyer 4 30 30 9 73
scott2753
Narn G'Quan 4 15 30 7 56
rustythe1
Shadow Battle 2 15 10 4 31
Crab Reboot
HawkHart
Whitestar Prototype 8 30 35 9 82
Hybrid Fighter
Amras
Narn Frazi 6 30 35 8 79
Madkoifish
Centauri Vorchan 10 30 30 10 80
Madkoifish
Centauri Sentri 7 25 30 8 70
Medium Fighter
Madkoifish
1) Amras - Whitestar prototype
A) 8/10.
B) 30/40.
C) 35/40.
D) 9/10.
Total) 82/100
Comments: Sturdy original design. Fits well within the universe. Could believably be canonical. Very high poly for what it is but otherwise good.
2) rustythe1 - G'Quan
A) 4/10
B) 15/40
c) 30/40
D) 7/10
Total) 56/100
Comments: Good rebuild of an existing design. Not updated much from the original and texture work is a little rough, good detail level, though very unnecessarily high poly at 1.6 million. Renders well out of the bag. Lost a lot of points for messy poly flow, could do with a lot of cleanup.
3) Starbase1 - Zagros VII
A) 3/10
B) 25/40
c) 35/40
D) 8/10
Total) 71/100
Comments: Easy to use, well presented, true to the original while updating it fittingly.
4) Starbase1 - Vree Xorr
A) 3/10.
B) 15/40.
c) 15/40.
D) 5/10.
Total) 38/100
Comments: Not a design that easily lends itself to being updated, but the detail is too simple and sparse and the textures too understated to really stand out. Good recreation of the original, but could have done with a lot more updating.
5) HawkHart - Battlecrab
A) 2/10.
B) 15/40.
c) 10/40.
D) 4/10.
Total) 31/100
Comments: Needed a lot more updating for me. Not a bad recreation of the original but a lot more could be done with the design. Lots of weird triangulation in the model, looks like every non-planar was tripled which is unnecessary and means the model could never be subdivided. Texture looks more noisy than skin-ish.
6) scott2753 - Warlock
A) 4/10
B) 30/40
c) 30/40
D) 9/10
Total) 73
Comments: Very high poly for what it is - though some of the weird triangulation could be the result of inter-app conversion. Very detailed in some areas, not quite detailed enough in others. The mis-match is a little odd. Otherwise looks great, nice recreation of the original with extra detail, could've been updated further but is probably the best Warlock mesh I've seen online so far.
7) Escelse - Starfury
A) 5/10.
B) 20/40.
c) 35/40.
D) 8/10.
Total) 68/100
Comments: Very nicely presented, but far far too high poly. A lot of reduction could be done with no visible quality difference, and having 750,000 subpatched polys is completely unnecessary. Updating of the design is fairly subtle, but believably done. Top wingart is great, would've been nice to see the rest of the ship given the same level of texture work. Lost a lot of points for modelling inefficiency.
8) MKF - Frazi
A) 6/10
B) 30/40
c) 35/40
D) 8/10
Total) 79
Comments: Efficiently modelled, nicely textured, some stylish updating of the design in areas. Could be a little more radical with the design maybe, but the original design is fairly low-key anyway.
9) MKF - Vorchan
A) 10/10
B) 30/40
c) 30/40
D) 10/10
Total) 80/100
Comments: Fantastic stylish redesign, taking a lot of liberty with the original design but all for the better. Loses some points for being unfinished, both in terms of modelling and texturing.
10) MKF - Sentri
A) 7/10
B) 25/40
c) 30/40
D) 8/10
Total) 70/100
Comments: Another sturdy redesign. Efficiently built with nice surfacing. Could stand to be more detailed in places. Not too fond of the snub-nose design, but other added elements work very well.
11) Crook - Badger
A) 6/10
B) 20/40
c) 25/40
D) 7/10
Total) 58/100
Comments: Unnecessarily high poly again, and some messiness/weird tripling. Texturing is a bit simple, but plenty of variants and nice/funny details in the textures make up for it. It's nice to finally see someone tackle the Badger.
Starfury by Escelce Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-06-412284_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-06-412284.jpg)
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-06-412310_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-06-412310.jpg)
XORR Class Vree Saucer by Starbase1 Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-18-400071_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-18-400071.jpg)
Zagros VII by Starbase1 Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-19-495672_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/06/2-19-495672.jpg)
WarlockDestroyer by scott2753 Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/07/2-03-725440_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/07/2-03-725440.jpg)
Narn G'Quan by rustythe1 Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-03-409845_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-03-409845.jpg)
Shadow Battle Crab Reboot by HawkHart Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-06-6481592_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-06-6481592.jpg) http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-06-6481591_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/08/2-06-6481591.jpg)
Whitestar Prototype Hybrid Fighter by Amras Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-27-164032_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-27-164032.jpg)
Narn Frazi by Madkoifish Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429447_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429447.jpg)
Badger Class by Crook Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429566_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429566.jpg)
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429797_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-429797.jpg)
Centauri Vorchan by Madkoifish Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-436162_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/09/2-30-436162.jpg)
Centauri Sentri Medium Fighter by Madkoifish Uploaded
http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/10/2-01-473898_tn.jpg (http://www.foundation3d.com/uploads/contests/2011/10/2-01-473898.jpg)
Well, if you can believe this. We have three judges who have sent us their voting sheets and their comments. I want to say how much I appreciate these guys stepping up and being willing to help. Two of the judges have worked on B5 either in the beginning or in the more recent series. They are Jack Nichols aka JackN and Fabio Passaro aka Fabio. We had hoped to have three other judges who worked on the series submit their votes, however in the end work and time issues got in the way. So we looked to a stand-in, Rhys Salcombe aka Meurig. While swamped at work he graciously agreed to step in and be the third judge. While not involved with Babylon 5 his work on films such as Harry Potter and the recent Batman films provide plenty of professional background. The combined expertise between all three judges provide a balanced and objective view at each and every model. While all judges used the same criteria judges did not discuss their thoughts or votes with each other. In fact once posted this will be the first time they have seen the results from the other judges.
The criteria used for were as follows:
1. Originality 10%
2. Poly flow and distribution 40%
3. Texture and Surfacing 40%
4. general Look and Feel 10%
That gave each entry a max of 100. To arrive at the final rating the aggregate score was divided by three giving a final average score which was then compared to the other entries for placement. Placement being 1st, 2nd, 3rd and so on.
Comments are included for each entry if provided. Comments are those of the judges and do not necessarily reflect the views of Foundation 3D or it's staff. They are however provided in the hopes they will provide constructive feedback which the artists can befit from.
Putting your work out there for a panel of judges to rip apart is not for the feint of heart or the thin skinned. Everyone who has presented their work for review is to be commended. It's a brave, bold step you have taken and I believe it shows a level of confidence. Bravo!
And Finally, Congratulations to Amras and MKF! Amras took first place and MFK took second and third! As you will see from the stats it was a tough decision for the judges so congratulations to everyone!
Now to the voting:
Grand Winners
First - Whitestar Prototype Hybrid Fighter by Amras - 91
Second - Narn Frazi by Madkoifish - 90
Third - Centauri Vorchan by Madkoifish - 82
Field Placement
WarlockDestroyer by scott2753 - 80
Narn G'Quan by rustythe1 - 80
Zagros VII - 77
Centauri Sentri Medium Fighter by Madkoifish - 76
Badger Class by Crook - 71
Starfury by Escelce - 65
XORR Class Vree Saucer by Starbase1 - 59
Shadow Battle Crab Reboot by HawkHart - 52
Rankings by Judge
Jack Nichols
Tie -First - WarlockDestroyer by scott2753
Tie -First - Centauri Vorchan by Madkoifish
Third - Narn Frazi by Madkoifish
Fabio Passaro
First - Whitestar Prototype by Amras
Second - Narn Frazi by Madkoifish
Third - Narn G'Quan by rustythe1
Rhys Salcombe
First - Whitestar Prototype by Amras
Second - Centauri Vorchan by Madkoifish
Third - Narn Frazi by Madkoifish
Jack Nichols
Model/Author (O) (PF&D) (T&S) (L&F) Total (100)
__________________________________________________ _________________
Starfury 9 37 37 9 92
Escelce
Badger Class 9 37 37 8 91
Crook
XORR Class
Vree Saucer 9 38 33 8 88
Starbase1
Zagros VII 8 35 35 9 87
Starbase1
WarlockDestroyer 9 40 38 10 97
scott2753
Narn G'Quan 8 38 38 9 93
rustythe1
Shadow Battle 8 32 32 6 78
Crab Reboot
HawkHart
Whitestar Prototype 10 38 38 9 95
Hybrid Fighter
Amras
Narn Frazi 9 39 38 10 96
Madkoifish
Centauri Vorchan 9 40 39 9 97
Madkoifish
Centauri Sentri 9 39 38 9 95
Medium Fighter
Madkoifish
Fabio Passaro
Model/Author (O) (PF&D) (T&S) (L&F) Total (100)
__________________________________________________ _________________
Starfury 5 7 20 3 35
Escelce
Badger Class 7 34 15 7 63
Crook
XORR Class
Vree Saucer 5 31 18 6 60
Starbase1
Zagros VII 8 29 28 8 73
Starbase1
WarlockDestroyer 6 35 22 8 71
scott2753
Narn G'Quan 8 47 27 10 92
rustythe1
Shadow Battle 6 27 10 5 48
Crab Reboot
HawkHart
Whitestar Prototype 10 48 28 9 95
Hybrid Fighter
Amras
Narn Frazi 10 47 28 9 94
Madkoifish
Centauri Vorchan 9 34 18 9 70
Madkoifish
Centauri Sentri 8 33 15 8 64
Medium Fighter
Madkoifish
Battlecrab& swarmer
Originality
Although departed from the original I feel that some of the organic nature has been lost as it is predominantly blocky in appearance with rounded edges rather than a more wholly organic feel with more rounded and chaotic cross sections. A lot could have been done with this but it feels like it’s development has been left wanting. I liked the addition of the eye like pieces on the top but again these could have been developed much more.
6/10
Polyflow
Poly flow is nice and tidy but definitely shows the box modelled genesis of the model as a whole. More could have been done to tweak the overall shaping rather than just extrude sections of the original base object in nurbs mode. One point I would make is that the object has been frozen. The crab is an organic object and probably able to manipulate it’s shape – it may have been a better idea to have left it as a nurbs object for this purpose.
12/20
Texturing
A standard LW vein procedural and some noise has been used – it’s been done well – but whole lot more could have been used here to make the surfaces pop. Like for instance a duplication of the same procedural but smaller underneath the larger veining .
15/30
Surfacing
Surfacing settings are pretty basic – no additional tweaks such as colour highlighting etc..
10/30
General Look and feel
Looks nice but for me not a true development and evolution of the original. The original was more organic and menacing for me and this version is more square and blocky with the addition of a few surface extrusions.
5/10
Total: 48/100
Warlock Destroyer
Originality
An obvious development of the original but with much more attention to detail and some development of original concepts.
6/10
Polyflow
Poly flow is nice and tidy and very efficient but with over 1.6 million polygonsthere has been perhaps too much attention to detail in small areas that will likely never be seen very close up and so some restraint could have been shown in those areas...I managed to shave off 150K polygons without affecting any detail anywhere. Care must be taken to ensure that polygons that are not necessary are culled- like extraneous divisions along straight pieces of pipework for example.
15/20
Texturing
Pretty good but the map used is not particularly to my liking – the panels look haphazard and like there has been many repairs done over a long time with the effect of panels on top of panels on top of panels - like patchwork repairs over a long term – I would rather have seen more time devoted to selecting a more suitable military style panel map. That said that’s the only real fault I can find; the map itself has been used well.
20/30
Surfacing
Attention to surface characteristics has been done here and the maps have been used well with good surface settings – I would have liked to have seen maybe some more in-depth detailed work done with spec and diff highlighting in specific areas.
22/30
General Look and feel
Anice take on the original with some additional well placed detailing. There was room though for more development of the concept.
8/10
Total:71/100
Badger Starfury
Originality
It’s original you can’t argue with that as it was aconcept from the original series. It’s been developed well and overall I think it works nicely..
7/10
Polyflow
Construction is nice and neat and tidy – however I would have liked to have seen more detail employed in the cockpit area as it is entirely feasible that the cockpit having been developed to the extent that it has; renderers would definitely employ an in-cockpit view at some point and the lack of detail and divisions here would certainly show. Overall the model could have benefited from much more detail – it’s a sort of digital economies of scale. Large ships need little polygonal detail in the smaller detailing as you never get that close however small fighters like this certainly benefit from the other extreme. I would have preferred to have seen more detailing employed in the polygons as opposed to the bump mapping in this instance. Also the lack of polygonal divisions shows up most when you get close and view the bump. Bump maps are handy but definitely show their weaknesses on small ships up close unless employed and prepared properly.
14/20
Texturing
Not a bad job . Work has obviously been put into developing the texturing and good use of UV’s has been employed and done well. However the maps are lacking in some areas – the bump for instance should strictly have been devoid of all surface weathering effects for example. Very nice but could have been better.
20/30
Surfacing
Surfacing has been applied well but things like diffuse maps were sadly lacking on many areas. Smaller ancillary object surfacing was pretty basic and no textures employed. More thought should have been put into advanced settings and proper synergy of diff spec and gloss settings. Surface smoothing was employed well. Oddly the cockpit glass was not showing as transparent & I could not see into the cockpit area – all settings seemed correct but replacement with a new glass surface sorted that out. Little things like the dirt weathering ( a surface dirt characteristic ) – was seen as a bump effect on the panelling – a no-no really..
15/30
General Look and feel
Very nice – I liked it – could definitely see it being employed in the B5 universe.
7/10
Total: 63/100
Centauri Sentri
Originality
I really liked this one. Lots of development of the original with new and unique twists and variations and well thought out design additions. Very nice for a fighter just the right blend of detail mixed with blank areas.
8/10
Polyflow
A very well built model. The only thing I can find fault with is that maybe some areas could have done with just a tad more detailing and chamfered edges..
18/20
Texturing
Sadly for me the texturing has been let down by a fairly blasé and bland panel map as a base – this model could have really shone and stood out with some custom mapping done for it and a bit more attention to detail.
15/30
Surfacing
Basic surface settings with some tweaking again leaves it look a tad bland. Some thought in this area would have really made the ship stand out and look great. It’s just too clean – every shiny “clean” modern military aircraft have subtle surface variations and these surfaces are suffering from the squeaky clean CGI look. Surface names and setup has been well thought out and applied.
15/30
General Look and feel
Overall I really liked the development of this fighter – it looks great – with a bit more attention to the mapping it would be a stunner.
8/10
Total: 64/100
Centauri Vorchan
Originality
I really liked this one. It’s obviously a Vorchan yet nothing like a Vorchan! Very nice work. This is the kind of design that gets me excited and would have incited a slight “wow” had I seen it in the show akin to the reaction I had when I first clapped eyes on the Whitestar for the first time. It does however need further development– the vertical wings for instance are much too bland at the moment being totally devoid of any detailing at all..
9/10
Polyflow
A very well built model. The only thing I can find fault with is that maybe some areas could have done with just a tad more detailing and chamfered edges.. There are areas that have an excellent amount of detailing and are slightly hidden away and yet others that are lacking any detail whatsoever and could have really done with it as they are out in the open – it feels slightly “unfinished”. The modelling itself however is almost exemplary – I would have no issues putting my name to this standard of work myself.
19/20
Texturing
Sadly for me the texturing has been let down by a fairly blasé and bland panel map as a base – this kind of panel map I’d only use for really large vessels as a subtle spec map to break up the surfaces of larger more dominant panel maps – it doesn’t really have a place on a smaller vessel like this. This model could have really shone and stood out with some custom mapping done for it and a bit more attention to detail. This model is crying out for some high quality custom maps and detailing work!
15/30
Surfacing
Basic surface settings with some tweaking again leaves it look a tad bland. Some thought in this area would have really made the ship stand out and look great. It’s just too clean – every shiny “clean” modern military aircraft have subtle surface variations and these surfaces are suffering from the squeaky clean CGI look. Surface names and setup has been well thought out and applied.
18/30
General Look and feel
I really like it – aside from the maps issue this is something that I really would want the author to develop further in the mapping area to make it shine!
9/10
Total: 70/100
STARFURY
Originality
Taking the original design concept and modernising it a bit makes it look a little more up to date and I like what the author has done here. Although little to no time has been spent on the cockpit interior which is a shame.
5/10
Polyflow
Oh dear – apologies in advance to the author but you’re going to get a bit of a lecture here so brace yourself.
The basic modelling techniques and polygon flow are quite good – as is a good understanding ofnurbs and how to use and manipulate them – sadly however there some things about nurbs that the author obviously knows VERY LITTLE about or simply has chosen to ignore.
When I first loaded this object it brought my computer to its knees – I could literally hear it screaming out “no more” – I have a quad core Athlon with 4 gb of ram running 64 bit OS and LW1064 bit – it required 1.8 gb – 2.8 Gb of memory and the screen blanked out with the GRFX card screaming for mercy also a Radeon 5400HD with 1gb on board ram.
How on earth was a Starfurydoing this? I wondered – But being experienced I sort of guessed why – after rebooting the computer –required cos my OS froze – I set the sub div levels in both catmull and normal to just 1 and loaded up again and there was my answer: 720,626 polygons set as NURBS!
Now the average level for nurbs in modeller to workwith effectively is about 4 and the vast majority work with a minimum of 6 (myself included) and some scenes 8, but let me break it down to you like this:
At the varying levels of sub d divisions you will end up with the following polygon counts when frozen ( and they get frozen whenever they are rendered and worse yet they even all get tripled if you know ANYTHING about nurbs in LW you know this to be true) Crucially however the grafx card will try and display the figure when frozen before tripling – anyway this is how it breaks down.
• Sub d level 2 - resultant polygon count = 2,882,504 and when tripled: 5,765,008
• Sub d level 3 - resultant polygon count = 6,485,634 and when tripled: 12,971,268
• Sub d level 4 - resultant polygon count = 11,530,016 and when tripled: 23,060,032
• Sub d level 5 - resultant polygon count = 18,015,650 and when tripled: 36,031,300
• Sub d level 6 - resultant polygon count = 25,942,536 and when tripled: 51,885,072
I’m sure you can work out for yourself what the figures are at levels of 7 and 8 which themselves are quite normal for modeller to be set to for most modellers. So as you can see my modeller apps was trying to display a model comprising of more than 26 million polygons! Frankly for a small fighter this is bloody ludicrous.
What annoyed me even more was that some pieces that were set as nurbs had themselves looked like they had already been frozen from a nurbs object and then set to nurbs yet again – which quite frankly is bloody lunacy!!
I can only ascertain the cause of this to be a few things:
• The author has a personal computer that is capable of running a Starfleet vessel and has no consideration for how the rest of the world may be able to use the mesh.
• The author has done this on purpose toshowoff the power of his equipment with no consideration for others – a sort of ‘look at what my pc can handle’ move.
• The author has no real understanding of the implications of using nurbs for hard bodied objects without the resultant freezing and optimising that should follow afterwards –
NOW – I can understand that the author may have wanted to use nurbs in order to prepare scenes that offered the model in various levels of detail for various camera shots – but realistically this is not the way to do it. Personally I would have asked for separate meshes for this use. The asset would have had to be planned wisely so that the original nurbs objects could then be frozen out at various sub d levels – optimised and provided for final use as a variety of different LOD objects – this would have been far more economical useof resources and time than to have an object that would vary from 6 to 25 million polygons when loaded.
But you know you can and could have used nurbs exclusively for this ship but it would have required much more wise use of them to keep the resultant resources required to use the mesh to a minimum – to cite examples - there are many fine car meshes out there that authors have left as nurbs and their resultant polygon resources are quite acceptable because they have been designed and planned well – this sadly has not.
Imagine for 1 second that I am a TD wanting to put 10 of these space fighters into a shot? Go on imagine what I would be shouting in that studio then……
7/20
Texturing
Very little in the way of texture maps have actually been employed with just a custom colour map for the top wing decal and this craft requires some dedicated custom maps to make it ultimately shine. Settings are mainly basic and procedural in nature.
10/30
Surfacing
Surface settings – a bit more work is needed to layout the correct surfacing of the mesh for final mapping.
10/30
General Look and feel
This could have been so good with more attention to the points already mentioned - sadly though even though this version hasmore detailing added which in itself looks good – the original version from over 20 years ago – looks better.
3/10
Total: 35/100
NarnFrazi
Originality
This is a classic case of a little goes a long way. There’s not much you can do to expand on the little frog – or is there? Subtle additions and design changes with completely new things added here and there have certainly made major inroads to update this classic little ship’s design. This actually ticked all the boxes for me, I could actually envisage this as a real world design.
10/10
Polyflow
As seems to be the trend with this particular author – good modelling ethics and well thought out and planned modelling strategies have been employed.
19/20
Texturing
Aah texturing that actually does the mesh justice – there are lots of little things in these maps that go along way to make the model believable, I would have liked to have seen a little bit more to actually sell the mesh totally – think modern day fighter jets and all the little markings here and there that we don’t ‘see’ but in actuality we do that sells the thing as a whole.
28/30
Surfacing
I really liked the way that a lot of thought has gone into the surfacing attributes of this mesh it really does look like a painted little fighter with a few battle scars and weathering here and there – a well-used and faded gloss paint cover. More work I felt was necessary on the small ancillary details of the metal work but overall excellent effort!
28/30
General Look and feel
I really liked this one an excellent version of the little frog fighter – with a little bit more fine detail work on the maps as mentioned this would be top notch!
9/10
Total: 94/100
Vree Saucer
Originality
A valiant attempt to enhance the classic Vree design has been made here but for me it felt like the development had been cut short and an opportunity to really modernise this puppy was missed.
There’s a lot more that could have been done with the lower and bottom hub sections and the guns felt just too “1950’s” and overly simplistic for my liking.
5/10
Polyflow
Good clean polygon work and good use of divisions levels for the nature of the object. Some areas needed more tweaking and development
16/20
Texturing
A lot more could have been done with this texturing. The ship was just way too clean – even if the vree were into polishing their ships every sunny Sunday there would be indications of wear and tear here and there – surface scratches and heat crazing for example – it wouldhave sold the ship a heck of a lot more..
15/30
Surfacing
Some parts come across as far too glossy and showroom shiny but this could have been down to a 3rd party plugin being required that was missing this end – which is why I prefer things like gloss to be handled with textures most of the time especially if the mesh is to become cross platform in nature.
18/30
General Look and feel
I’ve always been a fan of the Vree saucers and I feel that this could have been enhanced a lot further and it would have really looked spot on then.
6/10
Total: 60/100
Zagros
Originality
It’s very difficult to evaluate a planet fairly I feel when compared to things like spacecraft which really are a world apart – scuse the pun – and keep the scoring criteria fair. However in the old days the planet maps were nothing special and didn’t really come across that great even on screen. The author has done a great job to bring the planet more upto date with some additions and a more accurate scientifically based approach to its construction.
8/10
Polyflow
It’s a planet – you can’t really go wrong with making them! It’s an excellent job of modelling one but the score given reflects the relative ease of required skill to make the objects required when compared to the amount of work required for the other meshes submitted.
5/20
Texturing
Textures make and break planets and these have been thought out selected , created & modified and applied well – I’ve got to give some high marks here even though the maps are not as hard to place on a planet as opposed to spacecraft.
24/30
Surfacing
Give no thought to proper surfacing and a planet looks like a marble – the surfacing has been well thought out and applied very nicely – especially on the rings – high marks here!
28/30
General Look and feel
Well it’s a planet – it looks good – but then in the last 15 years the planets coming out in the 3d scene have all come of age – so it comes down to the maps at the end of the day , the rings work very well and the map –which I can tell is a custom one and made well – could have been a bit better truth be told.
8/10
Total: 73/100
NarnG’Quan
Originality
How do you develop such an Iconic ship – the only areas that you can really approach is the detailing – there is scope for Imperialising this ship. Where the original used texture maps for a majority of the details this author has relished the opportunity to add the further detailing as modelled areas and it pays off well – the addition of the turret and countermeasure systems was very pleasing to see as an evolution of the design.
8/10
Polyflow
On first load the first thing I notice is the polygon count of nearly 1.8 million polygons – so the first thing I set about doing is to see if this figure is justified. I was happy to see that yes it was entirely justified – polygons where they would not be necessary have been culled and they have been used very wisely indeed in the areas where they would be needed and not overly so. I’m happy to report that for me the polygon flow and modelling ethics in this model are top notch – an excellent job by the author in this regard. Dare I say it?? Top Marks!
20/20
Texturing
The author has taken the time to craft some really nice custom maps for this ship and the effort has paid off. My only point of contention is that I do not have a preference for the panelling map or the style the author employed as I would have preferred to have seen a much better effort made here – that said though the effect does still work well. Again High marks here!
27/30
Surfacing
The surfacing has been applied very nicely – the mesh has been broken up into a nice system of surfaces and the maps have been applied with care and attention. On the whole not enough attention has been paid to the spec and gloss channels. With slight tweaking this ship would really blossom as right now it has the ‘too much gloss’ look and feel to it as opposed to the militaristic feel and more “matt” effect in general which IMHO would suit it much more.
27/30
General Look and feel
An absolutely excellent effort here with only minor issues of contention. The addition of a nicely crafted scene file for end users is a bonus that will be much appreciated.
10/10
Total: 92/100
Whitestar Fighter
Originality
I can’t give this anything other than top marks for originality. It’s like nothing ever seen before in the B5 universe and yet the author has done well to make various design methods apparent as precursors for the Whitestar that was to come. The only other fan made mesh that I considered as original as this for a Min-Vorlon design was N.Goksu’s advanced Whitestar from a few years back. Well done!!
10/10
Polyflow
A very well designed and constructed mesh with just enough detail to pull off the excellent textures that are employed.
20/20
Texturing
Excellent use of UV maps in the nurbs stage has led to a beautiful job on the texturing. I’ve had a crack at this Minbari stuff myself in the past and it’s not easy – I really like how this author approached the textures for this type of hull – Nice work! Top marks nearly came here but I felt that the bump mapping could have done with a touch more work to get the organic grown effect to be more vein like in cross section rather than rising to a flat plateau if you get my drift – it’s a bit more like an organic bevelled edge rather than an organic fleshy veiny feel.
28/30
Surfacing
Bump mapping – specular and diff has all been employed very well indeed – along with some nice transparency effects and other effects that really just mesh together synergistically to sell the ship as a whole.
28/30
General Look and feel
Looks great – you’re only not getting top marks because you didn’t finish off that cockpit interior! ;)
9/10
Total: 95/100
Rhys Salcombe
Model/Author (O) (PF&D) (T&S) (L&F) Total (100)
__________________________________________________ _________________
Starfury 5 20 35 8 68
Escelce
Badger Class 6 20 25 7 58
Crook
XORR Class
Vree Saucer 3 15 15 5 30
Starbase1
Zagros VII 3 25 35 8 71
Starbase1
WarlockDestroyer 4 30 30 9 73
scott2753
Narn G'Quan 4 15 30 7 56
rustythe1
Shadow Battle 2 15 10 4 31
Crab Reboot
HawkHart
Whitestar Prototype 8 30 35 9 82
Hybrid Fighter
Amras
Narn Frazi 6 30 35 8 79
Madkoifish
Centauri Vorchan 10 30 30 10 80
Madkoifish
Centauri Sentri 7 25 30 8 70
Medium Fighter
Madkoifish
1) Amras - Whitestar prototype
A) 8/10.
B) 30/40.
C) 35/40.
D) 9/10.
Total) 82/100
Comments: Sturdy original design. Fits well within the universe. Could believably be canonical. Very high poly for what it is but otherwise good.
2) rustythe1 - G'Quan
A) 4/10
B) 15/40
c) 30/40
D) 7/10
Total) 56/100
Comments: Good rebuild of an existing design. Not updated much from the original and texture work is a little rough, good detail level, though very unnecessarily high poly at 1.6 million. Renders well out of the bag. Lost a lot of points for messy poly flow, could do with a lot of cleanup.
3) Starbase1 - Zagros VII
A) 3/10
B) 25/40
c) 35/40
D) 8/10
Total) 71/100
Comments: Easy to use, well presented, true to the original while updating it fittingly.
4) Starbase1 - Vree Xorr
A) 3/10.
B) 15/40.
c) 15/40.
D) 5/10.
Total) 38/100
Comments: Not a design that easily lends itself to being updated, but the detail is too simple and sparse and the textures too understated to really stand out. Good recreation of the original, but could have done with a lot more updating.
5) HawkHart - Battlecrab
A) 2/10.
B) 15/40.
c) 10/40.
D) 4/10.
Total) 31/100
Comments: Needed a lot more updating for me. Not a bad recreation of the original but a lot more could be done with the design. Lots of weird triangulation in the model, looks like every non-planar was tripled which is unnecessary and means the model could never be subdivided. Texture looks more noisy than skin-ish.
6) scott2753 - Warlock
A) 4/10
B) 30/40
c) 30/40
D) 9/10
Total) 73
Comments: Very high poly for what it is - though some of the weird triangulation could be the result of inter-app conversion. Very detailed in some areas, not quite detailed enough in others. The mis-match is a little odd. Otherwise looks great, nice recreation of the original with extra detail, could've been updated further but is probably the best Warlock mesh I've seen online so far.
7) Escelse - Starfury
A) 5/10.
B) 20/40.
c) 35/40.
D) 8/10.
Total) 68/100
Comments: Very nicely presented, but far far too high poly. A lot of reduction could be done with no visible quality difference, and having 750,000 subpatched polys is completely unnecessary. Updating of the design is fairly subtle, but believably done. Top wingart is great, would've been nice to see the rest of the ship given the same level of texture work. Lost a lot of points for modelling inefficiency.
8) MKF - Frazi
A) 6/10
B) 30/40
c) 35/40
D) 8/10
Total) 79
Comments: Efficiently modelled, nicely textured, some stylish updating of the design in areas. Could be a little more radical with the design maybe, but the original design is fairly low-key anyway.
9) MKF - Vorchan
A) 10/10
B) 30/40
c) 30/40
D) 10/10
Total) 80/100
Comments: Fantastic stylish redesign, taking a lot of liberty with the original design but all for the better. Loses some points for being unfinished, both in terms of modelling and texturing.
10) MKF - Sentri
A) 7/10
B) 25/40
c) 30/40
D) 8/10
Total) 70/100
Comments: Another sturdy redesign. Efficiently built with nice surfacing. Could stand to be more detailed in places. Not too fond of the snub-nose design, but other added elements work very well.
11) Crook - Badger
A) 6/10
B) 20/40
c) 25/40
D) 7/10
Total) 58/100
Comments: Unnecessarily high poly again, and some messiness/weird tripling. Texturing is a bit simple, but plenty of variants and nice/funny details in the textures make up for it. It's nice to finally see someone tackle the Badger.