Tsiolkovsky-Station Core

Both modules together provide ten docking ports for expansion modules. Something I have to build yet...

The last rendering is a quick improvised experiment to create a vertical panorama of the station. It's made of five renderings and composed together in Photoshop. The transitions between the images are not nice but I wanted to try out how it looks. Maybe I can use it for an illustation in my book.

Tsiolkovsky-Station Block-B

The second part of the stations core. Basicly a cargo module it provides storage room and additional water and fuel tanks. It's also equipped with a large heat radiator witch is part of the stations thermal control system.
Both core modules Block-A and Block-B are stand alone spaceships with all nessesary systems that will be docked together in orbit.
I'll post some renderings of this soon...

Tsiolkovsky-Station Block-A

The first module of the "Tsiolkovsky-Experimental-Space-Habitat", formerly the ISS2. It's the same model I posed a while ago here. Since then I added some more details, rebuild the docking ports and overworked the materials.

The first rendering is lit up by a sunlight, three blue lights (in different tones) and some light arrays for diffuse light.
On the second one I tried to build up a realistic light setting. It's rendered with global illumination and contains only one light (the Sun) and a huge blue sphere (the Earth) to simulate the reflected light onto the station.

Clipper Docking Device

Recently I started working on the chapter about the docking procedures and rebuild the docking mechanism of the Clipper-model.

When docking the probe on the extended shaft is used to grapple the station-side docking-device and establish a soft connection. After that the shaft is retracted, both docking-devices are pulled into each other until several clamps in the docking-ring establish a pressure- tight seal between station and spacecraft.

The materials need some improvement but that will be done when rendering the final artwork.

Clipper Launch Vehicle - Top

And finally the most interesting part of the rocket...

The small rockets and grids attached to the module between Clipper and upper stage are part of the rescue system. In case of emergency the rockets will fire and raise the spaceship out of the danger zone. While the rockets are firing the expanded grids will work as airbrakes stabilising the flight attitude.

Clipper Launch Vehicle - Upper Stage

The 3rd stage of the rocket. Bottom render shows the stage after separating the engine-covering to save additional mass.

Clipper Launch Vehicle - Rear

I think I haven't shown the launch vehicle for the Clipper, yet. The first render shows the five-rocket-bundle of the 1st and 2nd stage, and the bottom picture the central-stage after separating the outer rocket-modules.

Because of my attempt to create a believable 3D-model the design is heavily inspired by first mock-ups and prototypes of the russian Angara-rocket.

Entering the Clipper

One of the small amount of finished pictures for my book project. It's from the first chapter about the flight preparations. The scene itself is the middle part of a series of illustrations.

ISS2 Test Renderings

A few renderings I did the last days to test the revised configuration of the station. I had some trouble with this model, it's far from being finished but it already grew up to 2,5 million polygons and Cinema refused to render it (out of memory).

However, I switched to the 64bit version of XP and ordered a new bundle of 4GB RAM. I hope it will bring release...

Space Tug

This is another model for my ISS2-project. I already build it during the last fall, the model is nearly finshed... there are just a few more details.

The Tug will be always docked to the space station, it's more kind of a mobile station-module than a stand-alone spacecraft. It's able to act as a constuction plattform, maintenance vehicle and of course as a tug to move space station-modules and bigger cargo.
At the front is a docking port with several additional clamps, fuel and oxygen tanks. Besides the cockpit are two big remote manipulators, three smaller manipulators are folded at the botton. The rear contains the main engines, solar-panels and a second docking port.

The idea behind the design was to create a replacement for the capabilities of the space shuttle as a flexible working plattform after it's retirement.

... somehow I'm afraid how big this project gets.

ISS2 Power Station Module

The ISS2 Solar Dynamic Power Station is the biggest module and build to provide cooling capacity and enough energy for the fully developed space station.
The big parabolic mirrors concentrate the incoming sunlight onto the mast top, smaller dishes concentrate the lightrays again and reflect them back to the energy generator between the main mirrors.
The circulating fluid inside the box is heated up, fades into steam, builds up pressure, drives a small turbine and finally energy is created.
After passing the turbine the steam is cooled down (via the small radiators), fades again into fluid and the cycle is closed.


Both slewable mirrrors are placed at the end to two masts that are rotateable around the center-line for optimal sun-tracking.

And two close-up's of the forward docking port and the main cooling radiators.

ISS2 Core Module

I cannot believe there was no posting since 6 months. Since I'm working on a bigger project (the ISS2 is a part of it) for my diploma thesis, I forgot to make any updates.

The renderings show the core module of the space station. Two of six docking ports are already occupied by a small storage module with attached radiators for cooling and a docking adapter for spacecrafts.
The docked spaceship is an early but quite accurate model of the actual design of the Clipper (the layout changed a lot since the first version).

The ISS2 WIP

The current layout of the space-station I mentioned in the previous posting: Besides giving the Clipper spacecraft a home, is the goal of this project to create a (I hope more than less ;)) realistic alternative or follower to the actual International Space Station.

Orbiting

Three orbit renderings I made a few weeks ago for the presentation at school and to test the new space environment.
Right now, I'm building a space station that will be the home of the Clipper spacecraft...

Managers and Leaders - Part 3

The final illustrations:





The renderings are 5000px wide, plus a lot of additional work in Photoshop the last psd-files were around 1GB. It took around 10 minutes to load a single one. My next system needs definitely more RAM...

And at last, some close-ups in the original resolution:





To be honest, I was very sceptical if I could handle this unusual topic. But now I'm quite happy with the result and because it was my first published and paid work I've ever done, I finally think this project was a rewarding experience.

Managers and Leaders - Part 2

After sketching the basic layout, I used the drawings as close reference for the 3D scenes. The 3D version of the last illustration is missing because I haven't found a rendering of the wip-process.
I liked these early pictures, but after the first meeting with the people from the Business Manager I had to make a lot of changes...




At first I wanted to mix a drawing of the author with the 3D scene, to avoid making a 3D character (I haven't done this before). But during the process I wasn't happy with the result (they were to bad to be shown here ;)), so finally, I had to make a 3D character.
Another challenge was that there was only one useful portrait of the author, I could use for the 3D model:



I'll post the last part tomorrow or sunday...

Managers and Leaders - Part 1

At the beginning of this year our school had a cooperation with the german issue of the magazine "Harvard Business Manager". The topic of this issue was the anniversary of the Harvard Business School in the US and our goal was to fully illustrate the included articles written by famous teachers of the Harvard Business School.

The article I got was about the different personalities of managers and leaders and their respective style when leading a company. My idea was basically to show their different characters within the architecture of two bridges and later how both styles can possibly interact together.
Besides our job to illustrate the different topics we got the additional task to show the authors on the first picture. So, the man standing behind the bridge was supposed to the author of the article.

I started in doing a few drawings to presend my basic idea:



Then I sketched down the layout:





The next two parts will come during the weekend...

Final Kliper 2

And some close-up's of the service module, sensors, rendevous antennas, orbital engines etc.. The last picture shows the rocket adapter with integrated escape rockets.

Final Kliper 1

I nearly finished my Clipper model. This is the first part of some renderings I made for a presentation at school. Right now, I'm finished with the model. The next step will be, to start creating some scenes that show how the spaceship works. Then I'll see if there's something to improve...

Touch-Up

Do you remember my very first posting here?
Next week I have to expose the my projects from the last two years at school and I had to touch-up some of my older projects for this.
I haven't changed anything at the 3D-model but completely replaced the lighting. It's amazing how much a few minutes of work (except the render-time) increased the look of the model.

I hope sometime I'll find the right inspiration to finish this.

PS.
The other touched-up WIPs are the Spacebus, the Kosmotech and the Ropetrain.

Scaffolds

I intend to make some hangar-scenes with my Clipper-model, so I had to build some of these racks that will later surround the bow of the spacecraft.

Book Cover

Front cover:

Back cover:

I made these two illustrations for a book called "Rogues of the Galaxy", nearly two years ago.

Although it's a bit unusual stuff for me (after my military service my topics got somehow more peaceful ;) ), I had a lot of fun doing this.

(Sunrise over) Ground Base

Two updated views of the new ground-station during the martian morning...

Ground Base - Update

Two very rough renderings of the new version of the space-elevator's ground base. I kept the shape of the original tower but I changed it into a bundle of huge cables, keeping the spacerope into position over the basement.
-> Early concepts

Clipper WIP Pt.3

Some views of the landed Kliper. The gear is quite fictional because I haven't found any indication of a landing gear in the reference material. But I think the concept demands a kind of gear, so I used the chassis of the HL-10 as inspiration.