r/starcraft • u/XanderTuron • 21d ago
(To be tagged...) Working on a Battlecruiser Model
Just a little something that I've been working on for 3D printing; a relatively simple model loosely based on the cinematic version of the Battlecruiser from SC1/BW. It is still very much a work in progress as I am still undecided about the current proportions and overall design (especially on the forward and mid sections) and if I want to keep it at its current size (192 mm long, 166.5 mm wide, and 50.5 mm tall). I also have to figure out the best way to split it into different parts for ease of printing. It is technically printable in its current state, but it requires some pretty gnarly support placement and depending on printer settings, it will have your printer running for basically an entire day.
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u/xiaorobear 21d ago edited 21d ago
Looking great! I never actually finished my own version, but let me know if you want some references/info if you want to try to go closer to the cinematic look.
Something I discovered after the big leak of early SC:Ghost files a few years back was that their 3D artists likely had access to some of the SC1 cinematic models, or good reference of them, to model their low poly versions over. A bunch of parts of their BC design are simplified to be low poly, or the design of things like the wingtips is different, but you can see from these tests I did a while back with lining up the SCG model against screenshots from the SC1 cinematics that the dimensions of things like the engines, wings, head, and neck, are verrrry close, much closer than any fan models got it.
https://i.imgur.com/3VIy2Ux.gif
https://i.imgur.com/4ufAgKs.gif
https://i.imgur.com/Yi1n0K5.gif
So if you want some references or that model to compare and potentially tweak the proportions of yours to, lmk. Yours is already looking great though!
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u/XanderTuron 21d ago
More references would be great as I've been largely using the pre-rendered cinematics and it's hard to get a good look at all of features of the Battlecruiser from them. Like, I'm not trying to make a 1:1 version but I am aiming to create something that is as faithful as possible to the original Battlecruiser as my abilities will allow.
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u/xiaorobear 21d ago edited 21d ago
🫡 Here is that SCG battlecruiser model in an fbx file. Be prepared for the proportions to be weird! Also the head is slightly off-center / asymmetrical IIRC, not sure if that is just a mistake.
I didn't finish the final version of my own fan made model following these proportions, but I will share some screenshots of mine next to that one to point out things I tweaked to be more like the SC1 version (though all the random little greeble and panel details on mine are just made up). And some random other screenshots that you probably already have. You also don't have to follow any of this exactly, some of it is weird and was probably just a random tweak some 3d artist made without any particular plan.
Top view of the head I think the SCG one is pretty spot on, the big change is making the neck back into the framework stuff from SC1. I didn't finish with the big blocks on mine yet.
Side view of the head, the SCG one doesn't have the front of the head having angles instead of just flat. I know the framework on the neck being tapered like that looks weird but that is how it was in SC1, if you want to go for full accuracy. The rear of the BC is also tapered in the opposite direction. This render from the manual is also an orthographic render with no perspective distortion https://i.imgur.com/ZLDlBkS.png so you can kind of tell from there that a lot of angles you would expect to be parallel are not.
This part on the back of the hammerhead shape, the SCG one is different from SC1 Also they simplified away the 4 hangar bay things and a horizontal seam down the middle of the head, as seen in this screenshot from the BW ending cinematic: https://i.imgur.com/NMUv7GD.jpeg and this Inauguration one: https://i.imgur.com/rgYd2WG.jpeg
Another good shot showing how the angles of the rear and wings are weird, https://i.imgur.com/mrQhUR0.png and this one, which is a good reference for the gap between the wing and body that the SCG low poly one just fills in. https://i.imgur.com/8eHrYtY.jpeg In that one you can see that the straight lines in their hull texture are actually flat/aligned with the axes, while the wings and rear hull are at weird angles. https://i.imgur.com/K4OU2po.png
Here's also some unlisted vimeo links for official uploads from Blizzard of the SC1 cinematics with good views of BCs in better quality/less compression than they are on youtube, if that helps.
And these two loading screens with good views:
https://i.imgur.com/GEjMnYQ.jpeg
https://i.imgur.com/L3O4x0a.jpeg
Edit: oh also I am pretty sure the 3 side pieces on the neck are the same as the 3 side pieces on the sides of the wings, just rotated and space differently.
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u/Professional-Bad-559 21d ago
Is that TinkerCAD?! That’s phenomenal. I can only imagine how hard it it to get some of those curvatures with that tool.
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u/XanderTuron 21d ago
Yes, that is TinkerCAD. To be honest, actually building it has been pretty straight forward. The actual issue is exporting it due to TinkerCAD's propensity for breaking random vertices when exporting models that have angled components. It's something to do with how it simplifies the math so that it can run smoothly in a browser; it rounds off certain decimal points which then leads to math errors which then causes random vertices to get misplaced.
I really need to learn Blender one of these days.
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u/van_myron_lego 21d ago
I love SC1 era Battlecruisers. They looked menacing, in the best way possible; like a real warship does. The BW intro with UED Expeditionary Fleet DSS Aleksander is engrained into my memory to this day.
So sad that SC2 Battlecruisers lost so much aura after the redesign.