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Do you like the Illustrated Novel Space Ships?

Discussion concerning the TV, film, and comic adaptations.

Do you like the Graphic Novel's Space Ships?

1) Yes, I like the fins.
10
15%
2) No, I prefer canon ships with impellers.
55
85%
 
Total votes : 65

Re: Do you like the Illustrated Novel Space Ships?
Post by MaxxQ   » Wed Jan 29, 2014 12:23 pm

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Jonathan_S wrote:
MaxxQ wrote:The last movie to do space right was 2001, back in 1968, and for its time, it actually did very well. Try to do it the same way today and it may still be a critical success, but it would end up a complete commercial flop.


Well it was a much simpler scale, but I'd say Apollo 13 did space well. (within the admittedly very limited confines of the Apollo command module and LEM)

But that had the advantage of recreating a known event, not having to do imaginary, large, long duration spaceships.


I'm not a fan of the giant thrusters in the current art, just like I didn't like them on the cover art for my paperback of Honor Among Enemies, but if I have to I can live with them for the same of more Honorverse. (Or if the comics and/or movie turn out horribly I'll just pretend they never existed :D)


Yeah, you're right. Apollo 13 *did* do space very well, even filming some scenes inside the Vomit Comet to get "real" microgravity. I had forgotten about that.

As for the thrusters, I think we'll eventually see them either completely gone, or drastically toned down. There's other ways to differentiate the ships (or denote fore and aft) if they really thought about it.

Referring to your parenthetical, I agree. It's pointless to scream and yell about this or that right now. Make constructive criticisms, yes, but calling people names, or saying they're on drugs isn't constructive, and only serves to make sure that ones crits are ignored.
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Re: Do you like the Illustrated Novel Space Ships?
Post by SWM   » Wed Jan 29, 2014 2:20 pm

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cralkhi wrote:Hmmm. Maybe I DO need to watch 2001 again; I don't remember it being slow until the psychedelic bizarro colors stuff started happening (that part was boring, mostly because nothing comprehensible was happening).

Yes, you should see it again. The space flight to the moon is just watching people move around, eat, sleep, and use a zero gee toilet, just to show what weightlessness is like. The first sequence aboard the Jupiter mission starts with 10 minutes of watching the crew wake up and go through an ordinary day in the rotating section--with no speaking--just to show what it is like. The exterior space scenes have several segments longer than a couple minutes just watching people move around. It takes Dave several minutes to chase down his dead and drifting partner, with just breathing noises and repeated views of the slowly approaching body. There isn't any drama aboard the mission until 2/3 of the way through the movie.

In a modern Hollywood movie, if something doesn't happen every single minute, it is considered slow and dull. A modern cut of 2001 would take 1/4 of Kubrick's work (at most) and insert a few explosions and action sequences against HAL's defense systems.
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Re: Do you like the Illustrated Novel Space Ships?
Post by Brigade XO   » Tue Feb 11, 2014 12:10 pm

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Given the distances and range of weapons involved in the books, it is unlikely that someone on a ship actually sees both sides of an engagement with their eyes like was possible in WW I and WW II. What you are seeing -IF you were at an observation port- would be your own ship giving fire (perhaps even graser fire if there was something to make it visible) and feel impacts/results of hits on you own ship.
What we “see” all the time in the books is 1) what is described as happening ON THE TACTICAL SCREENS of the warships bridges and 2) author’s detached description of results of fire etc.
This kind of thing has been shown well for years without having to show both sides at very long range of a battle. Think the shots of incoming fire in “In Harms Way” or both sides – shooting and receiving- of Master & Commander. Same thing back in “Pursuit of the Graf Spee” It was done quite a bit less well (because for those of us with an appreciation of what it was taken from but was actually suppose to be) in Star Wars (I think II) where the two capital ships did a passing engagement with rolling broadsides at a range (and with crew served weapons) much better suited to the 17th to early 19th century.
Even with LACs in their roll as a PT Boat analog you would still be at beyond visible distance though you could put them in a situation of something like “Midway” showing LAC groups manuvering/attacking/etc though showing the targests on the Tactical screens of a LAC (from the LAC command deck) and then the results of their weapons launch.
It is just a thought. Much of the communication of the film is going to be inside things. That would be ship command decks, conference rooms, various ship areas(weapons, damage control, engineering) and interior shots on perhaps Manticore but at least Grayson plus some “outside” shots at Grayson at least to set the background of what the people there have to do such as live in domed/enclosed cities.
If you look at “good” (to me anyway) movies such as “Master & Commander” they set most of what goes on in a relatively enclosed space. Ok, the deck of a frigate is not “enclosed” but it is fairly well defined and bounded even if that is a ship on a lot of ocean. This is not doing the main battle of Waterloo with a lot of wide screen shot of massed infantry etc or Helms Deep with legions of Orks.
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Re: Do you like the Illustrated Novel Space Ships?
Post by Brigade XO   » Tue Feb 11, 2014 12:33 pm

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The other side of this is that while there does need to be some obvious design differences between different Systems warships (Haven, Manticore and Grayson –which at this point does NOT have any ships from either Manticore or Haven (rebuilt Haven prizes)- there needs to be very clear differences between the UNIFORMS of the FOUR major combatant forces. Manticore, Haven, Grayson and Masada. This is complicated by Manticore Royal Marines as a 2nd uniform type for Manticore (officer & enlisted) and at least the security force & possibly personal Armsmen of Benjamin on Grayson. There also needs to be some though to civilian clothing for at least Grayson and this would include “regular” for any general shots and more business like or up to formal for the diplomatic level – from Manticore and the Grayson side at Benjamin’s level plus (of course) his wives at the formal dinner. That then also leads to Formal military uniform for Honor etc.
Details, details……..and continuity.
Yes the Peeps on the “Masadan” ships are in Masadan Navy uniforms but I have no idea if we are going to see anything of actual Peep ships and military (beyond the ships given to Masada with some “Masadan” logo and various other markings) except perhaps in the scenes “suggested” by RFC as Honor’s dream/flashback recap and orientation/background introduction. One GOOD thing is that other than holding a lower rank (and being a hyper-capable ship commander at the time so a white beret) for Honor, nothing has to change for at least the Manticore uniforms from the time frame of the flashback to “current time”.
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Re: Do you like the Illustrated Novel Space Ships?
Post by The E   » Wed Feb 12, 2014 8:17 am

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SWM wrote:In a modern Hollywood movie, if something doesn't happen every single minute, it is considered slow and dull. A modern cut of 2001 would take 1/4 of Kubrick's work (at most) and insert a few explosions and action sequences against HAL's defense systems.


I recommend you watch "Moon". You don't need to have awesome exciting things happening every second in a modern movie, but you do need to develop your story in some way in every scene. 2001, to me at least, is completely and utterly boring, because it spends ages just trying to establish its setting visually. It takes time out of furthering the plot to establish the setting, a sin RFC commits with great frequency in his books too, and as a result, it just ends up not being very engaging.
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Re: Do you like the Illustrated Novel Space Ships?
Post by Werrf   » Wed Feb 12, 2014 9:55 am

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The E wrote:2001, to me at least, is completely and utterly boring, because it spends ages just trying to establish its setting visually. It takes time out of furthering the plot to establish the setting, a sin RFC commits with great frequency in his books too, and as a result, it just ends up not being very engaging.

It's not a sin, it's a different style. The setting is the plot, and humanity is the main character.

For me, the key element of 2001 is the mundanity of space travel, compared to the marvel of space mastery.
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Re: Do you like the Illustrated Novel Space Ships?
Post by hvb   » Sun Feb 16, 2014 2:27 pm

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Here (again) are my (somewhat long-winded) thoughts on how to construct easily-recognizable, read color-coded for your convenience, sides in the conflict (both specifically in Evergreen’s Honor of the Queen, and keeping it consistent forwards ... and backwards if Top Cow should be interested):

Useful convention: Wedges should always be show when an outside shot is made (at least in shots where focus has shifted from a different ship or planet- or station-side). This has the benefit of adding a second way to indicate orientation and make the ships even more color-coded for the audiences convenience (see below for a way to do this that is not overly inconsistent with canon).


Wedge colors should (to my way of thinking) not be heraldic tinctures applied over the whole wedge in one solid coloring, but rather a heavy aurora borealis-like wash moving over the transparent wedge, emanating from the nodes (along visible strands) and spreading towards the edges.

This would have the advantages of allowing the ship to be intermittently visible through the wedge when that is desirable (although this is not canonically the case for double-wedge military drives), and making the strands connecting the nodes to the wedge visible, as a combined standing and running rigging, will increase the visual sailing ship analog, with the wedge as the sail; Warshawski Sails by extension may be seen as spinnakers (adding a slight curvature to both strands and the two Warshawshi Sail disks could be used to imply strain, again indicating directionality). During maneuvering the strands on one side could be brighter than the other to further reinforce the imagery.

Wedges 2-4 times as long as the ship, and flag-shaped with rounded edges, to make them narrower over the beam, will give a sense of orientation (very rounded edges could take the shape a third of the way towards an oval).

Keeping the wedge open even when the ship isn’t moving will give a clear sense of which end is forward once the first scene, which should be a zoom-out rather than zoom-in, has established that the pointy hammerhead end (frustum taken as close to a cone as seems needful) goes with the open throat of the wedge, and the flat (cylindrical) hammerhead end goes with the narrower kilt.

One establishing scene, and thereafter whenever the audience sees a wedge, they will know what end of the ship is which. The throat should of course be more open when a ship is traveling at speed than when not, but as there are only really four common speed settings used in the Honorverse (as opposed to the velocities they represent for a given vessel), this should still allow the narrowest setting to be discernibly non-parallel, to show orientation of ships that are not under acceleration.

The four speed settings I identify are as follows:
1: floating in orbit/coasting (parallel in book canon); a 10 degree angle in the film/other visual media would establish orientation.
2: escorting at merchanter speed (the Merchies would be showing the setting 3 angle, as they are traveling at their safe maximum speed, unless they are in convoy with larger Merchies), say 20 degrees or less; the amount less depending on how much the warship is out-massed by the merchanter. Thus wedge angle would be an additional visual aid for the viewer in estimating relative mass/size between ship traveling in company.
3: cruising at full normal speed (80% of full military), say 26 degrees.*
4: Full Military speed (100%, no compensator margin; this should be the “ridiculous angle”, say 30 degrees).
( http://www.mathsisfun.com/angles.html scroll down to “try it yourself” to see what the angles look like).
*A rule of 10 degrees plus 0.2 degrees per % of inertial compensator maximum could be used; this would become interesting when/if Storm from the Shadows is made, as a subtle visual clue to viewers that the Manties are running at only 70% (24 degree angle versus the 26 degree norm, the SLN didn’t notice ... let’s see if the viewer is more attentive ;) , it is one of those little breadcrumbs that say’s the moviemakers have done their homework).


Specific Color Schemes:
Wedge colors: I am aiming to evoke a subconscious recognizable scheme from some galaxy far far away for the good guys, without copying it for the baddies (nor either’s sad devotion to some ancient religion ... ).
Hull colors: I will use the Canonical colors, but stretched as much as possible for increased distinction

e.g. (actually i.e. for the hull colors):
Manticoran ships: Clear Green auroras wash over the wedges, Snow White hulls (maybe with detailing in Gold for a visible tie-in with the crew’s colors; the White as the inversion of the uniform’s Black), round-ish hammerheads (both frustum bow, cylinder stern), Black hull name/number in identical-sized font for all classes (fills a lot of the forward taper on small ships; only little on capital ships, for added sense of scale).

Grayson ships: Clear Blue auroras wash over the wedges, Light Blue hulls (e.g. same as the crew’s tunics, with the detailing done in the Dark Blue of their trousers), round-ish but more primitive/less sleek look over all (more stuff sticking out, etc.), Black hull name/number, slightly different/old-ish font.

So Clear Blue and Green colors for the most visible aspect of the BLUFOR, with white and Light Blue for the detailing.
OPFOR should in contrast have less good-guy colors, so reds, purples and unnatural greens (foreshadowing their distant past as good guys, and later change to same status) seem appropriate. As we also have a canon white for the Havenites, we will render that as a dirty tarnished white.

Masadan ships: Purple auroras shot through with frequent yellow ”flickers” wash over the wedges, Scarlet hulls with Gold or Yellow ”sash” stripes diagonally across both broadsides (mirrors the Scarlet and Gold uniforms), angular and primitive ”junkyard job” look over all (lots of stuff sticking out, etc.), Gold or Yellow hull name/number in Ye-Olde-Bible-Gothic font, complete with elaborate initial letters (but no images of false idols obviously). This color palette should say bad guy to most people (at least if Yellow is used in place of the uniform’s Gold), agreed?

Havenite ships: Poison Green auroras wash over the wedges, Skull White or other darkish/broken white* e.g. ”light gan-Green-e”-ish hulls, angular (e.g. square-ish) hammerheads, Dark/Poison Green hull name/number in a different, but ”near-modern” font. Should emote as a Fallen/Poisoned-with-Evil-Thoughts former good guy palette, right? (To link in with the Green top & Grey trouser uniforms, Grey could be used for detailing, again strengthening the link between outside and inside shots by reusing the same colors).

Anti-Ship Missiles: For visual distinction from the ships, let’s go for Orange auroras washing over the wedges, searingly bright Azure-White beams from the lasing rods when they detonate, with sidewalls turning the rod of light into a cone of lesser intensity.

Counter-Missiles: Again for visual distinction, let’s do Yellow auroras washing over the wedges, wedge-intercept with an attacking missile should be a spectacularly bright flare, Blue-White with Orange/Yellow streaks to make them stand out from the laser rods (visualized if needed as a few individual drive nodes burning on for a tenth of a second on power surges while spinning off the wreckage).


Further Notes (forwards compatibility):
*: Andermani ships: by canon Gray, so make that a Dark Gunmetal Gray, thus leaving room for Skull White or some other broken white color for the RHN to offer a clear difference to the Snow White of the Manties. Thus:

Andermani ships: Clear Green auroras wash over the wedges, Dark Gunmetal Gray hulls, hammerheads of some other shape(e.g. oblate), White detailing (based on the IIRC White uniforms), Blood-Red (light enough to be seen ... maybe with a white outline) hull name/number in an easily legible yet Gothic-inspired script.

Later on the good guy’s aurora colors should shift to represent the admix of the Grayson innovation to the other alliance navies’ ships, so a Clear Blue-Green for the early Manticoran Alliance upgrades (e.g. Minotaur), a Murkier Blue-Green for the Havenites (and Andermanies) as they catch on, while the Manticoran Alliance have moved on to reuse the original Clear Blue color of the Grayson ships by then.

The (Invincible) Solarian League Navy ships: the same kind of Murky or Poison Green auroras as the Havenites started with still wash over their wedges, Unfortunately their uniforms are White with shoulders (for Mess Dress uniform: tunics) Color-coded for Branch, but the hulls could be any pick-a-bad-guy-color (e.g. Blood Red) with White detailing, hammerheads of some ”edgy-nasty” shape (decahedral, octagonal, hexagonal; likely with flanges at the seams), White-or-go-fish hull name/number in some over-officious-looking font.

Erewhon SDF ships: What? Do I have to do all the work? :D Wedges as per the Alliance (lacking a bit behind) ... how about a Pale Yellow for the hulls? (This “yellow for unknown force” foreshadows the on-again off-again nature of their alliance with Manticore) … detailing in … Maroon? For some reason, Maroon comes to my mind as their uniform color, but I cannot find any Canon text-evidence one way or the other, so either someone else will have to do the research, or if undefined they may have to be made up (this is generally the case for the entries below too). Cap-ship shape like the SLN (they buy their capital ships from the same supplier), else get creative; same for font.

Mayan “Navy” ships: As SLN until their deal with Erewhon, then wedges as Erewhon, rest standard SLN (until the “hypothetical” clean break).

“Rembrandt Trade Union” Navy ships: Maybe vaguely like the Erewhonese, as they buy/franchise-build Solly designs ... add enough differences to be distinct (mostly more primitive/clunky, and a different hull color scheme, e.g. Brown or some other earth color), similar for the Nuncians and other small fry good/neutral guys.

Mesa & New Tuscany: Echos of the Masadan or Solly color schemes (i.e. “the evil colors”) if undefined*, with the Mesa ships being Erewhonese-modern in shape, while the New Tuscany ships are Masadan-crude in appearance (and probably have ill-tuned nodes, for the same yellow wedge-flickers also, if less frequent that those Masadan home-builds).
*N.B. the Mesan Alignment Navy colors are Maroon and Green, but the Mesan Space Navy wear different colors, IICR they look more like overdone current-day USN uniforms (from Torch of Freedom chapter 44: “hectares of braid and … tall caps whose visors dripped old-fashioned "scrambled eggs",”).

Beowulf SDF ships: Somewhat like SLN/Erewhon, but without the “edgy-nasty” flanges, and a more good-guy hull color … again, I cannot recall what their uniform colors are supposed to be … if they have to be made up, a Blue and Red Together “hero color” scheme might work; or that most underused of martial colors, Pink? As detailing on a mostly White hull that is, not as the primary color component. ;)
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Re: Do you like the Illustrated Novel Space Ships?
Post by Jeroswen   » Mon Feb 17, 2014 12:14 pm

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hvb wrote:Here (again) are my (somewhat long-winded) thoughts on how to construct easily-recognizable, read color-coded for your convenience, sides in the conflict (both specifically in Evergreen’s Honor of the Queen, and keeping it consistent forwards ... and backwards if Top Cow should be interested):

Useful convention: Wedges should always be show when an outside shot is made (at least in shots where focus has shifted from a different ship or planet- or station-side). This has the benefit of adding a second way to indicate orientation and make the ships even more color-coded for the audiences convenience (see below for a way to do this that is not overly inconsistent with canon).


Wedge colors should (to my way of thinking) not be heraldic tinctures applied over the whole wedge in one solid coloring, but rather a heavy aurora borealis-like wash moving over the transparent wedge, emanating from the nodes (along visible strands) and spreading towards the edges.

This would have the advantages of allowing the ship to be intermittently visible through the wedge when that is desirable (although this is not canonically the case for double-wedge military drives), and making the strands connecting the nodes to the wedge visible, as a combined standing and running rigging, will increase the visual sailing ship analog, with the wedge as the sail; Warshawski Sails by extension may be seen as spinnakers (adding a slight curvature to both strands and the two Warshawshi Sail disks could be used to imply strain, again indicating directionality). During maneuvering the strands on one side could be brighter than the other to further reinforce the imagery.

Wedges 2-4 times as long as the ship, and flag-shaped with rounded edges, to make them narrower over the beam, will give a sense of orientation (very rounded edges could take the shape a third of the way towards an oval).

Keeping the wedge open even when the ship isn’t moving will give a clear sense of which end is forward once the first scene, which should be a zoom-out rather than zoom-in, has established that the pointy hammerhead end (frustum taken as close to a cone as seems needful) goes with the open throat of the wedge, and the flat (cylindrical) hammerhead end goes with the narrower kilt.

One establishing scene, and thereafter whenever the audience sees a wedge, they will know what end of the ship is which. The throat should of course be more open when a ship is traveling at speed than when not, but as there are only really four common speed settings used in the Honorverse (as opposed to the velocities they represent for a given vessel), this should still allow the narrowest setting to be discernibly non-parallel, to show orientation of ships that are not under acceleration.

The four speed settings I identify are as follows:
1: floating in orbit/coasting (parallel in book canon); a 10 degree angle in the film/other visual media would establish orientation.
2: escorting at merchanter speed (the Merchies would be showing the setting 3 angle, as they are traveling at their safe maximum speed, unless they are in convoy with larger Merchies), say 20 degrees or less; the amount less depending on how much the warship is out-massed by the merchanter. Thus wedge angle would be an additional visual aid for the viewer in estimating relative mass/size between ship traveling in company.
3: cruising at full normal speed (80% of full military), say 26 degrees.*
4: Full Military speed (100%, no compensator margin; this should be the “ridiculous angle”, say 30 degrees).
( http://www.mathsisfun.com/angles.html scroll down to “try it yourself” to see what the angles look like).
*A rule of 10 degrees plus 0.2 degrees per % of inertial compensator maximum could be used; this would become interesting when/if Storm from the Shadows is made, as a subtle visual clue to viewers that the Manties are running at only 70% (24 degree angle versus the 26 degree norm, the SLN didn’t notice ... let’s see if the viewer is more attentive ;) , it is one of those little breadcrumbs that say’s the moviemakers have done their homework).


Specific Color Schemes:
Wedge colors: I am aiming to evoke a subconscious recognizable scheme from some galaxy far far away for the good guys, without copying it for the baddies (nor either’s sad devotion to some ancient religion ... ).
Hull colors: I will use the Canonical colors, but stretched as much as possible for increased distinction

e.g. (actually i.e. for the hull colors):
Manticoran ships: Clear Green auroras wash over the wedges, Snow White hulls (maybe with detailing in Gold for a visible tie-in with the crew’s colors; the White as the inversion of the uniform’s Black), round-ish hammerheads (both frustum bow, cylinder stern), Black hull name/number in identical-sized font for all classes (fills a lot of the forward taper on small ships; only little on capital ships, for added sense of scale).

Grayson ships: Clear Blue auroras wash over the wedges, Light Blue hulls (e.g. same as the crew’s tunics, with the detailing done in the Dark Blue of their trousers), round-ish but more primitive/less sleek look over all (more stuff sticking out, etc.), Black hull name/number, slightly different/old-ish font.

So Clear Blue and Green colors for the most visible aspect of the BLUFOR, with white and Light Blue for the detailing.
OPFOR should in contrast have less good-guy colors, so reds, purples and unnatural greens (foreshadowing their distant past as good guys, and later change to same status) seem appropriate. As we also have a canon white for the Havenites, we will render that as a dirty tarnished white.

Masadan ships: Purple auroras shot through with frequent yellow ”flickers” wash over the wedges, Scarlet hulls with Gold or Yellow ”sash” stripes diagonally across both broadsides (mirrors the Scarlet and Gold uniforms), angular and primitive ”junkyard job” look over all (lots of stuff sticking out, etc.), Gold or Yellow hull name/number in Ye-Olde-Bible-Gothic font, complete with elaborate initial letters (but no images of false idols obviously). This color palette should say bad guy to most people (at least if Yellow is used in place of the uniform’s Gold), agreed?

Havenite ships: Poison Green auroras wash over the wedges, Skull White or other darkish/broken white* e.g. ”light gan-Green-e”-ish hulls, angular (e.g. square-ish) hammerheads, Dark/Poison Green hull name/number in a different, but ”near-modern” font. Should emote as a Fallen/Poisoned-with-Evil-Thoughts former good guy palette, right? (To link in with the Green top & Grey trouser uniforms, Grey could be used for detailing, again strengthening the link between outside and inside shots by reusing the same colors).

Anti-Ship Missiles: For visual distinction from the ships, let’s go for Orange auroras washing over the wedges, searingly bright Azure-White beams from the lasing rods when they detonate, with sidewalls turning the rod of light into a cone of lesser intensity.

Counter-Missiles: Again for visual distinction, let’s do Yellow auroras washing over the wedges, wedge-intercept with an attacking missile should be a spectacularly bright flare, Blue-White with Orange/Yellow streaks to make them stand out from the laser rods (visualized if needed as a few individual drive nodes burning on for a tenth of a second on power surges while spinning off the wreckage).


Further Notes (forwards compatibility):
*: Andermani ships: by canon Gray, so make that a Dark Gunmetal Gray, thus leaving room for Skull White or some other broken white color for the RHN to offer a clear difference to the Snow White of the Manties. Thus:

Andermani ships: Clear Green auroras wash over the wedges, Dark Gunmetal Gray hulls, hammerheads of some other shape(e.g. oblate), White detailing (based on the IIRC White uniforms), Blood-Red (light enough to be seen ... maybe with a white outline) hull name/number in an easily legible yet Gothic-inspired script.

Later on the good guy’s aurora colors should shift to represent the admix of the Grayson innovation to the other alliance navies’ ships, so a Clear Blue-Green for the early Manticoran Alliance upgrades (e.g. Minotaur), a Murkier Blue-Green for the Havenites (and Andermanies) as they catch on, while the Manticoran Alliance have moved on to reuse the original Clear Blue color of the Grayson ships by then.

The (Invincible) Solarian League Navy ships: the same kind of Murky or Poison Green auroras as the Havenites started with still wash over their wedges, Unfortunately their uniforms are White with shoulders (for Mess Dress uniform: tunics) Color-coded for Branch, but the hulls could be any pick-a-bad-guy-color (e.g. Blood Red) with White detailing, hammerheads of some ”edgy-nasty” shape (decahedral, octagonal, hexagonal; likely with flanges at the seams), White-or-go-fish hull name/number in some over-officious-looking font.

Erewhon SDF ships: What? Do I have to do all the work? :D Wedges as per the Alliance (lacking a bit behind) ... how about a Pale Yellow for the hulls? (This “yellow for unknown force” foreshadows the on-again off-again nature of their alliance with Manticore) … detailing in … Maroon? For some reason, Maroon comes to my mind as their uniform color, but I cannot find any Canon text-evidence one way or the other, so either someone else will have to do the research, or if undefined they may have to be made up (this is generally the case for the entries below too). Cap-ship shape like the SLN (they buy their capital ships from the same supplier), else get creative; same for font.

Mayan “Navy” ships: As SLN until their deal with Erewhon, then wedges as Erewhon, rest standard SLN (until the “hypothetical” clean break).

“Rembrandt Trade Union” Navy ships: Maybe vaguely like the Erewhonese, as they buy/franchise-build Solly designs ... add enough differences to be distinct (mostly more primitive/clunky, and a different hull color scheme, e.g. Brown or some other earth color), similar for the Nuncians and other small fry good/neutral guys.

Mesa & New Tuscany: Echos of the Masadan or Solly color schemes (i.e. “the evil colors”) if undefined*, with the Mesa ships being Erewhonese-modern in shape, while the New Tuscany ships are Masadan-crude in appearance (and probably have ill-tuned nodes, for the same yellow wedge-flickers also, if less frequent that those Masadan home-builds).
*N.B. the Mesan Alignment Navy colors are Maroon and Green, but the Mesan Space Navy wear different colors, IICR they look more like overdone current-day USN uniforms (from Torch of Freedom chapter 44: “hectares of braid and … tall caps whose visors dripped old-fashioned "scrambled eggs",”).

Beowulf SDF ships: Somewhat like SLN/Erewhon, but without the “edgy-nasty” flanges, and a more good-guy hull color … again, I cannot recall what their uniform colors are supposed to be … if they have to be made up, a Blue and Red Together “hero color” scheme might work; or that most underused of martial colors, Pink? As detailing on a mostly White hull that is, not as the primary color component. ;)



I think the forum has diverted a bit from its initial purpose. The Illustrated Novel's space ships and how they look.

I like the look with the exception of the thrusters looking like the main drive of the ship. Gravity propulsion is a really really cool concept and I don't want to see if confused with regular thrusters.

As a possible fix could you get away from the conical hammerhead by making the hammerheads like a hammerhead sharks but vertically instead of horizontally? It would be a cool look and get away from conical hammerhead and its obvious similar look as a sex toy.
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