I started this model out of my passion for science fiction and also to play freely in a scene without client restrictions or any other limitations.
Space Firebird 2772 is one of my personal experimental projects done in 2014. I've played quite a while working on it during my evenings and free time, trying hard to improve my skills in #hardsurface modelling.
It was my first ever anime experience and I was absolutely ore struck. It spiked my fantasy at the time and made me daydreaming about a futuristic world and space travel.
The process of modelling this #spaceship (really it didn't look quite as anything at the beginning) wasn't very linear at all. I didn't follow any particular method or tutorial and I didn't want to set myself any limits at the beginning. After I deleted and restarted modelling a few times, I thought I would like to attempt to create a spaceship that would maybe be a tribute for one of my favourite anime films that brought joy to my childhood - #Phoenix 2772 #Space Firebird, original title - Ai no kosumozôn (1980) directed by Taku Sugiyama. It was my first ever anime experience and I was absolutely ore struck. It spiked my fantasy at the time and made me daydreaming of that futuristic world and space travel. I had my first ever philosophical revelation about the scale of men in report to the universe.
Making-of the spaceship in my scene
I started blocking out the shapes and eventually decided to go on with a bird shaped shuttle with large wings that would be part of the crew chambers and a module below that would carry a cargo of people in cold sleep. It symbolically represents "the #phoenix" bird (a symbol of rebirth) that would be a #transporter ship which would search for a habitable planet outside our solar system after our planet would become inhabitable.
The story in the #anime is quite different but this wasn't meant to be an illustration, it was more a starting point, an idea. I didn't really pursue a narrative but I had in my mind a sketch of the context in which this ship would "live".
Being one of my first more complex #hardsurface models, I made many beginner mistakes. One of the main mistakes being the attempt to add detail on a big model - you would normally create more pieces, smaller bits and put them together. Also I was tempted to add detail without finishing first the global shape and then having to delete many parts I've spent quite a lot of lot of time doing. So there were many lessons to be learned with this project.
Also using turbosmooth modifier added to the complexity. My intention is to have a high-poly model anyway, I wasn't worried about the resolution but I wanted to keep it clean in the same time which was quite a challenge at some point.
Eventually I had a model, not an ideal one but it was my first ever spaceship finished. I was dreaming of being a concept artist at the time but that wasn't a realistic career direction for me.
It remained as one of my first attempts to create something different, not only the projects I was doing for my full-time job. Coming back to the scene making-of I wanted to put this spaceship in a context so I thought to create a composition with a planet below.
I've added many satellite images from earth and overlayed them to create the illusion of a new habitable planet that the spaceship was heading to.
Next step was the interior. I made the interior as a totally different scene. I even thought the spaceship doesn't worth showing and I should only post the interior as a portfolio scene. It was only experimenting in the end so it didn't really matter.
I really enjoyed playing with the lighting although in the end I changed it completely. I was tempted to make an outer space lighting but I changed my mind because I thought it would be more interesting to just land them on the planet and see something different.
I used an HDRI from one of our trips at Chamonix (France) in the Alpes as I thought would create a spectacular bright light and I could easily give the impression in Photoshop that it's an alien planet.
I did quite a bit of work on the #coldsleep pods which I designed looking more like coffins. I wanted to give them a rather sinister look and I also added a few people in #postproduction
Here it is a closer look at the coldsleep pods:
The final image for the interior:
I've named it Time to Wake-up. I've presented this project at one of the #3dsmaxusergroup meetups in London - @3dslondon (twitter). I used to attend these meetups quite often and I had the honour to even do a couple of presentations myself.
Thank you for watching and hope to see you soon on my blog!