T O P I C ��� R E V I E W
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Dukhat
Member # 341
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posted
So after years of patiently waiting (and the occasional annoying email reminders I sent), Mr. Dan Curry finally got his model out of storage and took some pics of it for me.
After I got the pics, I replied back to Curry asking if it was ok to distribute them. The thing is, he's notoriously bad at replying to emails (hence the years it took me to get these pics). That's understandable, as he's a very busy man.
So here's the deal: If I hear back from him immediately (which I doubt), I'll post them here. If I don't hear from him in the next couple of weeks, I'll just assume he doesn't care, and post them here then. I want to at least make the attempt to ask permission, and I'm sure you guys don't mind waiting a little bit longer, since we've already been waiting since DS9 went off the air
Anyway, I will say this: I'm a bit irked now that I've seen the original model, as the replica I built is wrong in several respects. First, the saucer is further back on the secondary hull. The decals I used were all wrong (turns out he used runabout decals, not Reliant or Excelsior decals). Curry used the top half of the shuttle that came with the Enterprise-A kit in order to cover up the hole where the Excelsior warp pylon assembly goes (I just used a sheet of styrene to plug the hole). The bottom half of the shuttle is attached to the back underside of the secondary hull where the tractor beam emitter goes. Said emitter is now under the shuttlebay in front of the ship. I think I'll try to rebuild my model into the Raging Queen, and start building a new model for the Curry.
I'll post more info soon.
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The Mighty Monkey of Mim
Member # 646
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posted
Cool, and thanks for keeping at this for so long!
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MinutiaeMan
Member # 444
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posted
Wow, it's amazing how we can still dig up info like this after so many years. Next up, we're going to need HD screenshots from Wolf 359.
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Jason Abbadon
Member # 882
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posted
Sounds crazy- can you cudgel together a basic side diagram in Photoshop or something to illustrate what all the differences are? The 1:1000th scale Excelsior kit compared to the Runabout kit is quite small as far as parts go, so I'm trying to imagine where the Runabout parts can be that would not stick out like a sore thumb, scalewise.
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Dukhat
Member # 341
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posted
quote: Originally posted by Jason Abbadon:
The 1:1000th scale Excelsior kit compared to the Runabout kit is quite small as far as parts go, so I'm trying to imagine where the Runabout parts can be that would not stick out like a sore thumb, scalewise.
I think you misunderstood. I said that Curry used runabout decals, not runabout parts. The Raging Queen used some runabout parts, though. I'll post the pics next week.
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AndrewR
Member # 44
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posted
Excellent nerdy-hounding!! Woo!
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Dukhat
Member # 341
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posted
Here's the pics:
As I said before, some of the things I noticed were that the saucer is further back on the secondary hull, there's a little Enterprise-A shuttlecraft top covering the hole where the pylon assembly would have gone, and runabout decals were used on the Reliant pylons. Unfortunately these were the only pics Curry took for me, so I can't see the neck between the saucer and the secondary hull, or what that piece is underneath the secondary hull where the mounting rod is attached. I could tell that the bottom of the shuttlcraft is at the end of the ship on the underside, as I've already started building a new Curry model of my own, and that's what it looks like from that angle.
Also, as an added bonus, I was sent some old scanned polaroids of one of the DS9 kitbash rounds, in various stages of completion. Unfortunately, because Curry didn't build any of these models, he knows nothing about them. However, they're quite interesting: The Antares we've seen before, and there's what seems to be a standard Excelsior "U.S.S. Excel" (obviously named after the Microsoft spreadsheet program, lol ) And the Trieste looks quite bizarre; however it's registry number isn't the same as the canon Trieste, so obviously it's not the same ship.
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The Mighty Monkey of Mim
Member # 646
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posted
Not an April Fool's joke this time, eh?
I really dig the Trieste, very interesting and exotic-looking vessel!
I'd say this qualifies as a worthwhile payoff to your persistent efforts! Thanks again!
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Spike
Member # 322
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posted
Yeah, cool pics. Thanks for the effort, Dukhat. What exactly is the deal with the 3 other vessels? Do you know if they made it in one of the background scenes?
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Starship Freak
Member # 293
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posted
Neh, those last pics is an april's fool joke.
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Spike
Member # 322
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posted
Nope, they were posted on April 2nd and the Antares in these pics matches the pics we got earlier.
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Starship Freak
Member # 293
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posted
Alright, I read his post as: "posted April 01, 2013 11:10 PM" - but I guess I was wrong.
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AndrewR
Member # 44
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posted
The Curry is a nice fit for the Miranda/Nebula lineage of ship designs.
Any clearer pictures of the Antares?
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Jason Abbadon
Member # 882
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posted
quote: Originally posted by Spike: Nope, they were posted on April 2nd and the Antares in these pics matches the pics we got earlier.
I've never seen that "Trieste" before- it's a nightmare and I dont believe it. A line must be drawn in kitbashing...this far and NO FARTHER!
As to the Curry...man, it's waaay worse than I thought! the secondary hull is SO TINY! When I made my own, I assumed the entire Excelsior secondary hull was used....and I used nacelles much closer to the proper scale than those giants.
I was pretty far wrong...but happily so!
Thanks for these pics- once again, Flare remains the very crux of research into the smallest minutae of treknology.
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o2
Member # 907
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posted
Looking at the warp nacelles of the USS Curry, I wonder how they managed to make them glow. In the episode, the warp nacelle is glowing blue, but the model is not transparent in that particular area. Is there any information from Mr. Curry regarding this?
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MinutiaeMan
Member # 444
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posted
I'm pretty sure they use chroma keying or something similar to match certain colors or areas on the film and apply changes to add the effects. For example, the Centaur had fluorescent green paint for windows (see the first pic), which they substituted with the white lights.
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Dukhat
Member # 341
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posted
quote: Originally posted by Jason Abbadon:
As to the Curry...man, it's waaay worse than I thought! the secondary hull is SO TINY! When I made my own, I assumed the entire Excelsior secondary hull was used....
I'm not quite sure what you're talking about. The entire secondary hull was used, and there's no difference in size.
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Jason Abbadon
Member # 882
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posted
It seems shortened to me- look at my model compared to the studio moedel- sure. I kept the rear hangar thingie, but that should not account for any exta length. See how much farther back the seondary hull extends past the impulse engines of the saucer? Could they have mounted the neck connection facing backwards? That would account for the saucer being farther nack along the secondary hull...
Of course, the jumbo nacelles are perspective are not helping judge the studio model...man, what a dog.
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Dukhat
Member # 341
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posted
quote: Originally posted by Jason Abbadon:
It seems shortened to me- look at my model compared to the studio moedel- sure. I kept the rear hangar thingie, but that should not account for any exta length. See how much farther back the seondary hull extends past the impulse engines of the saucer? Could they have mounted the neck connection facing backwards? That would account for the saucer being farther nack along the secondary hull...
I think what's causing the confusion is that the saucer is placed further back on the secondary hull...which is the mistake I made when building my model before Curry sent me the pics. So the front of the secondary hull is jutting further forward than, say, the Raging Queen's secondary hull did.
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Jason Abbadon
Member # 882
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posted
Hmmm...msybe so. My neck part is mounted right on top of where the nacelle pylons join the secondary hull- and it's leaning forward, as God intended...that's as far back as I'm willing to go designwise on the secondary hull....
Ah! I see what I did differently now! When I added the forward facing pointy hangar bay part, I actually added extra length and blended it into the secondary hull to give the ship a more aggressive look...or I just though it looked better that way. I recall it was kinda a bitch to make look right, but was the right choice from a modeling perspective.
So....what can you explain to me about that abomination with the giant phaser ball turretts? Looks like something from the new JJverse movie. Prior to this thread, I have never seen such a thing and kinda assumed you were ducking with us again (which would have been funny for a while, but now less so).
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Mars Needs Women
Member # 1505
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posted
Those ball turrets, they look like the ion cannon the Rebels had at Echo Base in The Empire Strikes Back. I recall having a Galoob MicroMachines Hoth playset that had the ion cannon, I wonder if whoever built the Trieste had several of those playsets. It would about the right time period (mid to late 90s).
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