noonespecial

As I said, I'm not giving up or abandoning the project. It is simply I'm putting the Orion and Launch system on the back burner and shifting priorities to the payload systems that aren't already done in other mods. That being said: Eye candy, the ALTAIR Ascent Pod

It's just the ascent module for the ALTAIR lander. It's only a small portion of the intended lander and used primarily just to ferry people from the surface to the Orion in orbit. Here is the (maybe) finished untextured model

Preliminary "Rough" model of the ATLAIR ascent pod with placeholder texture.

Forth Coming Project

So I noticed something today that kind of made me lose interest in this project a bit. My primary motivation for doing this was I saw the SLS and noticed a lack of anything like it in game. So I was excited to do it. There were a few stockish projects. So I said to myself, I'll do this at full 8.4m scale to make it unique. Then today, I noticed in the ChakaMonkey Beta 0.12 release, there are 8.4m parts. I have only recently started follow YANFRET's endeavors, so I don't know if it's a new addition or was originally planned and I missed it. Regardless, everyone contributing to ChakaMonkey are much better modelers, texture artists, etc., than I am and now that they are (or have been?) doing 8.4m scaled parts, I see little point in continuing what I've been doing here. As such, I putting the MPCV/LUS/etc on the back burner and shifting the goals of this project. I will release them eventually, but I see little point in concentrating solely on them as there are higher quality versions of exactly the thing already available. However, I will eventually finish them and release them because I said I would and I'm not the sort of person to leave something half finished. Instead, I'll be concentrating on the other components planned for the SLS. Such as: The Lunar Radio Telescope Mars (Duna) Surface Mission The Advanced Technology Large-Aperture Space Telescope (ATLAST) and The Solar Probe 2 To reiterate: I'm not abandoning this project, just shifting priorities. The Upper Stage and Orion will eventually be completed (although I really don't see a point, I just can't leave something unfinished). I will just be putting priority on the other parts. That being said... I think I'll go start modeling the ATLAST. Looking at that thing makes my mouth water

Update 8/17/2014 Well. I've finished the initial "payload" launch system, including various adapters, the 4x version of the LUS, fairings, etc. That being said... I've restarted the MPCV (again, version 4 here). I keep having this problem. While doing other parts, I learn new tricks and become more proficient at blender. Then I go back, look at the Orion and shriek "Urgh!" at how bad I now think it is. This will, obviously, prolong the release, but hopefully also mean I will be able to produce a better quality Orion. Just to illustrate the differences: MPCV v1: MPCV v2: MPCV v3: I'm hoping v4 will be an equal improvement over v3 as v3 was an improvement over v2 and so on. Cheers Not to mention... I seem to suck at doing animations so the service module portion of the MPCV is also delayed. I'll figure it out eventually.

It's so...... beautiful (queue sad music and weeping in the background)

I'm not only going to do one configuration, but multiple configurations, so a player can use an upper stage suited for their payloads. I will be doing the 4x LUS, the 1x LUS, and the ICPS.

I've given this a test and can't seem to find any issues. What issue specifically so maybe I can find it? There are going to be two versions. One more geared toward RSS at full size (MPCV at 5m, Launch System as 8.4m), then one more geared toward stock at 0.64 scale of the RSS version. Thanks Yanfret. I will adjust accordingly. I swear you guys want to keep me in development forever with all the mistakes you point out that I'm making. Making the MPCV windows bigger, change the fairings... (joking of course)

That's a nice concept picture. Maybe I'll add some of those features. But, it's really impossible to do a 100% accurate replica at this stage, as the finished design of the SLS has yet to be decided. There are dozens of concept pictures floating around, each one slightly different and maybe none of them will be exactly like the finished SLS. For example: and Basically, I'm going for a "close-enough" paradigm of combining the elements I like from the various concept arts available.

Update 8/13/2014 I've finished all of the models for the upcoming Alpha 1 release. I've finished about half of the textures and normals, the complicated ones. The remaining ones are the easy ones, so should go pretty quickly. The part.cfg so far, I haven't really touched at all. There is just enough information to get them to load into KSP and work. Fuel, weight, etc., hasn't been balanced at all. I will do that before the release. Here is the line up for the Alpha 1 release, which I will hopefully be able to finish by the weekend. I still need to do the Single Engline Large Upper Stage assembly and the smaller ICPS engine assembly. I'm also working out the bugs in the animations for the solar panels. For some reasons, the part with the animation is SUPER laggy when loaded and only one of the four panels animate, despite all four panels being animated as a single model. Much to do.

What is that behind the the LUS? An inflatable heat shield? A HUGE inflatable heat shield?

Concept from the ESA website, dated mid-2013. The round ones are all dated earlier.

Update 8/10/2014 Finished the model, texture, and normals for the service model.

Indeed. Now the only question is: Built into the Orion or separate part? Then, all I'll have to do is figure out how dtobi did this:

I think you are right. This can only mean..... that the ESA uses KSPI!

Thanks, I'm still very much a novice at using Blender and I'm learning everyday. I am planning on rounding the lip at the edge of the heat shield for one specific purpose and just haven't decided precisely how I'm going to do it. Either as an additional part or built into the Orion model. The reason is this: Deployable/inflating landing/flotation bags. How am I at IVA? I don't know, I've never done one. I... actually have no idea how to do one. As with everything else, I cross that bridge when I reach it and I'll go see what tutorials I can find when I start planning the interior. Luckily, I do have a few pictures of the interior of the Orion. It's not much different than the interior for SpaceX's Dragon 2. I found something just a moment ago that I think may warrant a complete redesign of the service module. I just found this on the ESA website dated mid-2013, which would make it the most recent service module concept (that I have seen). It has some distinct differences from earlier concepts. Notice the fuselage is a 12-sized cylinder instead of circular as well as the (leather?) sheath around the service module/mpcv coupling. The solar panels seem to be somewhat narrower as well. Opinions gentlemen? This news version of the service module or stick with the older one?

Update 8/8/2014 Since I discovered that I can reference photos directly into blender, and no longer have to guess the scale, I've redone the MPCV and Service Module. Here is the mostly done MPCV and Service Module. The texture is mostly done on the Orion, I still need to do normal maps for it, and the textures for the Service Module should be started soon. I still need to model the service module fairings and solar panels (animations... I still need to figure that out). Speaking of animations. Is it better to do the animations in Blender and import them, or do them in Unity, or is there a third option? Any recommendations?

Download fixed. Incomplete models (orion and service module) removed.

The release parts should only include the tank and 4x engine clusters of the LUS (Large Upper Stage) assembly. It should does not include the MPCV or the service module. Those were included by mistake and have not been finished or properly scaled. My mistake, please ignore those. I double checked the download, the unfinished orion and service module are in the package.

I would say... actual reflections. Adding an alpha channel does not create a reflective effect. Here are some side-by-side comparisons of the same model with and without the reflection plugin. Both pictures have alpha channels. I'm using the plugin with minimal settings to give more of a glossy effect than a full reflective mirror effect, although the plugin supports it. If one wanted, it could make each surface a real time high quality reflection of everything around it for a considerable distance. I'm using it to, hopefully, enhance the model without relying on it or distracting from the model itself. I'm using low settings in the plugin to make system impact incredibly small.

Yeah. I completely didn't see his post.

Good idea and Done

I generally use PS. Except when I'm at work and randomly have free time between classes (I'm a ESL teacher) to work on SLS, I'll use GIMP.

Not exactly, The reflective plugin has nothing to do with blender . The reflective plugin uses the Alpha Channel in the texture image to control reflective strength. Black in the Alpha channel = no reflection and White = highly reflective. For these models, I'm generally using between 15-25% Black, to get more of a "gloss" than a reflective mirror. Starwaster can tell you A LOT more about it than me.