Martes

Vernon under sail:

Another ship in my "monstrous frigate" series: the HMS Vernon (1832): Considered at that time an experimental frigate, she was very large (similar in size to 80-gun ship), and one of the first to be constructed with some ergonomics in mind (space between decks increased to 7 feet, for example), and carried her guns at 10 feet above the waterline. The stern is also interesting - it's actually an extended round (elliptic) construction with a very conservative sternboard attached to it to make the appearance more classic. I have a weakness for the works of William Symonds, apparently.

Some closer views of the hull and the elliptic stern of the Spartan:

Finally got around to finish the HMS Spartan, Pique's little sister:

At a glance:

And I went into rebuilding the 74 for a reason. I used the Vindictive plans on the hull of the Colossus (which will explain a slightly different gunport arrangement and a straight stem). The elaborate semi-elliptic stern with hanging quarter galleries is especially interesting. So we have a frigate of a size of a battleship, with comparable armament, built to 1830's specification over a hull with lines designed in 1740's. Lacks only steam engine for complete madness, and even that's not impossible. For me it was a long dream, to actually and properly razee something Interesting, that most of the large post-war British frigates, starting with the Vernon, were, more or less, similar to those converted frigates, both in size and in armament, as if the Admiralty, after long decades got the idea that it just may be easier to design a large frigate from the beginning, than to build a two-decker and then cut it.

Two schools of naval architecture - Danish (Cambridge) and French (Colossus).

As I mentioned, I did plan to rebuild the Colossus, and here is the new version. The mesh is much more detailed and accurate. To make things somewhat more interesting, I added a round bow using a configuration of Minotaur/Tremendous, with the head still at upper deck level:

For what it's worth I can show how I do it. First, check if the drawings in the book include the planking - the original drawings usually do not, they show the shape of the frames, so you have to keep additional foot or so in mind. Then select a number of vertices for the frame curve (I use around 16 for a frigate, and then subdivide the edges where I need more exact curve - I'll show it later) and keep it the same for all stations you take from the drawing. Keep them flat - i.e. do not move any vertex forward-aft, only inside or outside, and when finished forming the shape, make them evenly distanced (there is a "space" function in loop tools in Blender, although I don't know how it is invoked in 3dmax, but there certainly should be something). Now, at the bow it's a little bit tricky, but still manageable. You take the last station from the line plan, place it along the stem line, and flatten it over the keel. Space the vertices. Then you take the station and the stem line and bridge them over with 3-4 segments. Then, using the horizontal plan view of the ship, you adjust those vertices a little outside, and space each of the lines once again. It takes some manual work, but you should get it right in the end. Remember, though, to constrain the movement of the vertices to single axis, it will save a lot of confusion. The sterns are tricky as well, since there are very little lines of them given, usually. So I generally also take the last station of the hull, and then extend it horizontally aft, cut over the sternpost, flatten, then cut vertically from each vertex of the last station - and then adjust the intersection vertices horizontally (only fore-aft) to get the smoother shape of the stern according to the plan. The image shows an elliptical stern of the Pique, but earlier ships work the same (and were actually built in this way), only the lines will end at the transom. When it's all done, you can smooth over the curves by subdividing them and triangulate if required:

Finally got around to finish my interpretation of the Prince Regent: Under construction And in game It is, essentially, the same hull as the Forte with only differences being a spar deck, different gun and boat arrangements and slightly different stern board, and she looks very realistic to me. Much more so than the first attempts in this thread anyway. Slightly overgunned, but they didn't care for range there, so that might not have been much of a problem. For the final variant I applied a standard frigate paint scheme with single stripe - the upper stripe, interestingly looking as it is, appears only on one drawing of 3 different pictures of the ship I found, so it might have been a fluke or existed for only a short time.

And a minor update for the 74-gun ship model: Doors and decorations on the beakhead Fixed the stern decoration rails (there was a small offset between side and stern texture, and that's gone), transom curve and hull curve under the forecastle It should be noted, though, the model is still done to older standard and will be eventually rebuilt, but, I guess, visually it will be very hard to notice.

Something I had to fix a long time ago - a proper Danish flag:

Some semi-random screenshots: And a sort of preview - although I am not sure when I am going to finish her: HMS Spartan (1841) Basically she's an oversized corvette - only slightly smaller than the Belle Poule (but wider), and armed with medium 32-pounders.

The HMS Forte (1811) under sail:

The Forte is ready: And, looking at her in 3d I am almost convinced the Prince Regent was if not a direct copy, but at least very closely based on her (well, anyway, much closer than any other project of similar size):

Did some digging on the Forte. Found several images of her: https://www.watercolourworld.org/painting/hms-forte-and-ganges-rio-de-janeiro-april-1827-tww012957 https://artuk.org/discover/artworks/hms-forte-passing-the-eddystone-lighthouse-175535 And possibly these two as well (one is named Ganges, but Ganges is the battleship she was accompanying, so it is possible the Forte): https://www.watercolourworld.org/painting/hms-ganges-tww012953 https://www.watercolourworld.org/painting/fighting-vessel-sea-approaching-tww00f9bd Additionally, the site gives some information about the painting of the Prince Regent at Oswego: https://www.watercolourworld.org/painting/troops-disembarking-attack-fort-oswego-under-command-genl-drummond-and-sir-t-yeo-lake-ontario-may-tww01617d Making this version the original and, if we believe the second image in the series: https://www.watercolourworld.org/painting/capture-fort-oswego-lake-ontario-north-america-genl-drummond-and-sir-j-yeo-may-6th-1814-drawn-spot-tww01617e Painted in place by an eye witness. And that, in turn, invites a curious comparison.

Curiouser and curiouser. All the sources I saw list the drought of the Prince Regent as 16-17 feet, which is identical to the Endymion, and yet the hull I made was significantly shallower. So I went and increased the depth of the hull: And at this point the form of the midship section began to remind me something I definitely saw before. And it is possible I was quite wrong about the design having no French influence, because it reminds the characteristic Forfait form of the Le President frigate. But if what I got from my rough reconstruction was closer to Seringapatam, the reconstructed lines from the wreck of Princess Charlotte (which are the only authentic source for those ships at the moment, I suspect) reminded another frigate, the Forte, derived from the Revolutionnaire, as designed in 1801 but not built until 1811: Moreover, the Forte is almost similar in size to the Prince Regent (157' 2" on gundeck against 155' 10", 132' 1 ½" keel against 131' 1", and this gets solved if we consider the straight vertical stern post as on Strickland's plan (and, in turn, it's confirmed by imagery of the wreck in the thesis above, see figure 5 on page 48) although slightly narrower (40' 6 ½" against 42' 6"). The main discrepancy here is the depth in hold (12' 5" on Forte, 9' 2" on Prince Regent), but due to the proportional difference in burthen (1,155 Forte, 1,293 Prince Regent, 1,277 Endymion) I would attribute it to either measurement error or different method of construction. So I am very inclined to consider remaking the model completely, using slightly widened lines of the Forte and, possibly, the more flattened sheer of the Seringapatam. It is, of course, a wild speculation, as before, but there is something plausible in this concept.

The Pique rigged and ready to sail:

As the Prince Regent gave me an irresistible Victorian streak, I present the HMS Pique (1834): A very original and some would say controversial ship, but I tend to find a peculiar beauty in all the works of Sir William Symonds. Sleek, powerful, and as if painted in broad strokes, this ship is strikingly different from earlier frigates of similar size, futuristic and alien. Note the elliptic stern that disguises itself as conventional, yet is anything but.

Made some very, very small corrections around the head, but mainly it's just two more screenshots:

Here is a kind of basic catalogue: F is earliest, ~mid 18-th century, A is closer to end of the Napoleonic Wars and beyond. Yellow can be replaced by red, white or the tan color they recently repainted the Victory with. Ships with red stripe sometimes had thin white delimiting stripes above or above and below:

Some little cosmetic fixes, as expected - slightly longer cheek pieces, further straightening of gunport distances, etc. She's so Victorian. "...the Prince Regent promises to be as fine and formidable frigate as any sailing on the Atlantic..."

Shifted the gunports a little more even - to prevent the overcrowding of the forward part and with better accordance to the side-view engraving.

Another version of the stern texture, closer to the painting (but still 8-windows).

Oh, found a watercolor version of one of the engravings. Original, perhaps? It is a little different (showing different stern layout, with 9 windows instead of eight) but the width of the after part of the ship and the whole substantiality of her construction is very apparent. Taken from here.