74 Gun | Ship of the Line - 3rd Rate | Blender

[garyshipwright]

Kurtis you can get the Anatomy of the ship Bellona from Abe books for about $30.  It says that it's used but looks to be in good shape.  A lot of those measurements come's from A book that Sea Watch has called Scantlings of Royal Navy Ships 1719-1805 by Allan Yedlinsky who is a member here on the site. Cost about $45. You might even see a few other books that could help you with your build. If you really want to get in to the how Vol one and two of the fully framed model HMN swan Class. Even through its a Sloops it breaks down all of the parts and pieces, giving the names of the timber's which will help you figure out your 74 and even show's how to figure out the head rails. Can't have enough info when it comes to those rail's. I could draw you a drawing of the head if need be and attached the measurements to it. Let me know. 

Edited July 28, 2022 by garyshipwright

[Kurtis]

Drawings would be a great help, certainly! Any help with those rails would be much appreciated.

 

I can't spend any more money on physical books right now but I do think I have a copy of the Anatomy of the Ships loitering around somewhere. I'll give it another look over.

 

I'll put the Anatomy of the Ship Bellona on a priority wish-list so I can get a copy of it as soon as I can because I feel like you're right; it would be a significant help with this project. May be a few weeks! I've also placed your other suggestions onto a list. I'll buy them as and when I can going into the next month or so.

 

I'll take it steady and work on other areas that are less thought-intensive in the meantime. I'm trying to develop the quarter galleries at the minute which are giving me a different set of headaches so I might just work on the small stuff on the decks like the bellfry, stairs, chimney, even the cannon.

Edited July 28, 2022 by Kurtis

[garyshipwright]

Well Kurtis hate to say it sir but the two hardest parts on the ship is the stern and bow. Have to agree with you and working on the other stuff should give you time to figure out those area's. For me I have been trying for years to figure them out and still get a headache. They do take a lot of time that's for sure 

[Kurtis]

11 hours ago, garyshipwright said:

Well Kurtis hate to say it sir but the two hardest parts on the ship is the stern and bow. Have to agree with you and working on the other stuff should give you time to figure out those area's. For me I have been trying for years to figure them out and still get a headache. They do take a lot of time that's for sure 

Like I say, I'll try and get the Anatomy of the Ship Bellona as soon as I can to try and help. I'm just on a super tight budget at the minute which is another barrier with this project. I have to work with what I have. I know there are inaccuracies with the model but I don't think it's come out too bad so far this time around (I say this now, my first post still makes me wince 😲)

[Kurtis]

No images yet, but I've managed to source a copy of the Anatomy of the Ship Bellona!! 😁😁😁 I have the Historic Ship Models coming too, so will review those before undertaking any more major work on the ship and take it from there.

[Kurtis]

I've had a go at rebuilding the bow section pretty much from scratch. I've moved the forecaste/bow wall forward and readjusted the placement of some of the fixings. Things feel a bit better now, with the only real exception to the vertical rails underneath the bow gratings. When I finished with the railings, they turned into more of an S shape than the C shape that's typical of most builds I've noticed. Getting them to match the prints and references were extremely difficult. Everything else seems to slot in place.

 

Edited October 27, 2022 by Kurtis

[Kurtis]

I've had another good go at the quarter galleries. Most of the framing seems to be in there, I've managed to get the rims in place and most of the windows. I still need to work on the balcony and pretty much the rest of the captains cabin, but the superstructure seems to be coming along. The shape seems mildly off in places but like the bow, things seem to be slotting together like a jigsaw puzzle on the whole. 

[Kurtis]

I've done some more work on the stern, mostly the decorative elements. The gun stern-chasers feel so weird to me, cos the placement of them seems to differ everywhere. On one set of prints, they're in the middle. In the museum that Mark iirc posted has them cut through the base rail,and another print again has them somewhere else completely. I just find that a bit odd 😅

 

I still need to work on the "drop" piece and finish the bulkhead (sp?) for the captains cabin, basically enclosing it from the elements.

 

 

[mtaylor]

2 hours ago, Kurtis said:

I've done some more work on the stern, mostly the decorative elements. The gun stern-chasers feel so weird to me, cos the placement of them seems to differ everywhere. On one set of prints, they're in the middle. In the museum that Mark iirc posted has them cut through the base rail,and another print again has them somewhere else completely. I just find that a bit odd 😅

Are these reference prints all the same ship?  Even ships in the same class had differences.   If you're doing just a generic 74, just pick one plan to follow for the chasers.

[Kurtis]

13 hours ago, mtaylor said:

Are these reference prints all the same ship?  Even ships in the same class had differences.   If you're doing just a generic 74, just pick one plan to follow for the chasers.

Yeah, they're all of the same ship. I've noticed other slight indescrepencies betweem them like the positioning and placement of the fencelines. I put it down to the era represenation as well as I figure the sillouhette of the ship will have changed a lot with the Bellona cos she had quite a long service. I wondered about the ports specifically though cos I figured they'd be permanent.

 

With the original "model kit" blueprint I was looking at, as well as the museum piece, they cut through the rail about half-way. On the Belona - Anatomy of the Ships, page 55, the gun-port is cut all the way through the rail. I might have got the idea of the mid-way port from the "Historic Ship Models" book or some side research.

 

I kind of am doing a generic 74, but I'd also like to get/keep it reasonably close to the Bellona class.

Edited November 24, 2022 by Kurtis

[mtaylor]

I'm not sure about this particular ship, but for a long-lived ship, rebuilds, reworks, etc. were common.   Look at the differences in drawings/painting of Victory or Constitution for examples. Still, just pick one and go with it as it would be accurate for a point in time.

[Kurtis]

I feel like I'm pretty much finished with the superstructure of the quarter galleries. They're pretty much ready for the decorating now which I'll possibly tackle down the line. I've decided to try and push with the top-side hardware; the oven chimney, the pins, the access stairways, and other little things.

 

 

On 11/26/2022 at 7:39 PM, mtaylor said:

I'm not sure about this particular ship, but for a long-lived ship, rebuilds, reworks, etc. were common.   Look at the differences in drawings/painting of Victory or Constitution for examples. Still, just pick one and go with it as it would be accurate for a point in time.

Aye, I've done this. I decided to go with the version where they cut through the rails about mid-way as it feels like  the right version.

Edited December 6, 2022 by Kurtis

[Kurtis]

 

I have installed some gun ports! Some of the rim rails needs a little tweaking in places and the line holes will need to be better positioned, but the main fixtures are pretty much ready. I decided to shrink the thickness of the wale a bit cos it looked a bit too thick, but the top one does get a bit washed out with these raw renders. Some proper colors and textures should hopefully make it stand out a bit again.

 

The rudder has some clamps, the helm has been installed, I've reshaped the belfry a little (I'd say that's the one piece I'm not happy with - I'm probably going to rebuild it,) and I've also reworked the skylight a little bit. I've added the ensign staff but it looks a tad odd being the only part of the rigging visible at present

[Kurtis]

 

I've gone ahead and put some of the boats on the waist beams! I'm thinking of naming her "Gorgo" (often known as Medusa) from the Greek mythology which will have a matching figurehead. I'm still not too sure what the paint-job will be - the classic black/yellow, black/white, or simply Bellona colours.

Edited December 26, 2022 by Kurtis

[SZKUTNIK]

Ahoy!

Beautiful model. Congratulations.
Below our decors for the 74-gun model  😉

[Kurtis]

Interesting design, thank you!  I love the patterns you have going on there. What ship are you doing?

[SZKUTNIK]

Hi Kurtis,

 

We play with the ship's modelling with Rhinoceros and Zbrush software. 🙂  3D visualisation, 3D PRINT, CNC, LASER CUT..... 😉

 

 

 

[Kurtis]

 

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I'm loving the figureheads, especially this one!  ↑ ▲

 

I enjoy the colour schemes you have set up, especially for the first rater / galleon, especially the red and golden mixup. I'm thinking of doing something similar but forgoing the red with a royal blue. The interior walls I'm trying to decide on (maybe cream) white or (royal) reds, though I do believe historically they were the latter - at least within the Royal Navy.

 

Here's a minor update for the ship I'm working on; I've installed the channels and tweaked other little bits which makes the ship's hull feel a lot more complete. I'm currently working on the cannon, and then I'll attempt to tackle the rigging.

 

I have a bit of a question with these cannon whilst I remember. In the Anatomy of the Ship Bellona book, page 119 (fig J11,) the cannon is in some kind of stored position where the muzzle is resting on the wall in a settled position. This would make sense whilst the ship is underway and not in battle stations, but how would the cannon be stored on the quarterdeck and forecastle where there aren't any walls for the muzzle to rest on?

 

Edited December 28, 2022 by Kurtis

[3DShipWright]

Looking Great Kurtis,

 

Your project is kinda like ghost of Christmas future for me, as I've decided a 1st or 2nd rate ship of the line will be my next project.

 

I didn't become a member till your project was well under way, but for what its worth I have hull creation down to a science that doesn't require hours of smoothing, subdividing, and sculpting. I'm sure you probably did some of these steps, but I'm curious to see another blender artists strategy:

1. Import three copies of the plans (as reference images), scale to blender world scale accordingly, and align the plans in all three dimensions. Tip: The origin should be the top of the rabbet (or top of the keel, failing that).

 

2. Trace the lines with a line mesh or a curve (We'll be converting these to curves, but I'm better working with meshes, so I prefer to start with a plane a delete two of the vertices so I have a line segment, then just extrude as needed. untill it smoothly follows the plans.

 

3.  Repeat step #2 for all hull 'slices' on the plan. Switch into plan view (X-Orthographic) and align each line or curve segment to its correct position along the 'Y' axis when done, it should look like this:

 

4. Select either the front or back curves, tab into edit mode, and with the pivot point set to 3d cursor, type 's' to scale, 'x' to lock on the x-axis, and then '-1' to essentially flip everything to one side. Finally, in object mode, select everything, convert to curves (if they aren't already), and go to 'object' menu -> 'apply' -> 'apply all transformations' The apply all transformations part is vital to the FINAL STEP

 

FINAL STEP is continued in next topic reply...

 

[3DShipWright]

Continued from above:

 

Step 5.

Add a small plane. I usually use 6in x 6in but it should be the approximate width of each plank in the hull. (Note: the example in the screenshots is actually a longboat, so I used a 4in plane) Tab into edit mode and rotate the plane along the 'y' axis 90 degrees, then align it so the bottom vertices are at 0 'Z' location. Finally press 'ctrl+r' to cut it vertically down the middle.

 

Step 6.

Add an array modifier with the following settings:

- Fit type = Fixed Count (Very important - the number you put here corresponds to the number of planks on the ship from the rabbet at the keel up the sides of the hull to the bulwark cap rail. This should be the same for each curve, so count the number of planks up to the lowest edge of the bulwark, i.e. ignore the forecastle, quarter deck, or poop deck planking for now.

- Relative Offset Factor: X=0, Y=0, Z=1

- Merge = Checked (default distance value is fine)

 

Step 7.

Add a curve modifier with the following settings:

- Curve = use the eyedropper to select the curve you want the array to follow. You will do this for all of them so it doesn't matter which you start with

- Deformation axis = 'Z'

Note: if the tilt is wrong like in the image above, just tab into edit mode and rotate the whole thing on the z axis + or - 90 degrees, until it looks like this:

 

Step 8.

Duplicate the plane, and clear out the 'Curve Object' value in the curve modifier. Then use the eye dropper to select the next curve in the series. Do this for all curves (assign 1 plane to each curve) You will notice that on the narrower sections of the hull the same number of planks will overshoot the curves, and on the widest parts of the hull, the planking may not reach all the way up.

 

Step 9.

To Fix the height inconsistencies, tab into edit mode and make the individual planks taller or shorter. We must do this BEFORE we apply the modifiers.

 

When done with all of them, it should look like this:

 

[3DShipWright]

Ok, so I lied about the last post being the final step lol. This really is the conclusion however (I promise)

 

Step 10.

Apply all modifiers on all the plane objects, then use ctrl+J to join them into a single object. Tab into edit mode, select two adjacent edges at a time a bridge them (make sure the 'merge' option is selected) To do this go to the 'Edge' menu -> 'Bridge Edge Loops'

 

After bridging:

Step 10b.

Once the edges have been bridged and merged, we actually want to dissolve the resulting edge. This may seem redundant, but this is necessary because the program has merged the points at the shortest distance and has not smoothed out the connection. Press 'delete', and select 'dissolve edges' from the resulting pop-up menu.

 

Step 10c.

Finally, there will be excess mesh on the outermost edges that doesn't follow the curve of the hull. Simply select these edges and choose 'delete vertices' as seen here:

 

Ta Da!!!!!!!! So this is where I'll leave you. From here, I usually just boolean cut the front with the keel object itself (which is always the next thing i model) to ensure a perfect fit, and then select alternate rows from the mesh and separate and solidify to start the planking process. There is always some amount of tweaking involved, but I've found through many failures that doing hulls this way sets me up for success, as its easy from here to create the frames, internal planking, and external planking all from one 'shell' so-to-speak.

 

Hope this helps,

-Nate

[Kurtis]

hi Nate;

 

What you have is a great start! I used a similar method when creating the boats on the three beams. It's not my favourite method of doing it because it can be difficult to get everything lined up in side view but it certainly does its job. I didn't have the prints that I do now when I first started this model but I would follow the lines the opposite way now (from bow to stern) and create the plankings this way.

 

Quote

 require hours of smoothing, subdividing, and sculpting. I'm sure you probably did some of these steps,

To answer this very specific part, I didn't really use smoothing, subdividing or sculpting in the way I think you meant. Instead, I created the hull in a semi similar fashion as you, but I used references from a modelling kit. I then duplicated the mesh, added extra geometry to simulate the planks with some additional attention near the stern where they start seperating them out and adding additional ones. I then used a mixture of shrinkwraps, lattices, geometry nodes and other modifiers to smooth everything back into its appropriate shape.

 

Quote

Ta Da!!!!!!!! So this is where I'll leave you. From here, I usually just boolean cut the front with the keel object itself (which is always the next thing i model) to ensure a perfect fit, and then select alternate rows from the mesh and separate and solidify to start the planking process. There is always some amount of tweaking involved, but I've found through many failures that doing hulls this way sets me up for success, as its easy from here to create the frames, internal planking, and external planking all from one 'shell' so-to-speak.

You certainly have a very valid method! I would advise to try and avoid booleans because they have a nasty habit of destroying meshes, but I look forward to seeing how your work progresses!

[3DShipWright]

Thanks for the kind words Kurtis... And yeah, I totally have a love-hate relationship with Boolean, because it always involves retopology after its used. That said, if used before you solidify and/or cut the individual planks, the clean-up is harmless.

 

Regarding your modifier stack, I'm interested to learn how/why you used the geo nodes and the weighted normals? Perhaps you know something I don't, and I'm always eager to learn new tricks... lol

 

Finally, on a slightly different topic, I thought I'd share a screenshot of the last figurehead I did. I think on my current project i'm going to attempt to replicate a wooden sculpture but below is an example of a worn bronze patina look w/ oxidation streaks. Note: which ever route you go, it may behoove you to model the generic character first, and use an armature to pose it on the front of the ship... you'll have way more flexibility this way

 

Best,

-Nate

 

[Kurtis]

hi Nate;

 

Quote

Finally, on a slightly different topic, I thought I'd share a screenshot of the last figurehead I did. I think on my current project i'm going to attempt to replicate a wooden sculpture but below is an example of a worn bronze patina look w/ oxidation streaks. Note: which ever route you go, it may behoove you to model the generic character first, and use an armature to pose it on the front of the ship... you'll have way more flexibility this way

Yes. That is the plan; character modles are probably one of my weakest skills at present so the plan is indeed to model something and then rig it into position. I also plan to rig the rest of the ship as well because I want to animate this eventually.

 

Quote

Regarding your modifier stack, I'm interested to learn how/why you used the geo nodes and the weighted normals? Perhaps you know something I don't, and I'm always eager to learn new tricks... lol

I used the weighted normals to smooth out the look of the bevel modifier. The bevel modifier creates a smoothed edge but creates two smaller sharp edges. It works for most applications in my experience, but if you need edges to look even smoother, then you have two options. You can either increase the bevel "segments" which creates more geometry but that often kills the poly-count, or use weighted normals which in turn creates the same basic illusion. Try it on a cube! Don't forget to turn on automatic smoothing in the object data tab.

 

I used it on the hull planking specifically because I wanted to create a smoother look. I didn't like the hard jagged edges you get when it's just the raw bevel.

 

As for the geometry nodes, I usually just want to translate the output of the solidify modifier. By default, solidify follows the face normal, but this made creating the fencelines and ports of the ship really difficult because of the weird angles. I thus set the "Output Vertex Group" > "Shell" to a new vertex group, and then within the geometry nodes, simply used a "Set Position" node. I've put together a quick video demonstration for you, have a look:

 

 

I do think your texturising skills are very impressive. I'm quite envious and I hope I can match your skills when it's time to do my own, but my sluggish PC has always been a barrier on that front.

 

Edited December 29, 2022 by Kurtis

[Kurtis]

I feel like the query I had about the cannon has gotten lost in the mix here, so I'll post it again before I add any more update images.

 

I have a bit of a question with these cannon whilst I remember. In the Anatomy of the Ship Bellona book, page 119 (fig J11,) the cannon is in some kind of stored position where the muzzle is resting on the wall in a settled position. This would make sense whilst the ship is underway and not in battle stations, but how would the cannon be stored on the quarterdeck and forecastle where there aren't any walls for the muzzle to rest on?

 

If anyone could advise, I would sincerely appreciate it!

Edited December 30, 2022 by Kurtis

[mtaylor]

I'll give it shot.....   Below decks, some cannon were stored with barrel raised and lashed to the inner planking which left the gunport open if need be for fresh air.   It could also have been run out of the port or pulled in with (in the later case) the port being  open or closed.   And.... the guns could have been turned sideways to give more room on the deck.   

 

For the two decks you mention, stored either run in, run out or turned sideways.   Captain's discretion applied as to how they were stored.

[Kurtis]

8 hours ago, mtaylor said:

I'll give it shot.....   Below decks, some cannon were stored with barrel raised and lashed to the inner planking which left the gunport open if need be for fresh air.   It could also have been run out of the port or pulled in with (in the later case) the port being  open or closed.   And.... the guns could have been turned sideways to give more room on the deck.   

 

For the two decks you mention, stored either run in, run out or turned sideways.   Captain's discretion applied as to how they were stored.

Thats great, cos it leaves a lot more open to imagination! I figured there might have been a standard way of doing it, but I'll experiment a bit with it. If I were captaining, I'd probably opt for the sideways position for most of them myself as it seems to be the most logical.

[Martes]

If I recall correctly, stowing the guns lashed to the sides was almost exclusively done when expecting very heavy storm, or on indiamen, because it is a difficult, dangerous and long process of getting them back to position if needed.

Later carronades and even heavier guns had pivoting mounts, but that's more into the 19th century.

[Kurtis]

27 minutes ago, Martes said:

If I recall correctly, stowing the guns lashed to the sides was almost exclusively done when expecting very heavy storm, or on indiamen, because it is a difficult, dangerous and long process of getting them back to position if needed.

Later carronades and even heavier guns had pivoting mounts, but that's more into the 19th century.

Thank you. I know cannon can weigh a literal ton, but ships do move around on the ocean, so I would've thought lashing to the sides was a common thing to prevent them from sliding around. It's an interesting observation that it would only be done during very rough weather.  I suppose an alternative solution would be to put chocks on the wheels, kind of like how they do at airports to stop even the largest of airliners from rolling around.

Edited December 31, 2022 by Kurtis

[Martes]

Obviously, plus the tackles.