I agree about the torches/lights, I was going to mention them too but ended up forgetting.
Whatever the towers may be, I'd still remove them. It makes the building look more complex than what it is - it's a lab, of which you can have multiple in a colony. It's not a unique structure.
Again, being a simple lab, run by civilians (scientists, regardless of being Klingons), it might make the warriors "unconfortable" having an obvious warrior symbol (and in multiple instances at that, at each lab) decorating it.
These are the Halls of Learning from BotF, not the Hall of Warriors

Whew! Noted. Your tact is appreciated all.

General notes: Images are tough, because no one is going to agree on every point. This is why I keep pointing out that the images YOU use with the game have no impact on game play at all. As long as you recognize them for what they are, you are able to play. Apparently I will have to keep pointing this out over and over.

That being said, the Production Facility images (PF's for those who don't get the abbreviation) are more prominent and important and the ones released with the game should satisfy the most people (if that is even possible).

Question: What did we decide, are PF's supposed to have backgrounds or not?

Image design notes: I added towers, reasoning that in early Klingon lore before spaceflight, when Klingon houses battled more amongst themselves, buildings had guard and defense systems. Who knows, towers might be traditional. Notice the high building base, done in a fortress like fashion. It's what Klingons do, research facility or not. And the good Cadet Kaladin was right, I imagined them communicating with the building via tunnels. Later as the Klingons advanced and unified, the towers were converted to "Professors" labs or offices or something. Also note the top image below which is a lab, has a guard like tower at the near end of the bridge to the lab (left side of image).

The red roof is a translucent skylight made of red transparent aluminum and lit further red from the inside. I got this idea from another of our Klingon images. It is below and you can see it in the background. Mine is redder than the image below because the minute you color anything in this game everyone comes back with, "I'd make it green because they are Romulans" (repeat for each empire - apparently all the non-federation races can only see one color ). I also made it bright because when you are playing the game, the small image next to the population allocation bar, needs color to stand out (the processing plant suffers from this).

Matress suggested the Bat'Leth as a design idea and I personally like them (they were also time-consuming to make flat, not to mention bend to follow roof contour - just so you know). Because of the nature of Klingons, who knows how much research went into Bat'Leth materials and balance and effectiveness?

One last note. This building is quite large, and its windows are floor to ceiling (high ceilings). Compare to the front doors. I raised the roof for you anyway and agree it does look better given the camera angle.

Having said ALL that. I made another image version. For those who like it better without the towers and want Bat'Leth's on the roof, they are easily added back for a third image version. I will have to say that the one advantage to the towerless image, is that the working party image is bigger for the small image in the population allocation area of the game.

Oh and I almost forgot. Good vjeko. Would be willing to entertain something for the windows. The only issue might be that as far as my skill level so far, I would have to individually name each window to put the image in because the program tiles them and it might be virtually impossible to keep the windows all the same name and adjust the tiling scale so that it lines up in each window. I hope that made sense.

I am working on a heavy replicator PF image. As of a recent post, I am not entirely sure it exists anymore.

I also have a Klingon shipyard I (all new) coming along, more like the existing one you like Matress, and armed to the teeth.

Here are three window textures so that you can have a bit more diversity, you should ranomly place them to the windows.

I can't wait to see the building with them. I was wondering how it would look like with a bit rusty pipes going from it to the ground and a tight metal web spanning the glowing roof.

Thanks mate! I'll get on it.

Of course not, but it's not like we have 5 different sets to choose from. And I haven't seen you keeping pointing it out



No, you don't. But what if we don't recognize it for what it is? It doesn't say Lab in a big flashing board above the door.



Which is why the people posting about it are, well, posting about it. The ones that aren't, there's no way to know their opinion.
I don't much agree that PF images are the most prominent. PFs are the backbone of a colony, no doubt about that, but the images for Buildings IMO are more prominent, due to the bonuses they give. Regardless, PF images should more or less convey what the respective facility is supposed to produce.



Yes, AFAIK. The complete sets we have ll have backgrounds. It's the military items that it's not clear whether they should have or not. Apparently they'll have them too, from the latest images.



Humans used to have towers and walls too for defense. The Feds don't have towers in their labs



Yes, you've been using the high building base lately, based on one Klingon image. That image was from a specific building, not a lab, and in a specific planet. Generalizing might not be the best option. It's not like we need to show the base, in every structure.



Or they'd build new structures for the advanced labs.



That image might not have been a lab in the first place. It might just be a placeholder image, and is going to be replaced. I don't know the story of that image, just pointing out that it might not be a lab originally.



Kind of an exageration. There _are_ colors specific to each empire, so that they're easily identifiable, and don't look out of place. Check the Card and Fed sets. They all have the same feel, and that's a good thing. All the Fed images are blueish BTW, so they too can only se one color. Those colors, while at it, are the empire's color, as displayed by their AoI.



I don't want to compare this to japanese labs and katanas, I really don't.
Just kidding, don't be offended.



That and you can actually see the entrance to the building, and I like that.
I'd still remove those polls though, and probably make the building not so tall.

A shipyard armed to the teeth? Well, it's just an image, but shipyards in the game will not participate in battles AFAIK.

The HR, well, nothing has been decided yet, but as long as it looks like an industrial facility, I'm sure it'll be used.
Which reminds me we still have to "fix" the duplicated name.

We agreed that production facilities wouldn't have backgrounds while structures would...

Captain, your work is fantastic...keep it up. I can only help with suggestions (providing my variation of the vision) and an occasional texture.

I was just thinking you should have a bit more light-dark variations of the materials used and also add more metal stuff to the images like half-ruty pipes, metal dishes with fire, rusty chimney that looks like it's added afterwars with flames going from it, or perhaps some fences, or even a landed shuttle or some craft, just some details to make it more like it has a everyday working purpose with wokers coming in and out and not museum/castle purpose.

That's not what I remember. Besides, all the PFs currently in the game (Cards, Dom, Feds) do have backgrounds, except those Bashir made recently and was waiting for you to add it.



Agreed.

We said that PF's wouldn't have backgrounds, the current images would be repurposed and captain would make new ones for all races for continuity reasons. It's simply hard to make a background for one of these that feels real and not just "put together" To make it work more complex lighting would have to be added with multiple colors...composite background rendering and then photoshop finishing touches.

I was trying to make background for structure images like the great hall and hall of warriors, but I only had them in 270x225 format which you don't use anymore. I'll try to make bigger ones before the next update.

Image updates:

Sorry I didn’t mean to go and write a small essay your quote just inspired me to write on this topic. No offense is meant by the following, it is simply my thoughts on the matter.

Humanity also strayed away from the more feudalistic and aggressive eras (at least in Star Trek lore they mostly did) where as Klingons incorporate violence, aggressiveness and demonstrations of valor and power into their everyday lives. Even a Klingon scientist likely knows how to fight and would be a tough physical combat challenge for an average human.

Humanity is also a very poor comparison tool in this case because in reality humans come from many backgrounds and styles where as in Star Trek lore most of the races suffer from a more specific less diverse style that borrows from a culture or two on Earth in reality. The writers do this so its easier to focus on that race's traits; could you imagine a race with the diversity akin to humans in the Star Trek lore, it would be very difficult to follow with a simple introductions each episode. Instead we get generalizations like: Romulans are sneaky treacherous, crafty and ruthless; Klingons are warlike, powerful, strong and aggressive; etc.

My point is that thematic elements in each races design not only helps identify them as belonging to that race but also makes sense. For example outside some of the science buildings where I live they fly country flags, some have stylistic art, fountains, and/or statues. Flags and banners are a human identification mark (not that they are exclusive to humans), so I see no reason why Klingons or any other races wouldn't do the same. An alien flying over earth would likely think our structures look foreign, however in Star Trek the majority of the races are derived from humans because of the simplicity in the story telling mechanics and production. So because of this ‘humanization’ to distinguish between the races the writers gave each a theme, tone, color, and/or feel. I see no reason not to follow that pattern to make distinction easier.

I agree Kaladin. That's why I consider myself a sort of a expert into Klingon psychy beacuse my nation went trough our share of wars and developed a warrior-like and honor driven mentality. Even the more recent war in the ninties proved that.

Klingons are a fun race to create for and I think captain did a great job so far.

Exactly. Their colors and their architecture. Here's a red fortress lab with window enhancement.

Nice work Captain Bashir those new windows really add flavor to the image. If that image is going to be really tiny though I fear that detail might be lost, unless the player looks the building up in an in game encyclopedia or stats page (with a larger image seen).

I'm curious about the cement around the bottom right, it might be my perspective (I'm terrible with viewing perspectives on 3D art) but is that building and complex on top of a tower or is that a road/wall in the bottom right.

Regardless the already nice building is looking even better now.

Edit: Oops my reference was to the image with the towers you posted along side the shipyards, that new one is good too (wow you are uploading pictures faster than I can write), I like it with or without the towers, both are nice.

Hmm, I jost got the idea of puting different texture for the bottom of the image, something more like titled squared rocks, a bit darker than the structure. What do you think?

I think you are referring to the image with towers. It is the wall to the "moat" as seen in this image. I have to add something if the image goes on a background. Believe me, I have tried it without and it doesn't look right.

Also note, that there are lamp posts in the canon image of the Great Hall. The only advantage to lamp posts is that the lighting adds realism to the image and I currently don't know how to create the flicker-lighting pattern to fire. But working on it...

Edit: Oh and the windows are vjeko's work which is always appreciated.

Yeah I was referring to that one, it’s hard to tell with the current cropping though. You’d almost have to zoom out to see more of it to make it clear but then you would loose the focus on the building and reduce further the visibility of the details you put into it, so I'm not sure what you should do.

The rock texture is clearly not ideal, but of the rock textures I have, it comes out the best. I've spent a fair but not exhaustive time looking for something better.



Yeah, I've looked at it in game. I have a fairly large monitor and even in the encyclopedia page the detail is diminished. Since Mike asked for larger images, I'm kind of hoping that he may change the display layout to go with it. He may not because of the smaller images. They would look grainy. However, on my monitor there is extra room. This of course wouldn't be true of someone's laptop or something.

Can you post a more zoomed out version that shows the full/majority of the support system the building is resting on?

Also maybe as a compromise to those that don't like the towers, what about keeping 2 of them? Such as the two back ones, so they don't block the doors and are less prominent since there are fewer.

(Please excuse my arrows defacing your work)

The Klingon Shipyards: Everyone - They aren't perfect, but I am trying to take poorer, indistinct images and give them better definition and detail. Below are the old Klingon shipyards I and II.

Kaladin, I actually did try a two tower image. I'll have to dig it up somewhere and post it. PS. It's great to have you contributing.

Re: Shipyards

Oh you're updating art? wow I can't wait, taking something that looks good and making it even better never hurts

Re: Two Towers

Oh good, it will be interesting to see, I'm not sure if the towers will loose purpose with only two, stand out more or maybe even compliment the building without taking over. Seems like a trial and error type of thing, to find which one works and looks the best. It is tough balancing esthetics with practicality, especially when you might have to loose part of the work you put into it (which appears to be quite a bit).

Kaladin, the example are the OB's and cardassian shipyards...you can see them on this forum.

Two shipyards toned down and deblochified. Good suggestion.

I saw the cardassian ones on page 15 they look amazing.

OB's ? I know I'm going to smack my head after you tell me, maybe its cause I'm sleepy but what is OB?

Oh, sorry man - Orbital batteries.

They look better and clearer but that seems to unintentionally make them more Federation in appearance. The old ones had a more harsh darker military tone to them, these now look cleaner, better shape and more science oriented. Neither is wrong just interesting what the change did.

As soon as I hit submit I was like "doh, he probably means orbital base or batteries."

Told you I'd smack myself, hehe

Can you give the metal a green tinge and keep the red lighting? I was quickly flipping through klingon ships and a lot have green hauls or blueish steel. I figure if you gave the shipyard the greenish tinge it might just work.

Pant pant pant, here's the two tower working party. I think we might be on to something. By the way, the domes were copper topped (thus Klingon reddish hues) but corrode over time.