This project is a continuation of the CGI Columbia model. In 2006 I began to wonder what I could achieve with vintage software... and why better models of the Enterprise (or starfleet ships in general) hadn't really been made before around 2000. All the software was from around 1994, so I decided to try an all vintage attempt at a simple design, a scout. I set up my old Apple PowerBook 3400c/200 with a copy of StrataVision 3D 4.0 and used the version of Photoshop I had installed on it (5.5) to see what I could come up with. The biggest hurdle was that I couldn't directly bring illustrations into the app to trace. I could bring in crude curves to trace, but a lot of what I did was roughly drawn by hand. For this next phase I went a step further and found a copy of Strata Studio Pro 1.2 (also from around 1994) on ebay. While the software was a step up from StrataVision 3D, the biggest advantage was the printed manuals included with the software. I also started including some of my other Mac OS 8.6/9.x systems with faster processors and more memory. The first major change was modeling the secondary hull. Below is an early set of orthogonal views which were mostly made of the same elements from the Columbia. Click to enlarge Over time I improved on lighting, modeling and texturing, and was pretty happy with the results. The biggest improvements came from bump and lighting maps. This helped bring a lot more life to the model, as seen here... Click to enlarge And some close up views... I also applied these new skills to building a space station for the Constellation to visit... I was also able to employ transparency maps to simulate damage to the model without actually damaging/changing the underlying model. I also used these older systems to make videos using similar vintage software (Strata Videoshop 4.5 and Strata MediaPaint, both from the mid 1990s) of my models... Click to view (MP4, 3.8 MB) In the end, the biggest draw backs were that the models weren't "there" to look at. So once I had satisfied my curiosity about CG modeling, I started back into building physical models again.