Gunnery Drills Aboard The Dark Lightning

[gedren_y]

There she is, the Dark Lightning, proud warship of the Eslandola Fleet. Having successfully navigated rough seas, avoiding two hurricanes this trading season, Captain Raphiel Dunbarger was afforded the opportunity to redecorate her. The crew of the Corrington ship the Saucy Gibbon, whom she saved, might not recognize her today.

On this fine calm day the crew of the Dark Lightning are performing live-fire gunnery drills. The crew below deck have just fired both the port and starboard large bore guns, the largest of the 22 long guns aboard her.

The slight delay between the port and starboard firing only listed the ship slightly.

"Dinna' worry, Cal," Captain Dunbarger reassures his grandson. The boy had never experienced a warship firing at full sail before. Cal is just now old enough to join his grandfather as Cabin Boy.

While the captain is at the helm, Commander Juan lePaige keeps a firm eye on the main deck gunnery crew. One of them has messed with the setting of his sextant, so Juan is quite irate at the moment.

Lt. Commander Raun Stoatly is sighting a target buoy placed along their course.

Ol' Black Shocky here remains from the previous decor, and is the inspiration for the new detailing about the ship.

Petty Officer Luka Christoph has unarguably the best view of the whole crew. At this moment he thinks he has sighted a giant squid somewhere off starboard.

Master Sargent Ian MacRae is happily loading his favorite musket with his favorite powder horn. Captain Dunbarger finds the Truachesh man "quite an odd duck."

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Here's a look into the captain's cabin. I don't think I got quite a good enough angle on the desk, nor the hourglass on the shelf.

Above the captain's bed is a painted wood carving depicting his first command, and a piece of crochet work made by his wife.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

A good look at the crew.

Captain Raphiel Dunbarger: A veteran ship master who has been claiming his intent to retire soon for the past ten years. It is doubtful he will ever actually do it.

Commander Juan lePaige: This stern man is a master cartographer, Do not touch his instruments!

Lt. Commander Raun Stoatly: A total teetotaler. He is firm in his resolve that he will consume nothing that will impair his ability to hit what he is aiming at.

Master Sargent Ian MacRae: He is one of only a few Truachesh born members of the Eslandola Royal Navy. He was supremely happy he could get this musket and powder horn blessed my Dearji the Windsong. They are now his favorites.

Cabin Boy Cal El Kenti: He is the youngest son of Captain Dunbarger's oldest daughter. Some strange old woman claimed that he would be a great hero someday.

Petty Officer Luka Christoph: This lad believes he has be best eyes in all of the Eslandola Royal Navy.

Here are the gunnery crew that are visible on the main and upper decks. Yes, there is a pair of twins on this crew. The captain didn't like this, but they were assigned to him. They aren't allowed to man the same long gun, though.

------------------------------------------------------------------

More detail oriented shots can be found in this Flickr album.

When the Brickshelf folder is public, the .lxf file can be found here. If someone wants to take the time to do a render, it will be much appreciated.

I hope you all enjoy my first attempt at a warship.

[Vedauwoo]

Nice crew! I really like those slopes, curves and arches on the stern!

[kurigan]

The sails on this one certainly stand out as brilliant parts usage. I might suggest, however, hanging them upside down. In the current orientation the bolster seems to suggest wind coming from underneath the ship, which is rather impossible, what with all the water down there :)

[Garmadon]

As Kurigan mentioned, those sails are certainly what stand out here, but the large flag, figurehead, and stern are quite nice as well!

[Mike S]

Nice ship with some interesting techniques! I agree with Kurigan about flipping those sails upside down, I think it would be perfect. Any reason why the ship is mostly monotone in color?

[Captain Genaro]

Although others have said this, it bears repeating. Really good parts usage for the sails. Personally, I would prefer to see them in white, but nonetheless it's cleverly done.

You must have put a lot of effort into this ship, nice job. It looks like you've included a lot of the details that one would expect to see on a sailing ship.

Two areas that you might consider addressing are the great cabin and the color scheme. The great cabin is far too tall in comparison to the rest of the ship. I understand there are certain limitations when working with the prefab hulls, but I think that reducing its height would make the ship look much better. Also, (especially in LDD), an easy improvement would be the colors. Many ships were brightly colored and had various patterns and worked into the design.

[gedren_y]

Thank you all.

I understand what you mean about the sails and wind direction. I'll remember that for my next LDD ship.

The choice of grey was intended to make the Dark Lightning appear much like a cloud from a distance, with the black representing the lightning of her name.

The Brickshelf link is now public, if anyone wants to render her, or just to examine her in more depth.

[Legostone]

First - this is by no means a bad ship, so please don't take any of the criticism that might be in this reply personally - I just want to give you hints what you could improve. I'm not the biggest fan of long text, so I'll just make a list of both, my positive (there are many!) and negative (there are some:

1. the sails and the rigging

1.1. great idea for brick build sails

1.2. as mentioned before, the square sails seem to be upside down

1.3. the triangular sail is great, I just noticed it isn't just straight while checking the LDD file which is great!

1.4. however, those extra connectors on it seem a little bit odd to me - just leaving the rigging as a straight line over it would make it look better; I could just be missing something here though

1.5. masts

1.5.1 the foremast seems to be a little bit to small compared to the others - it should be a bit bigger and also have square sails (except I just haven't seen this type of rigging before, someone correct me!)

1.5.2 in the case of 3 masts the main mast is usually the middle one; in your case the last of the masts is the highest one, which is odd to my knowledge, but it doesn't look bad either - just a little odd

1.5.3 there seems to be a lot of space behind the main mast; I would try with one midsection less or maybe even a forth mast; while this may sound odd this could work

1.5.4 great combining multiple mast types!

1.6. The flag - the second brick build Eslandolan Flag I see, and the first one that really shows a lot of details - great! I think this is my favourite detail of this ship as it adds so much colour!

1.7. same for the crows nest - well fitting

1.8. some great part usage around the rigging - at the top of the mast, connecting the sails to the rigging

2. The Stern

2.1. looking from the back, the angled windows as and cat tails look great!

2.2 the piece for the rudder looks interesting, can you tell which piece it is?

2.3 Those "dark lightnings" fit well to its name:D

2.4 the different grey stripes below the windows look well fitting

2.5 the height - it seems to be to high compared to the rest of the ship, there are at least 2 studs above the door that could easily be gotten rid of. It also looks a bit boxy; this could be changed by adding a few curves to the connection to the main deck.

2.7 good interior!

2.8 the area above looks quite well too, missing maybe a compass if one is available in LDD; this area contains some nice details just like the deck!

2.9 What did you use for the lamp in the cabin? Great looking detail there

2.10 Just noticed the stairs going to the gun area - that looks good being raised above the stern

3. Deck and Gundeck

3.1 really liking the shape and colour difference around the gunports

3.2 the spacing, however, seems to be a little to small, you just have 2 studs in-between the guns here. At least 3 studs would look much better I think

3.3 the sudden end of the gunports - they seem to be only covering half the ships length. I would suggest spacing them a bit further apart and maybe removing one midsection; this would also deal with the to space between the mast and stern.

3.4 the anchor tends to be more forward (around the bow) as far as I know; I could be wrong on this subject though

3.5 the railings - great use of that crane piece! Many more details around here too; while it may look a little odd having the guns both above and below I think it fits the overall style pretty well!

3.6 really liking those diagonal parts on the bow - I wish there would be more angled parts all around this ship though!

4. Other details

4.1 there is a lot going on on this ship, thats great! All the (gunpowder?) barrels standing around, the huge and detailed crew, the stacked cannonballs (I sure hope this ship sits in a dock - they would be rolling around and causing a lot of harm otherwise;)!)

4.2 great figurehead!

4.3 again, nice crew!

4.4 the colours - please, be it this ship or your next one, use more, different, colours on the next ship you build! All grey just looks a bit boring!

4.5 To be fair - many of these details are difficult to see in the pictures and take some time to find in the LDD file;) Might look even better on a render though!

Edited April 8, 2016 by Legostone

[kurigan]

Dude...I don't think he asked for all that.

Some unsolicited advice of my own; wait till some one shows an interest before providing a page long list of corrections. What's more to the point, I've noticed that the more times you say "no offense" the more apt people are to be offended; I mean who are you trying to convince?

I feel a little guilty in all this, having started out the replies with a correction of my own, but I must admit, I was just being cheeky. No offense..?

Hey! Didn't even notice that before, "Saucy Gibbon" huh? I have a particular affinity for that little sloop, good lines. Great job on the escort then!

[Bregir]

Nice looking vessel, Gedren - I think this is a very good first warship in LDD, and as others have said, those are some very innovative sails. (Although I do agree with the upside down idea).

The crew is very nice too, and I like details like the bog flag, the firing cannon, and the fighting platforms halfway up the mainmast.

I do agree with Captain Genaro that the cabin is too tall (nice furniture, btw), which is something we have seen on quite a few ships in BoBS, (The hut-on-a-hull syndrome ) but I really like the details on the stern with the tilted windows, arches and bows. It is just too tall for the ship to be entirely harmonous. (And would definitely catch a lot of wind, making her hard to navigate... )

A comment on the general sail-plan. I have never before seen a three masted vessel with the mizzen being the tallest mast. Had it not been for the strange small foremast, which appears only to be meant to carry the job, she would have been a perfectly normal brig, but in this configuration, I think she is an entirely new invention in terms of rigging type! (I am not too convinced how well she would handle though. )

I really think you have done a great job with the masts and rigging (especially considering it is digital!), with a lot of nice details. However, the overall sail-plan just looks a little strange to me

Well done!

[dr_spock]

NPU on the sails. It doesn't take long to render the LDD with Bluerender. It would certain help with the presentation. This only took a few minutes on my old AMD PC.

Bley does make the ship harder to see. Stealth tech in BoBS?

[Bregir]

That render really boosts its looks alot!

[gedren_y]

Oh, wow. Thank you, dr_spock. Now that's the image that should be in the ship index (hey, Maxim take note)! And yes, the stealth idea is the intent here. I probably should have put that in the story somewhere.

I am okay with the criticism. I am by no means a learned ship builder. I had some reference materials from my local library, but foolishly returned them. My main aim was to make her worthy of the Class 5 Heavily Armed rating. I will do my best to someday make a rig so that the standard Lego cannon can be in the act of firing.

Legostone, I believe that rudder is from the airplane parts section.

I'm happy to once again add to the parts use ideas for BOBS. I'm also guessing now that there may be a run on Bricklink for those arch panel pieces, that I am reasonably certain are available in white. They make great surfaces for stickers as well, so the sails can be decorated. Printable sticker paper is your friend there.

[Ayrlego]

A great representation of the Dark Lightning (spelt correctly this time !) She does indeed look a little different to what the crew of the Saucy Gibbon remember, but then they had been a sea for quite a while.....

[TitusV]

Cool ship, altough hard to make out with the grey! I love the minifigs!