by Adrian Drake
A SHIP is a Seriously Huge Investment in Parts. It is a cutesy acronym that defines a space vehicle that measures at least 100 studs in length. Many people tend to think of them as the pinnacle of building in space, even if they are frequently just the pinnacle of patience and large collections. What does it take to build a SHIP? Planning, patience and pieces.
The biggest mistake a potential SHIP builder can make is to not think about their creation enough before they start working on it. This can result in a ship that doesn't flow, has poor color and shape, doesn't hold together, or can't be properly accessed, transported or displayed.
When building a SHIP, realize that the acronym Seriously Huge Investment in parts is absolutely the truth. The two primary SHIPs I built that I will use as a reference in this article, the Tribunal and the Thomas E. Dewey are in the vicinity of 40,000 to 50,000 pieces. Even smaller SHIPs, such as the 104 stud CMC-47 can be in the thousands of pieces. If you don't have a substantial collection, you will have to spend a lot of money, especially basic bricks and plates. If you don't have the collection or wallet to support an endeavor, don't even try.
Next, plan ahead. Both the Tribunal (here and here) and Dewey (here) had source pictures that were used as the basis for the model. Also with both models I used Computer Aided Design software to plan out scale and shape. I do this because I don't have the drawing skills to sketch out my ideas. You want to visualize the entire model prior to putting a single brick in place so that you can plan for structure, access, support and detailing, which I will discuss in future sections.
Once you reach a certain size, a SHIP becomes too heavy to actually pick up and swoosh around, but you still want to think about how it will hold together. A fragile SHIP will break apart under its own weight, and transport becomes impossible. The key to a strong SHIP is Technic. Using Technic beams as a central spine, keel, or frame will keep the vessel together when you try to move it. A very strong structure is two Technic beam rows, pinned together with staggered joints and layered with plates on top and bottom. The Tribunal has a Technic beam at both the top and bottom of the main crew area. The Dewey's flight deck is one solid piece due to the laminated Technic and plate structure.
Keep in mind when building the Technic frame to make it separate in pieces for transport if necessary.
One of the biggest flaws in many SHIP designs is Big Box Syndrome, where no amount of detailing can disguise the fact that the ship is basically a large box with bits added. Avoiding Big Box Syndrome can be done in many ways:
Next is color. Just because a creation is large doesn't mean you can violate the aesthetics of color use. When considering color, if you need to use multiple colors simply to make the SHIP larger (i.e. a Rainbow Warrior), rethink the idea of building at that scale. SHIPs will typically be one main color, with a single highlight color, with gray and/or black greebles.
SHIPs are big. That's sort of the point. Large vessels need large, prominent engines. There are many ways to make engines, be sure to give them some thought, and don't just slap a couple of wheels or hubs on the back end of your creation and call it done.
Unlike with smaller vehicles, not every square centimeter of a SHIP needs to have a detail tacked onto it. That's not to say that they will not be detailed, though. Consider the USS Missouri, a World War 2 era battleship. Its hull is, while not orthogonal, undetailed. The top of the ship is very heavily detailed. One of the best practices with a SHIP is to focus the detail in groupings. Another option is to use textural pieces to break up the large expanses of undetailed brick.
Also, consider the use of the vessel, as well as the environment in which it is found. The Dewey has very few exterior details, because it is in essence an atmospheric warship, and as such anything external would get damaged in battle.
For public displays, the interior is frequently more trouble than it's worth, but it goes towards making a good SHIP into an excellent one. When building an interior, you must give thought to how you will access it. Access is usually done by removing the top, or removing the sides.
Once the sides are taken off, as in the previous shot of the Asmodeus, enough detail can usually be seen. However, if the SHIP is fairly wide, interior details farther to the back may not be viewable. This technique has the benefit of making the top, rear wall and bottom a single structure, so it tends to be strong, especially with bulkheads for increased support. However, the side wall must be designed to be removed or hinged, and hiding seams can be difficult. Also, with creatively angled and shaped walls, this technique may not be feasible.
With top removal, you can see large expanses of the interior, without violating the flow of the sides of the ship. However, multiple decks can be difficult to access without breaking the structural strength. This structural rigidity issue can be avoided by making trays to remove the upper deck and reveal the lower ones. These trays are not attached to the walls, and sit on stud layers. This technique can require many plates to create the floors, especially for non-rectangular shapes.
There is a third technique, which has only been used in the Tribunal. This involves removeable side panels to access drawers mounted into the frame. The entire drawer is then removed to display the interior floor details.
One of the best things about working at SHIP scale is the relatively large amount of interior space they afford a builder to create detailed living spaces. The Tribunal, for example, features dozens of interior spaces, including crew quarters, hydroponics, storage, a machine shop, a movie theater, and a shuttle launch bay. Consider the role of a vessel when designing its interior. The Tribunal, as a long-term deep space explorer, features everything required to sustain its crew for long periods and has many creature comforts. The Dewey, by comparison is a warship. Most of its space is devoted to its fighters with very little space for the crew, and no comforts.
Don't be afraid to make the spaces inside something more interesting than just layers of plates. Levels and texture add a lot to the interior.
Speaking of crew, consider the number of people required to run your ship and make sure you have enough room for them. The problem is that crew bunks take up a lot of room. On submarines, the crew will hot-bunk, meaning that 2 crewmembers will share a single bunk, with one being on duty for 12 hours and able to access the bunk for 12 hours for downtime. This will allow you to halve the number of bunks required.
One hundred studs works out to 31.5 inches in length. The Tribunal, at 487 studs, is over 12 feet long. The Dewey, at 259 studs, is 6.5 feet long. At about 300 pieces per pound, ships can weigh a great amount too. If you ever plan on displaying your ship anywhere but in your Lego domain, consider how you will transport it.
The trick to transporting any MOC and SHIPs in particular, is to remove any parts that you will expect to break in transit, This way you control the separation, so that you don't lose pieces in the parking lot or the backseat of your car.
Once that's done, protecting the main piece or pieces of the MOC can be done with various levels of effort and technology. The easiest is to just wrap it up in a blanket or bubble wrap. Next is to put it inside of a large tote. A third is to build a custom shipping crate for transport. The Tribunal picture to the right shows all three techniques in use.
Special thanks to the following, whose SHIPS and articles are referred to in this article:
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