I have been working on a somewhat high-detail photorealistic model of the early 20th-century battleship HMS Dreadnought. The main purpose of this project was to practice the modeling of complex shapes such as the continuously varying profile of the hull. In terms of the accuracy of the model, I have stuck to the early part of HMS Dreadnought’s life (probably around 1907) in terms of the various equipment on her deck and some of her secondary armaments.
Looks really good.
I’ve started to model HMS Warspite a few times, but it’s hard to get good reference for it.
My dad served on Warspite in the Mediterranean in WW2 - I actually own a piece of her decking!
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Thanks @signguy. I have always had an interest in dreadnought and pre-dreadnought battleships from a naval history standpoint. As to the problem of references, I actually decided to model Dreadnought herself as information such as drawings was much more widely available. Additionally, the wide presence of detailed model kits gave me some details that were otherwise difficult to find.
I featured you on BlenderNation, have a great weekend!
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it looks great!! The details are fantastic.
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Nicely done.
I’m always surprised by how very little elevation the guns on those old ships had. I don’t think they could move more than a handful of degrees up.
15i inch guns on Queen Elizabeth Class ships could, for sure, be elevated to 30º
Not sure if that was maximum.
@Mark06GT I think the elevation was primarily a limitation of the range finding technology achieved at the specific time period (early 1900s) which in turn limited how far a shell could be fired with reasonable accuracy (so greater elevations may have proven unnecessary until the technology could catch up (Eg: Iowa class, Yamato etc.)
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True! But the QE-class succeeded Dreadnought by ~8 years, and was initially build to have 20° elevation (~ 21 km range). Some ship’s guns were refitted to have up to 30° only later in the 30’s. I think this impressively shows that even the designers were not anticipating the fast growth of expected battle ranges in the first quarter of the 1900s.
Anyway, this came of fantastically, a very impressive work! I am envious of your skill and dedication 
No doubt lot of research went into this one, often more time consuming than the model itself.
Really well done, it looks great.
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This looks really good. As others say, your research was probably a lot of the work.
Is it “photorealistic”? For long camera shots, maybe. I think if the viewer zoomed in, it would be noticeable that it’s a little “too clean”. These images look like it was never on the water… no grunge, no wear-and-tear.
Otherwise… it’s impressive to say the least.
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@calpgrmr I completely agree. I should have probably phrased it to mean that I have modelled it with the intention to include photorealistic elements like the various deck equipment. However, as you state, the texture quality is somewhat limited to long camera shots for the best results.
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Makes me think “Hornpipe”
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She is gorgeous! Just one minor detail - the forestays have a slight upward bend at their upper ends, instead of downward, as it should be due to gravity. Same with the backstay, but reversed. The textures are good if you assume that she just came out of the shipyard.
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@blend-E I see what you mean about the forestays and backstays. Somehow, I kind of missed this detail. I guess this will be useful when I attempt more ship models in the future!
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