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Abiogenisis — 'Cresting Wave'

#alex #airplane #alien #ries #scifi #seaplane #birrin
Published: 2017-10-27 12:41:42 +0000 UTC; Views: 77100; Favourites: 1579; Downloads: 689
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Description [A never before released image of a birrin seaplane from 2010! You can check out the process of producing it on my Patreon: www.patreon.com/alexries/]

Built from plans that predate the Fall, the Cresting Wave is a major component in southern logistics and passenger transport on the Birrin world. As a flying boat, it is an ideal vehicle to service the lakebound cities of the floating forest and the numerous towns and settlements that dot the coasts of Tuetalli.

Flying wings, in vogue at the time of the Cresting Wave’s initial design, offer advantages in lift to weight ratio. With two fuselages blended into the wing as sturdy hulls, much of the centre wing section can be loaded with freight. The flight crew is situated in the starboard fuselage and both of these reinforced structures can either house passengers or even more cargo.

To avoid water ingestion the engines are mounted in a tall dorsal nacelle, turbojets stacked vertically and sharing common paired intake slots that can be shuttered during surface operations; retractable propellers in both fuselages then provide slow but quiet and efficient propulsion.

The design has several limitations that have prevent its adoption much beyond the southern cities; several fatal accidents have been attributed to ‘tumbling’ of the high aspect ratio wings, and the relatively small engine nacelle reduces carrying capacity and results in long take-off runs. Additionally, the vehicle sits so low in the water that high seas render lift-off and landing risky endeavours. 

In spite of these issues large numbers of the vehicles remain in operation, in some cases simply out of habit or the inability to now afford something better. With reclamation efforts in the Kiln now increasing on both sides of the ocean, several Cresting Waves have been given larger engines and sent into the burning equatorial coasts to bring valuable pre-Fall salvage (among other things) south.

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Comments: 100

Abiogenisis In reply to ??? [2018-02-07 17:22:41 +0000 UTC]

This is an older painting, when I imagined the birrin world having two major moons

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IThinkOfaNameLater In reply to Abiogenisis [2018-02-07 21:14:48 +0000 UTC]

But is there still a miner moon?

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Abiogenisis In reply to IThinkOfaNameLater [2018-02-23 19:56:14 +0000 UTC]

Yes a captured asteroid now

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IThinkOfaNameLater In reply to Abiogenisis [2018-02-25 20:54:19 +0000 UTC]

Cool. Does it orbit the moon or the planet?

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Abiogenisis In reply to IThinkOfaNameLater [2018-02-27 04:17:15 +0000 UTC]

The captured asteroid is in a close orbit of the moon

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Johnof-1999 In reply to ??? [2017-10-30 21:45:33 +0000 UTC]

For a long time I wanted to ask you this question
The Birrin species have races? And if so how are they different?

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Abiogenisis In reply to Johnof-1999 [2017-11-13 14:05:35 +0000 UTC]

They do have lots of distinct ethnic groups, most of the differences are in body mass, height, and the color of the pale band along their sides

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quiroz2 In reply to ??? [2017-10-30 18:07:06 +0000 UTC]

Fantastic

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nubeees [2017-10-29 20:45:50 +0000 UTC]

Looks like a ground effect vehicle to me. Cool!

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Abiogenisis In reply to nubeees [2017-11-15 04:33:31 +0000 UTC]

 

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bagtaggar [2017-10-28 23:31:43 +0000 UTC]

Awesome!!!

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TheAtomicDog In reply to ??? [2017-10-28 12:56:25 +0000 UTC]

So, more of a 'flying boat' than an all-out seaplane.
The ghost of Rostislav E. Alexeyev turns from the shadows of dim obscurity and cocks an eyebrow.

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Abiogenisis In reply to TheAtomicDog [2017-11-15 04:33:51 +0000 UTC]

All us concept art guys love him

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ArtbyBones In reply to ??? [2017-10-28 10:47:33 +0000 UTC]

Cool design!

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SkyPotatoFire [2017-10-28 02:05:45 +0000 UTC]

Cool and Interesting.

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Abiogenisis In reply to SkyPotatoFire [2017-11-15 04:33:59 +0000 UTC]

Danke

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KevKoe [2017-10-28 01:18:27 +0000 UTC]

That is one beautiful seaplane!

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Abiogenisis In reply to KevKoe [2017-11-15 04:34:19 +0000 UTC]

 

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Tarturus In reply to ??? [2017-10-27 23:42:11 +0000 UTC]

Good pic.
Seeing as Birrin in the "present day" of your setting salvage things from their fallen hi-tech civilisation, do they try to reverse-engineer any old technologies or is it all so broken down and degraded it can only be used as scrap and building materials?

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Abiogenisis In reply to Tarturus [2017-11-15 04:34:45 +0000 UTC]

They can reverse engineer things, but almost all the tech is ancient and completely non functional

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Chobittsu-Studios In reply to ??? [2017-10-27 23:36:26 +0000 UTC]

Mmmmmmmm tasty

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cornellg [2017-10-27 23:21:09 +0000 UTC]

Everything you make is so nicely shaded and complete, even though the subject matter is wonderfully diverse. Visual cheescake, that's the stuff that you are baking. Well done!

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Abiogenisis In reply to cornellg [2017-11-15 16:54:03 +0000 UTC]

 

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MelodicChronic [2017-10-27 23:20:11 +0000 UTC]

Holy shit, dude! Really excellent work.

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Abiogenisis In reply to MelodicChronic [2017-11-15 16:54:20 +0000 UTC]

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Septimus-Oraka [2017-10-27 23:16:34 +0000 UTC]

I love the Birrin!

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XSONOHX [2017-10-27 22:34:53 +0000 UTC]

Really good work.

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Abiogenisis In reply to XSONOHX [2017-11-15 16:54:28 +0000 UTC]

Danke

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Altair75 [2017-10-27 20:47:19 +0000 UTC]

So nice!  So it is a ground effect vehicle, right? I like the complex and "futuristic" cityscape to the left in the background. Is the structure to the right an enourmous hangar or something else?

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Abiogenisis In reply to Altair75 [2017-11-15 16:55:23 +0000 UTC]

Its a flying boat so it can cruise at high altitude. The big structure is a coliseum like government palace 

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Birdhorse [2017-10-27 20:31:12 +0000 UTC]

Exotic, but also conniving.... Well done!

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Abiogenisis In reply to Birdhorse [2017-11-15 16:55:30 +0000 UTC]

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Birdhorse In reply to Abiogenisis [2017-11-16 02:21:38 +0000 UTC]

I meant to say convincing there...

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Abiogenisis In reply to Birdhorse [2017-11-16 12:01:37 +0000 UTC]

Got ya

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OmarSzkarr In reply to ??? [2017-10-27 16:55:47 +0000 UTC]

Amazing design! The detail level in both the flying boat and the facilities in the background, totally superb

Just one thing though. I always have some trouble conecting in my mind some of this vehicules with the birrim, because they look so human-made somethimes. i wonder if someday could you draw the cockpit of one of this vehicules? Because i wonder how actually a birrin controls these machines.

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Eluqqa In reply to OmarSzkarr [2017-10-29 09:42:13 +0000 UTC]

I think he balances it pretty well, since they don't directly look like any Earth vehicles but they still look practical enough.

The question is, would aliens produce something wildly different? They exist in the same physical universe, likely have access to similar materials, and they have similar practical constraints (in the sense of there being only so many ways to sensibly build, for example, a plane for flying in a dense nitrogen-oxygen atmosphere) so you'd probably get convergent design. Still, it's probably easy to underestimate how different the solutions produced by a completely different brain would be. Maybe they could take different paths in their production tooling, making their choices for practical to manufacture shapes different from ours. They would also likely end up developing various technologies at different times, so you might get mixes of disparate familiar technologies in unfamiliar applications.

One of the angles I've tried to take is trying to figure out what are the arbitrary, very human choices we make in our practical vehicles, but it's extremely hard to do without having a great amount of expertise about their design. Still, it's clear to see that, for instance, American and Russian military helicopters (which certainly aren't designed for aesthetics) end up looking rather different stylistically, even when the role is similar. Presumably aliens would make more different choices than two human cultures.

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OmarSzkarr In reply to Eluqqa [2017-10-30 00:05:12 +0000 UTC]

I admit, thinking about how an alien could design an equivalent of our same technology level without falling in techno-babble is reaaaaally difficult. I mean, if you start to really thread on the realism, you should consider even if a slight gravity difference in the planet varies the aviability of some materials over ohers, so they could end building a bronze aircraft or something like that!

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AriochIV In reply to ??? [2017-10-27 16:49:19 +0000 UTC]

Nice work!

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Abiogenisis In reply to AriochIV [2017-11-15 16:55:37 +0000 UTC]

Thank you

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IchthiusRex In reply to ??? [2017-10-27 16:13:33 +0000 UTC]

Well, you've done it again! You have made a superbly crafted design that is not only visually appealing, but, completely possible in the realm of science! 'Great Job' doesn't even do you justice!

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Abiogenisis In reply to IchthiusRex [2017-11-15 16:55:55 +0000 UTC]

 

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PeterRama [2017-10-27 15:07:36 +0000 UTC]

Very cool. The Russians actually have this type of aircraft. It's a Wing In Ground (WIG) Effect design. 
It's nicknamed the Caspian Sea Monster (it's only in operation on the Caspian Sea as it only works over relatively calm waters)

Here is a video: www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8Nu94…

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Abiogenisis In reply to PeterRama [2017-11-15 16:56:07 +0000 UTC]

Lovely beasts.

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Rubenandres77 [2017-10-27 13:03:39 +0000 UTC]

Interesting to see an ekranoplan in the context of the world you are creating.  This version of the lake transport is really beautiful. And it also looks completely possible.

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Abiogenisis In reply to Rubenandres77 [2017-11-15 04:35:01 +0000 UTC]

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SeanE [2017-10-27 12:54:01 +0000 UTC]

Have you ever produced a comprehensive book that's about the Birrin and their world/culture?...?

If not, you really should. Get it all together in one collection

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Abiogenisis In reply to SeanE [2017-11-15 04:35:15 +0000 UTC]

Gotta figure out how to fund it....

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SeanE In reply to Abiogenisis [2017-11-15 05:12:42 +0000 UTC]

I think Kickstarter would be a good place to look at...!

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Abiogenisis In reply to SeanE [2017-11-15 16:56:54 +0000 UTC]

Stressful, but definitely possible.

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