Hood-inspired BB suggestions.

First of all, hi everyone!
I've found this site and it's forum a couple of weeks ago when i was browsing some battleship linedrawings from google, i was searching related stuff for a "just for fun" work with paint.
Given the quality of many drawing i've found around in the site and here in the forum i began to lurk around and enjoy the creations, so at the end i've decided to make an account and ask some tips to you guys.
Believe it or not i was already playing around with paint before discovering this site, so i don't have, in any way, stolen ideas from other threads.
Let's take it from the beginning:
since i was a child i've always been interested in battleships, so as soon as i can i began collectin pics of them, the first step was a book called "a guide to battleships: from the beginning to now" (or "guida alle corazzte: dalle origini a oggi" if you prefer in my mother toungue); then comes internet, wikipedia, google search... and so the pictures and the linedrawings.
about 2 years ago i found this linedrawing of HMS Hood and made it part of my pics and drawings collecton:

Quote:

this pic was made by "Emoscopes" and can be found on Hood's page on wikipedia, so the credits of the drawing goes to him and no one else. (as his licensing permit requires)

Then, about 1 or 2 moths ago, i decided to have a little fun with it, so i made another copy of ith and began to modify it, for now those are the results:

The hull is 277 meters long, about 15 more of the real Hood, i've added about 8 more meters at the bow and 7 at the stern; i've got rid of most of the wires and cables, deleted all the boats, redone the bridge, added some enclosed platforms under the spotting top "starfish", partually enclosed X turret's barbette in a shelter deck, added a deck under the rear bridge (in order to raise it over the rear 5.25 turret), enclosed the lower part of the forward funnel with a deck extending from the bridge structure to the wireless room, changed the secondary armament and added many bofors and phalanx mounts.
The ship is not drawn in shipbucket standard because ath the time i still ignore the existence of this site (and obviously because the base drawing was made even before), the drawing itself is about 1,28 times bigger than the standard shipbucket scale, so i've scaled up the 5.25-inch to roughly match the right dimensions, the same goes for the Harpoon lanchers, differences in scale for the phalanx mounts and other smaller items turns out so minimal that i preferred to leave them a little undersized.

Before finally getting to the point i would point out some things:
I know that many things could not make sense, such the ridcolous amount of phalanx and their akward positions, or the presence of many man-manned bofors, actually the old bofors are supposed to stand for a more modern (and completely fictional) radar guided QF L/90 in octuple mounts wich requires manning only to replenish the magazines stockings (the one over B turret has only 4 guns, hence the different look); it could still absolutely making no sense but i'm happy with it, i'm playing around with history and tecnology because in real wolrd there is no more place (

) for ships like them, also i've no plans or whatsover to upgrade this "Hood" to shipbucket standars (other ships in future? we'll see..) or to post it on other boards.

Now the real point:
as you can see there are many systems stacked all around the drawing, radars, rangefinders, contermeasures, fire control directors... i'm planning to replace the three main rangefinders (conning tower/bridge, spotting top and aft bridge) with the 1938 main rangefinder, but i have absolutely no idea about all the other stuff, so i kinldy ask for your help, suggestions, constructive criticism and all sort of ideas are welcome; i would ask also if someone has ideas to make the top of the funnels look more modern, or to improve the look of the spotting top retaining the tripod mast and some sort of overhanging structure over the aft part of the bridge area.
Feel free to copy and edit some parts of the modified drawing if you want to show something more clearly.

Thanks in advance to you all.

that drawing is no shipbucket style nor scale, so why are you trying to use shipbucket style parts with it?

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i find it more pratical than doing it from scratch, bigger objects like the 5.25.inch DP guns and the harpoon launchers have already been scaled up (and others like the 1938 rangefinder will get the same "treatement" before beign placed on the ship), i've also changed some of the colors to make them fit better the ship's color; smaller objects (suche the phalanx itself or the smaller directors) got deformed and gain so minimal differences when resized that i've simply decided to left them as they are.

also i hope to not have missed somenthing when reading the forum rules, honestly and seriously, if it's not allowed to use shipbucket parts for non-style drawings i'll stop using them immediately.

There are Shipbucket-scale Hood drawings, use those.

You've got a plethora of parts from different eras on one ship. THe Hood was commissioned in the twenties, and you've added guns from the forties and fifties, Phalanx from the eighties to present, harpoons from the seventies to present, and radars from many years. Also, you're using what looks like an Andrew Aurthur drawing, which can be somewhat inaccurate.

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"If people never did silly things nothing intelligent would ever get done." ~Ludwig Wittgenstein

Raxar wrote:

Yes, complete accurancy and realism is not what i'm seeking here, i'm just playing around to create something that "looks good", drawing something else realistic and in shipbucket-standard will probably be my next step, as except for phalanx and DP guns everything else was already done before discovering this site; what i'm seeking here are some suggestions about wich it's the best place to put those radar/fire control related stuff because i have no idea about it (*), the last tip is about the spotting top and the funnels as i said before.
You guys semms to be much more clever than me when it comes to ship design (as i saw in other threads where while disigning the funnels of a DD things such smoke and blind spots when looking from the bridge where considered) so i tought it could be useful to ask for help.

*(i don't even need to put them all, just those whom makes more sense, for example, i have 3 differen HA/LA director, but i want to use just one of them; same goes for the three fire control)

Benvenuto in Shipbucket

Lazer_one wrote:

Benvenuto in Shipbucket

Grazie Lazer

Anyway, regarding the problem of the drawing not beign in shipbucket scale or style, i will try to redrawn myself in the correct scale all the sistems i'm planning to put on the ship, i just need to do some researches in order to remove all redundant equipment (like retaining only the most modern version for every type, just to make an example).
So, aside for the aforementioned problems, any tips for the funnels and the spotting top? (am i getting a bit too repetitive?)

BB1987 wrote:

Buona fortuna - I don't mean to sound too cynical, but you may be putting in too much effort than what the final result may be worth.

Si fa per dire.

don't worry, you are not sounding cynical, instead i could even say that you are right about it; still, i see my works with paint more like a free-time entertainment with no major ambitions, i'm not into real (or realistic) designs, i prefer to be creative with AU's ideas as it was my style since i was a child and i used pencil and paper instead of paint.

Right now i'm considering the possibility of making another version once i have finished this one, deleting all the Bofors, rearranging the Phalanx (both by number and placement) and editing parts of the superstructure.

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Hood-inspired BB suggestions.

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