The ultimate Fighting Machine project

[poyks]

I would consider this a great project for the new year. We have some very good visual artists on this forum, as well as members who have great ideas about how the original Fighting Machines should look according to the original novel.

We have seen many dozens of interpretations, including many of our own, that capture various accurate aspects of the machines as described by H.G., and many that have fallen short of the true (if sometimes vague) descriptions of the machines.

All of the representations are clearly important, as we let our imaginations run riot, to grasp the horrific feel of these awesome metal "creatures" creating the perfect juxtaposition against a beautiful Victorian backdrop.

I propose that we present our various ideas as we've done before, but as a think tank to come up with the "ultimate" design. We will have to be prepared to compromise to all suggestions made, and various stages of the construction will be voted on, and we'll allow the project to develop and evolve over a period of time. Those of us that can do the drawings and/or computer models will create representations along the way, with a totally open mind to criticism and positive input.

If there is enough interest, Nerf will consider opening a new category for the project, so please let us know your opinions.

[RustiSwordz]

This sounds cool! And unique! What we need to do is list all the things Wells said about the fighting machine and try to incorporate all of that into the design.

"Box like heat ray on an arm like a camera." Once weve established what wells said about the machine we then need to fill in the blanks. A lot of what he said ranges from the vague to the quite specific.

I have loads of sketches myself unfinished i'll have to put them up.

Nerfy's idea of a seperate forum/subject will be useful.

We'll need one thread (a sticky) purly for Wells description. Seperate threads for each artist, and a final maybe a sticky thread where people can see the finished agreed description/ sketch for each body/machine part as a reference thread.

Once the final agreed machine is finished each artist can go away and produce their own artwork based on the final agreed design.

[Scifishocks]

''Nerfy's idea of a seperate forum/subject will be useful.''

Not my idea at all, all Brendan's. But if enough people are interested in collaborating on this I'll be happy to add a seperate section to the board for it.

Whilst I'm away, if people want to come up with how you want it and I'll get on it when I return.

[Relyt]

This looks like an opportunity. Since I have read the book 8 times in the past 2 years, have created 16 Fighting Machines (also in the past 2 years) and base mine off of the book as closely as possible (while still making them look frightening), I may be of some help. Count me in!

WOAH! Nerfy, you and I just posted messages at (almost) the same time in the same thread ! Are you a mind-reader?

[Bagnew]

Of course he is.
You do NOT doubt the Nerf. Unless he says something silly, like that his name is, like Eyeball3000 or something like that. Then you can doubt him. Ima shut up now

[poyks]

lionheart said:

This sounds cool! And unique! What we need to do is list all the things Wells said about the fighting machine and try to incorporate all of that into the design.

"Box like heat ray on an arm like a camera." Once weve established what wells said about the machine we then need to fill in the blanks. A lot of what he said ranges from the vague to the quite specific.

I have loads of sketches myself unfinished i'll have to put them up.

Nerfy's idea of a seperate forum/subject will be useful.

We'll need one thread (a sticky) purly for Wells description. Seperate threads for each artist, and a final maybe a sticky thread where people can see the finished agreed description/ sketch for each body/machine part as a reference thread.

Once the final agreed machine is finished each artist can go away and produce their own artwork based on the final agreed design.

Nice one Rusti, and Relyt. One good thing would be to have a definitive list of the descriptions of the book that seem to be mostly written in stone, ie, the text that we will have to adhere to. For example, we know that the Heat Ray, as Rusti said, is a separately held piece of machinery rather than a weapon built into the main body, or the fact that the head is separate to the body.
We should go through the book to find these examples, and discuss them individually to make sure we arrive at the same conclusions.

I'll go through the novel myself, and present my own set of quotes and put them to everyone else.

Looking forward to seeing those sketches Rusti.

[Relyt]

I think I've got it covered Poyks. After all, as I've said it before, I've read the good ol' book 8 times.

First of all, the head. It's domelike in shape because it's described as similar to a dish cover, a roof of a house, a boiler, or a human head in a cloak. The head contains at least one window, and this/these window(s) are open-aired, for they have no glass or other covering.

Next, the cage. Obviously, it's a huge cage similar to a fisherman's basket and it's held behind the head/ main body of the Tripod. It seems to have no definate shape however, so you can use your imagination on this one...

Next, the legs. Again, Wells lets us use our imaginations for these. The only points he gives us is that they are long, thin, jointed, and have small feet or none at all.

Next, the Heat-Ray. This is a smooth and large box that vaguely resembles an early camera. This includes a funnel at the front that emits the Heat-Ray itself and the projector is held on either a metal tentacle or a jointed arm.

The tentacles are easy. They have no claws, are segmented, thin, long, and made of metal. Again, Wells lets us use our imaginations on these too, because he does not say where their points of origin are, whether they are on the head or the main body.

Lastly, the main body. Wells does not give us many, if any, details on this one, so once again, you can use your imagination.

Well, that's it. I hope I cleared things up for everyone (especially you Poyks ) but let me know if I missed something (but I doubt it ;D)!

(Whew, this took a long time to type...)

[omegatripod]

Sorry, Relyt, but you forgot one detail. According to Mr. Wells:

"And not only did the Martians either not know of (which is incredible), or abstain from, the wheel, but in their apparatus singularly little use is made of the fixed pivot or relatively fixed pivot, with circular motions thereabout confined to one plane. Almost all the joints of the machinery present a complicated system of sliding parts moving over small but beautifully curved friction bearings. And while upon this matter of detail, it is remarkable that the long leverages of their machines are in most cases actuated by a sort of sham musculature of the disks in an elastic sheath; these disks become polarised and drawn closely and powerfully together when traversed by a current of electricity. In this way the curious parallelism to animal motions, which was so striking and disturbing to the human beholder, was attained.

So remember, no fixed pivots or relatively fixed pivots on the Fighting Machines. Stay to the book.
I would also like to mention a certain part of an online War of the Worlds RPG, which has wonderful reports on Martian technology and may prove invaluable to our design. The direct link to the Martian technology report is here, and the direct link to the home page is here.

[Relyt]

Hey, you can't expect me to remember everything! But I've never been able to visualize the joints Wells described...

I'd like to try playing that RPG, but I don't know where to download it.

[poyks]

relyt said:

I think I've got it covered Poyks. After all, as I've said it before, I've read the good ol' book 8 times.

First of all, the head. It's domelike in shape because it's described as similar to a dish cover, a roof of a house, a boiler, or a human head in a cloak. The head contains at least one window, and this/these window(s) are open-aired, for they have no glass or other covering.

Next, the cage. Obviously, it's a huge cage similar to a fisherman's basket and it's held behind the head/ main body of the Tripod. It seems to have no definate shape however, so you can use your imagination on this one...

Next, the legs. Again, Wells lets us use our imaginations for these. The only points he gives us is that they are long, thin, jointed, and have small feet or none at all.

Next, the Heat-Ray. This is a smooth and large box that vaguely resembles an early camera. This includes a funnel at the front that emits the Heat-Ray itself and the projector is held on either a metal tentacle or a jointed arm.

The tentacles are easy. They have no claws, are segmented, thin, long, and made of metal. Again, Wells lets us use our imaginations on these too, because he does not say where their points of origin are, whether they are on the head or the main body.

Lastly, the main body. Wells does not give us many, if any, details on this one, so once again, you can use your imagination.

Well, that's it. I hope I cleared things up for everyone (especially you Poyks ) but let me know if I missed something (but I doubt it ;D)!

(Whew, this took a long time to type...)

omegatripod said:

Sorry, Relyt, but you forgot one detail. According to Mr. Wells:

"And not only did the Martians either not know of (which is incredible), or abstain from, the wheel, but in their apparatus singularly little use is made of the fixed pivot or relatively fixed pivot, with circular motions thereabout confined to one plane. Almost all the joints of the machinery present a complicated system of sliding parts moving over small but beautifully curved friction bearings. And while upon this matter of detail, it is remarkable that the long leverages of their machines are in most cases actuated by a sort of sham musculature of the disks in an elastic sheath; these disks become polarised and drawn closely and powerfully together when traversed by a current of electricity. In this way the curious parallelism to animal motions, which was so striking and disturbing to the human beholder, was attained.

So remember, no fixed pivots or relatively fixed pivots on the Fighting Machines. Stay to the book.
I would also like to mention a certain part of an online War of the Worlds RPG, which has wonderful reports on Martian technology and may prove invaluable to our design. The direct link to the Martian technology report is here, and the direct link to the home page is here.

This is exactly the kind of stuff we need to study, and the RPG links are very interesting to say the least! Obviously a lot of the interpretations are open to question, but that is a key ingredient to the project, and this is good positive input. Initially we will gather all the data from different fields, and it will of course be a bit of a mish-mash at first, until we fine tune and categorize each aspect of our design. Excellent progress!

There is one quote that has caught my interest lately, involving the way the Machine's legs function;

"The sprawling Martians were no longer to be seen, the mound of blue-green powder had risen to cover them from sight, and a fighting-machine, with its legs contracted, crumpled, and abbreviated, stood across the corner of the pit."

I had initially considered this to be something to do with a telescopic motion, but there is no mention of this before. This brings me onto another thing we should look out for, ie, descriptions that are not present. For example there are the Roger Dean pictures that are great in their own right, but they look like a kind of prehistoric bird. If they had looked that obvious, then H.G. would have used that as an example, thus what he does not describe is as important as the things he does portray.

[omegatripod]

relyt said:

I'd like to try playing that RPG, but I don't know where to download it.

You don't have to download it, because I'm making RPG statistics for every single book by H.G. Wells! ;D The rules are for a different and more easily obtained RPG: d20 Modern, a game made for the d20 system. d20 Modern has exactly the same rules as Dungeons & Dragons except for modifications to skills, feats, monsters, and etcetera due to the fact that it takes place in more modern times. Unlike D&D, which has 3 core rulebooks each costing $30, d20 Modern has one core rulebook costing $40, so you save $50. You can probably find it in the local gaming supplies store. Back to my custom statistics: I will post all of my statistics in separate threads, one thread per book. Yes, due to the amount of content in Wells' novels, there will be multiple books(not published, but home-made). There will be either one book per novel or three books: The Xenohistorian's Almanac, which describes the GM's, or Game Master's, campaign setting and background knowledge info, The Solar System Gazetteer, which provides player, society, and technology stats for the inhabitants of Earth, the moon, and Mars, and The Anatomical Planetarium, which provides encounter stats for the inhabitants of the previously mentioned cosmic figures. Please give me your opinion on whether I should write one book per novel or three books. Edit: I've already decided that there will be one book for Earth, another for the moon, and one for Mars.

(Note: The "d" in "d20 Modern" is lowercase even at the beginning of sentences, because the name is trademarked and it's a proper name.)

[thedonal]

I'm well interested in this project- the thing I find quite hard to conceptualise is the pivotless joints- I can sort of see the idea in my head, but the voices keep, sorry, I mean I can't quite translate it onto the page.

It's no wonder so many artistic liberties have been taken over the years with the design. For instance- to fit the basket onto the back of the body, would you put 2 legs at the front, or at the back, so the basket can sit between them? For this reason, I think Pete Fussey's design works so well- and also some of Rusti's work.

I can get on with the domed head- that's quite an easy concept, but does the heat ray sit on it's arm coming from the body, or the head? And where?

Personally, too, I think that the tentacles should come from the body- perhaps from a projection underneath- a bit like Correa's design.

Ohgods it's so dfifficult!

Maybe we could make a gallery where we point out our favourite and most faithful aspects of the design and cobble something together from that?

[poyks]

thedonal said:

I'm well interested in this project- the thing I find quite hard to conceptualise is the pivotless joints- I can sort of see the idea in my head, but the voices keep, sorry, I mean I can't quite translate it onto the page.

It's no wonder so many artistic liberties have been taken over the years with the design. For instance- to fit the basket onto the back of the body, would you put 2 legs at the front, or at the back, so the basket can sit between them? For this reason, I think Pete Fussey's design works so well- and also some of Rusti's work.

I can get on with the domed head- that's quite an easy concept, but does the heat ray sit on it's arm coming from the body, or the head? And where?

Personally, too, I think that the tentacles should come from the body- perhaps from a projection underneath- a bit like Correa's design.

Ohgods it's so dfifficult!

Maybe we could make a gallery where we point out our favourite and most faithful aspects of the design and cobble something together from that?

This is the way the project should work, questioning the representations that have been made so far respecting the artistic license that has been used, then adjusting accordingly in ways that lead to our design. This combined with new and fresh ideas will lead us on our way to the finished concept.

So far the initial input has been inspiring, and it gives me a lot of hope that this project is a workable one.

Good work!

[Anim8tr]

thedonal said:

Maybe we could make a gallery where we point out our favourite and most faithful aspects of the design and cobble something together from that?

That would be a great starting point! It would allow for a large variety of mediums and feedback to be considered.

[poyks]

anim8tr said:

thedonal said:

Maybe we could make a gallery where we point out our favourite and most faithful aspects of the design and cobble something together from that?

That would be a great starting point! It would allow for a large variety of mediums and feedback to be considered.

Agreed. Many aspects can be considered, including the emotional and artistic points of view; they are just as important as the technical detail. We could run the risk of ending up with an accurate model that just fulfills the descriptive criteria, yet the emotive aspect can be left out if we're not careful. We have to include the emotive and fear aspects.