Request Icarus I and II (from Sunshine)

[werdna]

I think the movie was amazing, and the end was perfectly fitting and not out of place as many seemed to believe. It's one of my absolute favorites, despite it's scientific inaccuracies. I think someone ought to make an Orbiter addon for it.
--SPOILERS BELOW. SEE THE MOVIE!--
The Icarus II (and I) from the movie is a wonderful ship. Aside from the gravity, it's very well considered in terms of it's design (except for the communication towers, which should have been able to fold/disable, especially after the payload is detached.

The heat shield is amazing, as are the gold-covered space suits designed to reflect light, with very small visors.

The journey of the Icarus would be cool to simulate in Orbiter, and it would be fun to have an scenario/option for a successful journey, where the payload detached and fired into the sun, and everyone goes home. The sun could be given a very large atmosphere, and the payload should have an autopilot where it fires in four minutes, just like, well, what was supposed to happen in the movie before things totally went haywire. You could watch it decend into the sun like in the movie!

I suppose the hardest part would be accurately modeling the ship and suits, the movie itself would be the best reference I guess. The suits could use UMMU, but with the custom mesh. (Kind of like addons for 2001, right? Or do they use other frameworks?)

 

[FatalFlux]

Man, that would be cool indeed. That ship would be one hell of a beast to model and optimize.

Dunno who these 2753 Productions people are, but they've got themselves a really nicely detailed model of the ship. Hot damn, that's good stuff.

 

[werdna]

That model may not be suited for Orbiter, but good god- maybe they did work on the actual movie!

 

[Felipi1205]

Hey, what happened? Is someone out there working on the Icarus spacecrafts? I love the movie Sunshine!

 

[Heero_Himura]

I would love to fly the Icarus spacecraft. Not only to reenact the sunshine movie or to attempt to ignite Jupiter into a dwarf star >=D like in Stargate SG-1. Or use Icarus sling around Jupiter and Saturn to dive into Neptune or Uranus to study their cores.
Though with those velocities its doubtful the crew will return to the Earth. Maybe one can deploy the top section to aerobreak and descend into the planet while the crew section will slingshot around the planet for a return course to the Earth.

'ey, one can dream can I? lol

Also I was thinking, what if this addon had a First Person View and were able to walk and navigate around the ship with rooms and layout similar to the sunshine movie, like RagTag's FireFly 2011 Verse addon.

 

[werdna]

I would love to fly the Icarus spacecraft. Not only to reenact the sunshine movie or to attempt to ignite Jupiter into a dwarf star >=D like in Stargate SG-1. Or use Icarus sling around Jupiter and Saturn to dive into Neptune or Uranus to study their cores.
Though with those velocities its doubtful the crew will return to the Earth. Maybe one can deploy the top section to aerobreak and descend into the planet while the crew section will slingshot around the planet for a return course to the Earth.

'ey, one can dream can I? lol

Also I was thinking, what if this addon had a First Person View and were able to walk and navigate around the ship with rooms and layout similar to the sunshine movie, like RagTag's FireFly 2011 Verse addon.

The only thing the Icarus ships were supposed to do was to approach the sun and drop a stellar bomb before returning to Earth. They weren't designed to go into a gas planet's atmosphere. Remember, the shield is in the front only. As for the first person view, there is a download on OH called first person view, where you use W and S to go forward and backwards, and movement of the camera to turn. If the model had a detailed interior this is totally possible. The only problem is that when you want to input text into an MFD, like when renaming a UMMU or typing in the name of a target, pressing w or s still moves the camera.

Also, I should point out one thing which needs to change about the design of the Icarus, which is totally possible without making any other changes to the movie. After the bomb is detatched, the front shield isn't big enough to protect the antennae in the back. It just needs to have a diameter large enough for that. It wouldn't be bigger than the stellar bomb's shield, so the only real change would be in the vector diagram that Capa uses to describe the process, as well as the scene where the bomb is separated. In fact, it would only improve the ship since the larger area combined with the concave design would make for a better solar sail.

Also, it would be cool if there was a model of the gold-foiled spacesuits from the movie we could use for UMMUs. The small visor looks similar to a welder's mask. I get the sense that the people who worked on the movie were well aware of scientific or physics flaws since the stuff that was done correctly was done so well.

The thing about this movie is that to really enjoy it, you need to suspend your disbelief in its physics. That's it: The ship design is good, and would work in a zero-g environment (with some furniture changes, of course). The space suits are good. The acting's good. And the ending- all those people complain that it turned into a "slasher" movie. Nonsense. Like I said, you have to accept the physics of the movie. The idea of time and space distorting near the sun makes for a beautiful scene of what is essentially a decent into chaos and the sublime, with the element of something disturbing (remember David Bowman's disturbed distorted faces from the 2001 stargate scene?).

I even used one of the "tiles" from the stellar bomb's interior as the background for my blog.

 

[Felipi1205]

I can create the UMmu meshes, but I can't work on the spacecraft model because I'll comeback to the Cygnus in the next days... But if someone wants to create it, I can help!

 

[2753Productions]

Thanks

Hey guys, had to register and say thanks for the kind words about my Icarus II model on my website. I do appreciate it. LOL and no I didn't work on the movie, though currently I am working on a few different films. I was modeling the Icarus II ship simply because I wanted to, I loved the movie very much.

Unfortunately I have as yet to finish the ship, as other gigs have kept me from returning to it, and once I do finish it I assure you I will be posting finished pictures in my gallery and on my main website. I do hope to return to modeling the Icarus II within the next few weeks or so.

Thanks guys :thumbup:

Scott

 

[Ragtag]

The only thing the Icarus ships were supposed to do was to approach the sun and drop a stellar bomb before returning to Earth.

I felt that the unsaid undercurrent of the movie was that it was a one way mission.

Also, I should point out one thing which needs to change about the design of the Icarus, which is totally possible without making any other changes to the movie. After the bomb is detatched, the front shield isn't big enough to protect the antennae in the back.

That and how were they going to maneuver for the return trip without getting toasted? Look at the trouble they had and damaged caused by just trying to get to the first ship. Bad decision going for that other ship but, if they didn't they wouldn't have had a movie. :lol: This was another reason why I thought it was a one way trip.

I bought the movie so that I could have a reference to model from but I realized that I could never do the model with enough detail to get it usable in Orbiter. All that truss work equals lots of polygons.

 

[werdna]

I felt that the unsaid undercurrent of the movie was that it was a one way mission.




That and how were they going to maneuver for the return trip without getting toasted? Look at the trouble they had and damaged caused by just trying to get to the first ship. Bad decision going for that other ship but, if they didn't they wouldn't have had a movie. :lol: This was another reason why I thought it was a one way trip.

I bought the movie so that I could have a reference to model from but I realized that I could never do the model with enough detail to get it usable in Orbiter. All that truss work equals lots of polygons.

From what I can tell, the original mission calls for them to deliver the stellar bomb and then return home. Icarus II detaches from the bomb, and then the concave inner shield will act as a solar sail. Remember, the Icarus I and II would loose the enormous mass of the payload after it detaches. Icarus I and II are like feathers attached to boulders. Light enough to be pushed away once detached, Icarus I and II would make their way home from momentum provided by solar wind. I'm not saying solar wind is that predictable, especially so close to the sun, but in the context of the movie it makes sense.

Besides the fact the inner shield have been larger, another problem is: there should have been a mechanism in place to cover the docking port in the center of the shield (seen when Capa jumps to the payload in his suit). This is a weak spot, and the worst possible place to have a weak spot!

The only reason Icarus II was damaged before it was destroyed was due to human error (Trey's miscalculation and Pinbacker forcing the undocking).

Let's not forget that solar wind traveling horizontally relative to the ship would destroy it as well.. This is a big problem, and a plot hole equivalent to a black hole. Designing a ship to be shielded on all sides would drastically change the movie, but I'll stop there because the movie is wonderful even with its flaws.

Hey guys, had to register and say thanks for the kind words about my Icarus II model on my website. I do appreciate it. LOL and no I didn't work on the movie, though currently I am working on a few different films. I was modeling the Icarus II ship simply because I wanted to, I loved the movie very much.

Unfortunately I have as yet to finish the ship, as other gigs have kept me from returning to it, and once I do finish it I assure you I will be posting finished pictures in my gallery and on my main website. I do hope to return to modeling the Icarus II within the next few weeks or so.

Thanks guys

Scott

Welcome! While you're at it, why not give Orbiter a try!

 

[Mandella]

As it happens, I just watched the movie for the first time two nights ago, and yes, the "plan" was that there would be a return voyage (16 months to get back, or maybe 6 if I misheard). Of course, the *writers* knew that they wouldn't be coming back, so it's entirely possible that they failed to give the return voyage the attention it needed to be believable. Plus it was pretty well admitted that the odds were long even to get to the point of delivering the payload, much less return.

As for the movie itself, I enjoyed it even with its technical flaws. The only problem was a bad case of mental whiplash -- I thought it was going to be a cheesy-fun B movie like The Core, not an intense psychological thriller more akin to 2001!

 

[Izack]

I thought it was going to be a cheesy-fun B movie like The Core, not an intense psychological thriller more akin to 2001!

My reaction exactly. Went in thinking "Sounds like the Core rehashed in space." After hearing the intro, just kept thinking "Great. Now it's Inception in space. Or The Space After Tomorrow." Two hours later it was one of my favourites.

 

[werdna]

As it happens, I just watched the movie for the first time two nights ago, and yes, the "plan" was that there would be a return voyage (16 months to get back, or maybe 6 if I misheard). Of course, the *writers* knew that they wouldn't be coming back, so it's entirely possible that they failed to give the return voyage the attention it needed to be believable. Plus it was pretty well admitted that the odds were long even to get to the point of delivering the payload, much less return.

As for the movie itself, I enjoyed it even with its technical flaws. The only problem was a bad case of mental whiplash -- I thought it was going to be a cheesy-fun B movie like The Core, not an intense psychological thriller more akin to 2001!

This film is genius, and it indeed comes close to 2001- and that's a major complement. The ending contains similar elements- distortions, things that are somewhat disturbing, and a journey into the unknown. There was tension. Lots of tension- the fate of human civilization - one little mistake and Capa could have failed.

It's like time is slowed down inside the payload- listen to the background noise when the three remaining characters are in the payload bay- if you speed up that sound really fast it would be the sound of solar wind and particles banging the surface of the payload heat shield.

At the very end, you can hear a sound both before and during the time Capa sees the payload ignite in the very center of it, right before it crashes into the sun. To me, it sounds like an alarm- perhaps because the cube-shaped payload was getting to a point where it would finally break apart. If we made an addon which recreates the movie, that sound could be used as an alarm- it would go off a minute or so before the payload burns up.

EDIT- it's actually only after the payload is ignited, so maybe it's just a warning for any occupants that the payload is going to explode in a number of seconds. Not that it would be useful, but watch that part and listen. It's like a distorted alarm. (It was well directed, and this could have been a stylistic choice, but the thought it could be an alarm makes sense. Kind of.)