When I first played Elite on my C64 back in 1984-ish I wished that someone would make a Cobra Mk3 model that I could hold, examine and admire.
That was back when to own such a thing would have required hours of careful modelling, casting, production runs, retailing negotiations, packaging, shipping and eventually purchasing from my nearest stockist.
Tonight, I made one for myself:
So after 29 years or so, I at last have a model of a Cobra MkIII that I can turn over in my hands, look at in different light and from different angles and admire the simple yet unmistakable lines of the iconic ship that launched with one of the home computer game industry’s most engaging titles ever: Elite.
I can’t really take any credit for this particular model though as it exists thanks to the efforts of many very smart and talented people;
David Braben, from Frontier Developments and Ian Bell, the original Elite developers
The simply awesome Oolite project and all contributors there
Giles Williams, for creating Oolite model extraction scripts
Alessandro Ranellucci, for Slic3r
kliment, for PrintRun (or specifically, Pronterface for Mac)
The guys at Printrbot, for building the PrintrbotJr
And, just in case you didn’t already know, Elite will live again in the form of Elite: Dangerous, so you may be interested to discover more about;
The game: Elite: Dangerous
The novel (one of several, which is excellent news): Elite: Reclamation
Good hunting, commanders.