The Imperium Bengal Project v1 - CitizenCon 2953

The Imperium Bengal Project was originally thought up/inspired by the very 1st episode of “10 For the Chairman'' that premiered on December 6th 2013, when we got a look at Chris Roberts new office at CIG Santa Monica, & saw the models of the Concordia & Snakir. I thought to myself “What Chris really needs is a cool Star Citizen model to go along with those models from Wing Commander.” But while the idea might have started almost a decade ago, it took time to figure out how we were going to do it. I recruited fellow Org member Trophias, to help me plan it out, and at the same time (or maybe even slightly before) I also reached out to CIG to see if anyone within CIG could help us obtain the files to create such a model. Luckily the project came to the attention of Sandi Gardiner/Roberts, & she thought that our idea was pretty cool too.

We tried to get the project going for the 1st time in May 2016 when we signed a NDA with CIG, and obtained a copy of the (current) Bengal Art Files along with a license to produce models of the ship both for our own Org to display or to make as a gift for CIG. Unfortunately the model we received had a number of flaws and wasn't usable for 3D printing without a lot more work to repair than was practical. So, we put a pin in our first attempt to create the model and decided to wait & see if it ever became practical to attempt it again later.

Fast forward to 2020, and as we all know, the world got a little bit crazy, suddenly everyone was stuck at home with way too much time on their hands. It was in this environment, during the Pandemic that I saw some really cool Star Citizen models start to get posted here & on Reddit, and so I thought to myself “Well, I still have the original file that CIG gave me, and a lot of time, why not see what you can do” so I bought myself my first 3D printer and got my hands on some modeling software, & I decided to see if I could fix the flaws in the original Bengal model and make it printable.

My success in making the original file printable encouraged me to recruit Brosion and JosephW (both skilled 3D modelers and Org members within Imperium) & to go back to CIG and get an updated file (and NDA & license). These new team members did the incredible job of taking the updated set of Bengal Art Files, that were (in theory) the exact same as the Bengal Carrier that would appear in SQ42, and turning it into a printable 2 meter model. I only had to figure out how to get it printed & assembled on time for CitizenCon 2953...

To say that the completion of Bengal v1 was both a challenge & a learning experience would be an understatement, & even though we weren’t able to include all of the features that we wanted, I am still incredibly proud of the work that my team & I were able to accomplish. Not only was the model huge, but it was also extremely detailed (more so than any other model of its size category that I have seen). The lessons that we have learned in completing v1, will now be put towards making v2 & v3 even more detailed, robust, & fully-featured. I can’t wait to show the entire Star Citizen Community what Imperium can accomplish next when we put our minds to it!

If you want to learn more about this project, you can find a more detailed write up on r/starcitizen or also on r/3DPrinting & r/ScifiModels (for a more detailed discussion as it relates to those communities). If you want to learn more about our Org, & all of the various projects (both model, and in-game related) you can find us at https://discord.gg/imperiumsc (visitors from all across the Star Citizen Community are always welcome).