B’rel Nach – Bird Saber Inspired by the Klingon Bird of Prey

nuqneH! Hello Everybody….as you might have guessed from my little bit of Klingon we are headed back to Federation Space today for another Star Trek saber. To be specific we are headed to the planet Genesis where we find Captain Kirk attempting to recover the “body” of his friend Mr Spock in the hope of restoring the Vulcan to life. This is the plot of Star Trek III – The Search For Spock and as you can imagine things don’t go smoothly for our Fed heroes. The Federation are surveying the newly regenerated planet Genesis and a survey team beam down to the surface when they discover signs of life on their scanners. Whilst the scientists (including Kirk’s son David Marcus) investigate some unwelcome visitors stealthily arrive to try and obtain the Genesis data and equipment to use as a weapon -The Klingons led by Commander Kruge!

So Kirk, you are going to try time travelling? I did that once in the future..or was it the past?

This is Commander Kruge, a very harsh, imposing and not to mention ruthless Klingon (played by Doc Brown actor Christopher Lloyd!). Kruge killed his own crewman gunner when the gunner “misplaced” a disruptor beam and destroyed a ship….oh and Kruge killed his girlfriend too when she revealed she’d seen the Genesis data! Now Kruge and the Klingons arrived in their ship and as I mentioned attacked (and destroyed) a ship which was the USS Grissom the Fed science research vessel resulting in Kruge having to also beam to the planet surface to try and capture the “away team” of Lt Saavik and Dr Marcus. All this happens just as Kirk, McCoy, Sulu and Scotty arrive in a newly stolen Enterprise. But how did the Klingons arrive and remain undetected?

Well they were flying in a B’rel class starship more commonly known as a Bird of Prey! This ship had a very distinct appearance and a very special feature. So today I present my B’rel Nach or Bird Saber….

Yes, I have immortalised the Bird of Prey in lightsaber form and it is a sort of crossguard hilt. I tried to replicate the basic outline of a Bird of Prey by giving this saber a pair of “wings” either side of the emitter. In the tips of these wings are small lights which represent the BoP’s Disruptor cannons and look closely and you can see hull plating to replicate the “feathery” details the real ship has on it’s wings. The BoP is very special as some people don’t know it is actually a Romulan design! Back in the 60’s series of Star Trek one episode named “Balance of Terror” established that ships painted with bird designs were Romulan. One small line of dialogue in the movie though explains the Klingons stole this Bird of Prey! Back to the saber and the emitter represents the bridge module of the ship with windows to allow blade shine through, but look on top and you can see I modelled a basic “bridge cupola” and that has tiny windows circling it! The emitter mouth is the launch tube for the Photon Torpedoes which are replaced by the saber blade. Here is Gallery Two …

In these pics you can see the “Photon Torpedo Saber Blade” and the raised bridge cupola atop the emitter. You can also see that this saber has a lot of grime and streaks of rust on it’s surface. The tail or aft section features the leather handgrip from my “Quartermaster” hilt (https://ftsabersite.wordpress.com/2021/07/24/the-quartermaster-saber-inspired-by-the-mandalorians-the-armourer/) and is adorned with a Klingon Kahless Empire logo. The last two pictures show the saber back on Kronos (the Klingon home planet) and at rest on it’s display stand – this time borrowed from my “Chang” saber. (https://ftsabersite.wordpress.com/2021/08/21/chang-saber-a-weapon-for-a-klingon-general/) However this time I modified the stand so I could place the hilt at an angle to show off it’s lines. You will also notice the wings have folded downward into their rest position.

Now I mentioned a special feature of this ship and it explains how this ship approached and destroyed the Grissom without being detected…the answer is the BoP has a “Cloaking Device” making it virtually invisible. The BoP has to deactivate this shield in order to fire it’s weapons and it was this small disadvantage that allowed Kirk and the Enterprise to survive an attack (at least for a little while). Kirk realising the situation sets a trap for the Klingons and he and the crew beam to Genesis…where Kirk comes face to face with Kruge, and a young Vulcan. I won’t spoil the final scenes of the film just in case some of you still haven’t seen the movie….so this would be a good place to bring this post to an end but as always my usual thanks and messages before I go where no-one has gone before….

Thanks so much for checking this design out, I hope you have been enjoying the change of pace with these Star Trek designs – they have been fun to build. And as always thanks for the continued support you show my site and I hope you will return for more new saber designs. I have Star Wars Sith sabers, a saber inspired by the silver fern and maybe a few modified Quartermaster hilts. Oh and I might even add a few Lego models too. There is still so much more to come in future posts. Till next time…..Qa’Pla!

“B’rel Nach” saber” is a For Tyeth Editions design inspired by the Klingon “Bird of Prey” ship from the film “Star Trek III – The Search for Spock” The design, model and renders where created by For Tyeth in Blender 3D and are ©Copyright of For Tyeth/FTSabersite 2016-2021. Star Trek and all names, images, logos and related material are Trademark/ ©Copyright of Paramount Pictures.

“Horey’So ‘Eth” saberstaff – Honour Blade – Inspired by The Klingons

Hello Everybody, wow it seems strange not to be showcasing a Bad Batch saber this week but I hope you’ll like this offering just as much. I mentioned a few times that the ideas for the Bad Batch hilts came all at once in a burst and I quickly modelled/rendered them – well this afforded me a bit of time to “relax” as I had a supply of material to show you all. In this “downtime” I tried watching a bit of TV and discovered that one of my cable channels had a Star Trek movie marathon on (yes I mentioned Star Trek again!). I figured a change was as good as a rest and decided to watch a few Trek adventures and saw something in ST6 The Undiscovered Country – a Klingon weapon…sort of. Captain Kirk and Dr McCoy are framed for murder in the film and sent to a penal colony named Rura Penthe. During one of the scenes I saw a Klingon prison guard use a type of shock baton (cattle prod). I attempted to model it in Blender from memory but it wasn’t good and lacked a lot. THEN it hit me…what if I doubled the weapon and connected them to form a Maul style staff? I set to work and came up with “Horey’so ‘Eth” or Honour Blade…

I made a nice looking, balanced staff but it still needed detail so taking inspiration from my B’Elanna’s Blade” and “Gre’thor” hilts I reworked the image of the Klingon cranial ridges to form the cut-out windows on the emitter. I then (I think) cleverly used the same model piece I used as a cutter to create the windows to form the activation switches too! I scaled the piece and switched it from having a plain material and gave it an emission to make it glow – resulting in the red chevron shaped switches. And just to enforce the link to the Klingons I 3D modelled another Empire three bladed logo to act as a decoration on the switch section and emitters.

I also had chance to play with some settings I don’t use much in Blender and those are controls to create ultra-real looking textures using multiple layers of “paint”. The staff above has 4 “layers” starting with a Base Material. This is just a plain photographic texture image and makes the object look coloured but flat and lifeless. However applying the remaining 3 layers changed that. The next layer, Metallic, controls how shiny various parts of the Base Material are then next is the “Roughness” layer which adds chips and scratches – finally a layer named “Displacement” adds a special 3D shadowing effect to trick the human eye into thinking the texture has a raised surface. This technique is sometimes known as “Bump Mapping” used to add details like rivets and screw heads to models. OK enough chatting again, it’s time for Glamour Gallery two…

I realised that the first batch of images were a little dark as I tried to add a bit of “mood lighting” but that meant the details didn’t show too good so I turned up the lighting and while I was modifying I figured I’d add a couple of gold accent rings to hold the leather handgrip in position and I added this colour to the logos so they stood out better too. Hopefully you will be able to see the much more detailed material textures – the red paint almost looks like it is peeling off for real. Finally I decided to build a ceremonial or regal version of the staff and gave it a classic black and gold scheme. Gallery three…

Again this colour scheme uses the advanced texture settings and you should be able to see what appear to be machining marks as if this staff was carved from solid metal on a lathe or CNC mill (a computer controlled manufacturing machine used by saber companies to cut aluminium bars into empty lightsaber handles).

I really enjoyed my break from building Star Wars hilts and am pleased how this design turned out. I think it will look good in my Star Trek gallery which you can find here: https://ftsabersite.wordpress.com/tag/star-trek/

I am drawing to the end of this post but first I’d like to mention what’s coming up in future posts. First I have received a few parcels, one regarding my recent costume build and another couple of packages containing some collectibles which I’m excited about (I had to buy two of these collectible items so I can keep one boxed and display the other!) Hopefully pictures will follow of all my purchases. And in saber designs, I still have a Star Trek ship inspired hilt along with a Bounty Hunter and a Blacksmith saber from the Star Wars universe – basically plenty to entertain you all.

That’s it for today, thanks so much for your visit and support – all your comments, likes and subs are much appreciated. Whether a new caller or one of the FTSabersite regulars please call back for future posts. Till next time…..

“Horey’so ‘Eth” is a For Tyeth Editions design and are ©Copyright of For Tyeth/FTSabersite 2016-2021. They were inspired by the Paramount Pictures and CBS Television franchise “Star Trek” and “Star Trek VI – The Undiscovered Country”. All Star Trek names, logos, images and related material are Trademark/©Copyright of Paramount Pictures/CBS Television.