Lithia’s cargo ship, The Amaranth

Like many of the aspects of The Amaranth Chronicles, this started as a “hobby project”. After we had the concept art and a 3D model for Lithia’s ship, I started spinning my wheels in the direction of laying out an interior for it. I know, I should have done it the other way around, but in my defense… I have no defense. Every Saturday morning I’d wake up early, rain or shine and work on this model.

Over the course of about a year I blocked out several different layouts that would use the interior spaces as best I could. No version was perfect, many of the layouts left large “voids” in the interiors spaces that I had originally labeled “techno babble” or “deus ex machine” goes here.

Some things were very apparent very early on. For instance, the large round cargo bay door on the bottom of the vessel seemed to imply that section was the inner cargo transport area, the cockpit glass gave clear indication of where the vessel would be controlled from and the long “exhaust” and engine seemed to imply this area was unlivable. This helped narrow down where the physical spaces a character could occupy would go. Eventually, after about six or seven different layouts, I started showing them to friends and other 3D modelers. After getting their feedback I was able to get to something I was happy with and start building or commissioning art for the interior spaces of the ship. The following is the current states of the interior designs.

A - Deck is not only the top deck but also the busiest floor of the ship. As you can see everything from the cockpit to the engine room is accessible from here. When designing the interior layout, I was actually going for a boat allegory, trying to design it so that the majority of the daily duties would be taken care of “above deck”. Now no one can ask me “where’s the bathroom?”

B-Deck. The nosecone of the Amaranth provided the opportunity for a lot of usable space however this section of the vessel hasn’t been mentioned yet in the series so I haven’t devoted the amount of time to it design as he other decks. This section would be accessible from the stairs in the main galley (You can see the down stairs from the image of the kitchen) and would be a sort of living room or entertainment room. Maybe have a big L shaped couch and a big screen TV, maybe a pinball machine or a pool table.

We figure a vessel that would be out on longer trips as the Amaranth is capable of, it would eventually be necessary to have some sort of medical room onboard. Maybe a robotic capsule an injured crew member could climb into that would administer treatment for burns, breaks and other injuries.

C - Deck. This deck is pretty self explanatory as well. A large portion of the Amaranth’s interior is dedicated too an internal cargo bay Chris and I have been referring too as “the bathtub”. This deck also houses six small private bunks for crew members when they’re off duty and need some shuteye. This “bunk hub” is directly below the entertainment room which is actually directly below the cockpit. Note the elevator in the bottom right corner, this elevator moves upward to A- Deck’s Storage and Maintenance room.