History Main / ISOStandardHumanSpaceship

* Caldari ships in ''EveOnline'' are like this: Gunmetal gray, blinking signal lights and angular shapes. Conversely, the Minmatar designs are even more utilitarian, containing only the bare minimum, welded together in a junkyard shop and come in various shades of rust-brown and red. However, some of the more modern Minmatar ships such as capital ships and the Maelstrom have a more 'finished' look, with complete, symmetrical hulls, although still mostly falling within the category.

-->Caldari: Corporate, efficient, with emphasis on shields and electornics. Designs keep out the unnecessary.
-->Amarr: 1[[superscript:st]] back into space. Large powerful empire. Golden to reflect the wealth and impress the natives

** [[FridgeLogic Despite the fact]] they only ever seem to carry one small box, or large crate at best, per delivery.

#SpaceFighter[=s=] and other small craft]] will be [[OldSchoolDogfighting built around a cockpit and wings to look like airplanes]], but may have some style.

* In the ''WingCommander'' games, the human ships have varied between the utilitarian, blocky gray designs of ''WingCommander III'' and onwards, and more curvy designs of the earlier games. In all the games featuring the [[MegaNeko Kilrathi]], most of the designs have a base tan color with various “warm” colors used for markings, but [[AllInTheManual the manual notes that the color is the color of the metals used for their armor]].

-->"UNEF's first starships had been possessed of a kind of spidery, delicate beauty. But with various technological developments, structural strength had become more important than conserving mass (one of the old ships would have folded up like an accordion if you'd tried a twenty-five-gee maneuver), and that was reflected in the design; stolid, heavy, functional-looking."

The first design, often refered to as a "rocketship" and now mostly [[DiscreditedTrope discounted]] as {{Zeerust}} (see RetroRocket), is (or was) a cigar-shaped needle with three or so large fins on the base. These are often either brightly coloured or chromed to make a {{Shiny Looking Spaceship|s}}. The initial design is now usually found in parodies or homages to classic sci-fi.

The second design, mostly based on other works and the "realistic" age of spaceflight, follows some simple rules:

#Spaceships should be grey. While some important parts may be coloured, the majority of the spaceship should be the colour of unpainted metal.

#While not required, visibly being constructed from metal plates is encouraged, as is [[StarTrek Borg cube]][=-=]like details called [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greeble greebles or nurnies]].
#Large spaceships must be utilitarian; the standard human spaceship will be mostly rectangular with engines on one end and weapons on the other.
#[[SpaceFighter Fighters and other small craft]] will be [[OldSchoolDogfighting built around a cockpit and wings to look like airplanes]], but may have some style.

Existing spacecraft have so far had a mixed record: modern rockets and atmospheric landers tend to be white and aerodynamic, but blockier than sci-fi space fighters and only sometimes winged. Craft designed for vacuum or near-vacuum atmospheres are less swoopy and more utilitarian, and reflective foil (for heat management) is common, but they do tend to look much more delicate than the hulking brick-like starships of media.

[[AC:Modern human spaceships]]
* ''{{X}} 3 : Terran Conflict'''s Argon, Terran, and Teladi ships all follow this.
* ''{{Stargate}}'' : The [[http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/stargate/images/c/c0/F302.jpg F-302]] is essentially a forward-swept flying wing with jet and rocket engines. The [[http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/stargate/images/2/2a/X-303.jpg Prometheus]] and the [[http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/stargate/images/3/3e/ApolloOverEarth.jpg 304 deep-space carriers]] however, being built out of a naquadah/trinium alloy, fit this trope perfectly even though there's not many reasons for lacking paint (they can't afford to do space shuttle-like fiery reentries lest they will be spotted by the public).
** Interestingly, the F-302 is modelled after Goa'uld Death Gliders, so it's also a strange case of [[AdaptationDecay Adaptation Decay]].

* ''DarskstarOne''
* ''{{Freespace}}'' does this with all Terran ships (and with the [[http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/images/Gtvacolossus.jpg Colossus]], which was a combination Terran and Vasudan ship). For the [[http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v423/kc1991/VasCruis2.png Vasudan]] and [[http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/images/Sjsathanas.jpg Shivan]] ships, tendencies are to have more curved and smooth designs instead of blocky ones--the ships still tend to be paint free, but colored differently to give them a more alien look.
* ''{{Babylon 5}}'' : Humorously lampshaded in "Legend of the Rangers" with the human design of the Valen looking like "a flying brick." ([[FlyingBrick No relation]].)

* ''SinsOfASolarEmpire'': Played straight with the TEC, but averted with the Advent(who are also humans, just psychic ones with a different culture). Advent ships are sleek, [[ShinyLookingSpaceships shiny]], and definitely non-utilitarian in appearance.
* ''StarWars'' has spacecraft starting off with more color and rounded edges in the prequel trilogy, then evolving into the gray, straight-lined, utilitarian war machines of the original trilogy. Strangely, almost all the spacecraft in the SW universe, even thousands of years back, [[ContinuityPorn resemble in some way the ones from the original trilogy]].
* The rectangular aspect is averted in ''StarTrek'', but they're definitely grey metal.

** Actually, it seems worth noting that humans are pretty much the only guys we ever see on Star Trek traveling in [[FlyingSaucer Flying Saucers]]. Many of the Starfleet ships involve some sort of saucer shape (usually, but not always, connected to a larger non-saucer shaped hull, with warp nacelles).
*** Originally, Roddenberry wanted them to be able to separate their saucers, like the Next Gen Enterprise eventually did. The saucers were there mostly because Roddenberry was a huge fan of ''ForbiddenPlanet.''

** One model of DropShip in particular, the Leopard, was even called "the Brick" in the canon itself. Its slab-sided appearance, coupled with a small bridge, stubby wings and massive engines on what amounts to a nigh-rectangular chunk of steel means it falls squarely within this trope.

** It should be noted that the ''Macross'' was in fact redesigned closer to those lines. Later subverted with the later Macross-class ships which were more angular, and ''Robotech's'' SDF-3, which was originally designed/disguised with Zentraedi-like lines, but by the end of the Third Robotech War had the same ''Mospeada''-style design.
* The RedDwarf is painted red, but that only serves to make it look ''more'' like a giant, flying brick.
* ''{{Halo}}''
* ''{{Homeworld}}'' with the exception of the Mothership.
* Lampshaded in AnneMcCaffrey's ''{{Acorna}}'' series, where the Linyaari are openly baffled as to why human spaceships only come in one color. Slightly subverted in that Linyaari ships are, to human eyes, painted in loud and garish colors.
* Noticeable in ''{{Futurama}}'' where military spaceships are indeed mostly gray-white, but ''civilian'' ones come in all colors, the one used by the main characters being lime green and basically a short, fat version of a {{Zeerust}} rocketship (possibly justified in that the rocket shape is seen as a styling ideal but one that has been heavily compromised to maximize cargo space on a delivery vehicle).
** [[FridgeLogic Despite the fact]] they only ever seem to carry one small box, or large crate at best, per delivery.
*** [[FridgeBrilliance Of course]], they're never depicted as being a particularly ''competent'' delivery company.
*** They specialize in shipping things to dangerous or hazardous areas where the demand is high and supply is low, and presumably Hermes keeps the professor from shipping too much to keep up the recurring business.

-->Caldari Corporate, effecient, with emphasis on shields and electornics. Designs keep out the unnecessary.
-->Amarr 1st back into space. Large powerful empire. Golden to reflect the wealth and impress the natives
-->Gallente Freedom loving more artistic, this more flowing and free designs in ships.
-->Minmatar Freed slaves. So all "older" ship designs should look like junk heaps as that's all they had to work with
--> Thus cap ship look more finished because they actually have an empire to support a cap fleet.
* In DavidWeber's Honorverse it's mentioned that all of the major powers use reactive pigments to give their ships a primary color to distinguish them in visual inspections, but it's also noted how easily it is to change the paint-scheme.
** As for the shapes, given the physics of the universe, they tend towards a generally cylindrical design, with all warships having "hammerheads" on both ends to allow room for chase armament ([[SpaceIsAnOcean similar to those on old-fashioned sailing warships]]).
* In the WingCommander games, the human ships have varied between the utilitarian, blocky gray designs of ''WingCommander III''' and onwards, and more curvy designs of the earlier games. In all the games featuring the [[MegaNeko Kilrathi]], most of the designs have a base tan color with various "warm" colors used for markings, but [[AllInTheManual the manual notes that the color is the color of the metals used for their armor]].
* Originally, the ''Discovery'' in ''[[TwoThousandOneASpaceOdyssey 2001: A Space Odyssey]]'' was going to have large heat radiators to dissipate the heat from the nuclear reactor. However, ArthurCClarke decided he didn't want to have to [[RealityIsUnrealistic explain why a ship in space had wings]]. One of the very few instances in the movie they went with RuleOfCool over scientific accuracy.
** I believe it was Stanley Kubrick who made that decision, not Clarke. And surely to avoid the radiators looking like wings they could have just mounted them vertically anyway...
* RealLife: the Lunar landers were chunky boxes of metal. They were originally supposed to be spherical but the sphere kept getting chunks cut out of it to make it lighter and smaller.
* Subverted in DavidDrake's ''Reaches'' trilogy, where the main characters' ships have ceramic hulls to resist the corrosive atmosphere of their native Venus. Every other spacefaring culture uses metal hulls, and it's noted that when the stresses of [[SubspaceOrHyperspace Transit]] become too great, a ceramic ship falls apart all at once, with a total loss of life (one ship is seen to have come out of Transit looking like a cloud of gravel), while a metal ship's hull might hold together long enough for some of the crew to be rescued. Also, ''everybody's'' hulls tend to be rounded, usually more-or-less cigar-shaped, although they fly or land with the long axis parallel to the ground, unlike "rocketships."
* Deliberately averted, avoided, hell, run away from in Darren Aronofsky's ''TheFountain'', where the Astronaut's spaceship --carrying only him and the Tree of Life within it-- is a huge transparent bubble that moves easily across space in its long, long journey from Earth to the star Xibalba. WordOfGod says that they chose this simple, but appealing design because not all spaceships have to look like "trucks in space."
* StarshipTroopers seems to follow this school of design.
* d20 Future (ScienceFiction expansion to D20Modern) generally presents this as the "default" look for spaceships.
* Terrans of ''{{Starcraft}}'' operate these kinds of spaceships and put very little effort, if any, into making them look pretty. This is in stark contrast to the whimsical [[CrystalSpiresAndTogas Protoss]] designs which seem to feature no straight lines or right angles whatsoever, and to the Zerg OrganicTechnology.
* ''XCom Interceptor'' tends to avert this, with the human ships actually using functional, forward-swept-wing designs, or in the case of the second-tier ship, rounded wings. All ships are also painted, and in the case of the X-1A tier one ship, even whimsical, with shark teeth painted on the nose.

* ''{{Infinite Space}}'': mostly averted, especially in Adis, where the ships are both extremely funky-looking and pink, but it does happen: the Freedom and Nebula in particular are both grey, flying bricks.
* ''{{Firefly}}'' mostly averts this trope, with the majority of ships seen having either a large cylindrical design or a smaller, more agile (but still not blocky) design, such as with Serenity herself. However, the ships do tend to have very metallic appearances, and several of the ships briefly shown do fit the trope better than the larger Alliance vessels and Serenity.
* Generally followed to a T in ''{{Space 1999}}'', with the show's signature Eagles being entirely utilitarian shuttles designed to function in the absence of an atmosphere, in lunar gravity. They were mostly grey, although some had orange details. The alien spaceships, on the other hand, were often brightly-coloured, in the style of contemporary sci-fi artists such as Chris Foss and Peter Elson.

[[AC:Early human spaceships]]
* [[{{Thunderbirds}} Thunderbird 3]]
* ''Gene Wars''
* Moon-Rocket in the ''{{Tintin}}'' adventures ''Destination Moon'' and ''Explorers on the Moon''.
* ''{{Futurama}}'''s Planet Express Ship.
* The ''Luxion''-class ships from ''{{Gunbuster}}''
* Arguably, the ''OutlawStar''.
** ''Outlaw Star'' was a one honking [[{{Lampshaded}} lampshade]]. It was ''specifically designed'' to look like an old sci-fi rocket.
*** There's also a probably not-unintentional resemblance between the ''[[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/1/10/Outlaw_Star.jpg Outlaw Star]]'' and the [[http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1c/X-15_launched_bw.jpg North American Aviation X-15]] hypersonic research plane (especially given that the ''Outlaw Star'' is officially designated '''X'''GP'''15'''A-II).
* Most incarnations of ''FlashGordon''.
* The [[SpacePolice Space Ranger]] ships in ''BuzzLightyearOfStarCommand''.

While this is probably going to be TruthInTelevision for spacecraft in the near-future (with the earliest favoring the tinkertoy/habitrail/industrial plumbing aesthetic of the International Space Station, just because of the limits of our launching methods-- cylindrical rocket sections bolted together in space), eventually it may become a [[{{Zeerust}} relic of the near-present]] as space-based construction becomes easier. In space, there is no gravity or air resistance to design around, and due to the distances involved [[StealthInSpace and other factors]] visual camouflage probably won't be much use either. Historically, armies put quite a bit of thought into looking good and only stopped when it became necessary to do so; given the chance, it's likely that [[BlingOfWar looking grand]] will be back on the agenda (the [[AwesomeButImpractical engineers will probably hate it]], but [[ExecutiveMeddling then again...]]).

While this is probably going to be TruthInTelevision for military spacecraft in the near-future (with the earliest favoring the tinkertoy/habitrail/industrial plumbing aesthetic of the International Space Station, just because of the limits of our launching methods-- cylindrical rocket sections bolted together in space), eventually it may become a relic of the near-present as space-based construction becomes easier. In space, there is no gravity or air resistance to design around, and due to the distances involved [[StealthInSpace and other factors]] visual camouflage probably won't be much use either. Historically, armies put quite a bit of thought into looking good and only stopped when it became necessary to do so; given the chance, it's likely that [[BlingOfWar looking grand]] will be back on the agenda (the [[AwesomeButImpractical engineers will probably hate it]], but [[ExecutiveMeddling then again...]]).

The first design, often refered to as a "rocketship" and now mostly [[DiscreditedTrope discounted]] as {{Zeerust}} (see RetroRocket), was a cigar-shaped needle with three or so large fins on the base. These are often either brightly coloured or chromed to make a {{Shiny Looking Spaceship|s}}. This design is now usually found in parodies or homages to classic sci-fi.

The second design, mostly based on other science fiction spaceships, follows some simple rules:

## Ships in anime may be painted blue instead.

The first design, often refered to as a "rocketship" and now mostly forgotten as {{Zeerust}} (see RetroRocket), was a cigar-shaped needle with three or so large fins on the base. These were often either brightly coloured or chromed to make a ShinyLookingSpaceships. Now usually only found in parodies or homages to classic sci-fi.

* ''{{Babylon 5}}'', humorously lampshaded in "Legend of the Rangers" with the human design of the Valen looking like "a flying brick." ([[FlyingBrick No relation]].)

* '''{{X}}'''3: ''Terran Conflict'''s Argon, Terran, and Teladi ships all follow this.

* ''{{Stargate}}'' - the [[http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/stargate/images/c/c0/F302.jpg F-302]] is essentially a forward-swept flying wing with jet and rocket engines. The [[http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/stargate/images/2/2a/X-303.jpg Prometheus]] and the [[http://images1.wikia.nocookie.net/stargate/images/3/3e/ApolloOverEarth.jpg 304 deep-space carriers]] however, being built out of a naquadah/trinium alloy, fit this trope perfectly even though there's not many reasons for lacking paint (they can't afford to do space shuttle-like fiery reentries lest they will be spotted by the public).

* ''{{Babylon5}}'', humorously lampshaded in "Legend of the Rangers" with the human design of the Valen looking like "a flying brick." ([[FlyingBrick No relation]].)

* ''HomeWorld'' with the exception of the Mothership.

** despite the fact they only ever seem to carry one small box, or large crate at best, per delivery.

* ''{{Freespace}}'' does this with all Terran ships (and with the http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/images/Gtvacolossus.jpg Colossus], which was a combination Terran and Vasudan ship). For the [http://smg.photobucket.com/albums/v423/kc1991/VasCruis2.png Vasudan] and [http://www.hard-light.net/wiki/images/Sjsathanas.jpg Shivan] ships, tendencies are to have more curved and smooth designs instead of blocky ones--the ships still tend to be paint free, but colored differently to give them a more alien look.

** [[JustifedTrope Justified]] because each races ships reflect their standaradized personality.

#While not required, visibly being constructed from metal plates is encouraged, as is [[StarTrek Borg cube]][=-=]like detailing.

* ''{{Freespace}}''

* ''Infinite Space'': mostly averted, especially in Adis, where the ships are both extremely funky-looking and pink, but it does happen: the Freedom and Nebula in particular are both grey, flying bricks.

** Although to be fair, the F-302 is modelled after Goa'uld Death Gliders, so it's more a strange case of [[AdaptationDecay Adaptation Decay]].

While this is probably going to be TruthInTelevision for military spacecraft in the near-future (with the earliest favoring the tinkertoy/habitrail/industrial plumbing aesthetic of the International Space Station, just because of the limits of our launching methods-- cylindrical rocket sections bolted together in space), eventually it may become a relic of the near-present as space-based construction becomes easier. In space, there is no gravity or air resistance to design around, and due to the distances involved [[StealthInSpace and other factors]] visual camouflage probably won't be much use either. Historically, armies put quite a bit of thought into looking good and only stopped when it became necessary to do so; given the chance, it's likely that looking grand will be back on the agenda (the [[AwesomeButImpractical engineers will probably hate it]], but [[ExecutiveMeddling then again...]]).

* Lampshaded in AnneMcCaffrey's ''Acorna'' series, where the Linyaari are openly baffled as to why human spaceships only come in one color. Slightly subverted in that Linyaari ships are, to human eyes, painted in loud and garish colors.

* Terrans of ''{{Starcraft}}'' operate these kinds of spaceships and put very little effort, if any, into making them look pretty. This is in stark contrast with the whimsical [[CrystalSpiresAndTogas Protoss]] designs which seem to feature no straight lines or right angles whatsoever, and with the Zerg OrganicTechnology.

The first design, often refered to as a "rocketship" and now mostly forgotten as {{Zeerust}} (see RetroRocket), was a cigar-shaped needle with three or so large fins on the base. These were often either brightly coloured or chromed to make a ShinyLookingSpaceships.