A Catalog of Nautilus Designs

The Catalog
of
Nautilus Designs

When I first established this page, I had only a small collection of designs to feature. Since then, the list has grown and grown, with two effects: Examination of the many designs reveals existing relationships, and some cross-pollination has occurred when designers who viewed the page produced new boats incorporating features seen here. What began as a passive collection has become an active inspiration.

The catalog is limited to versions of the Nautilus that I consider non-fanciful, that is, compatible or consistent at least in part on Jules Verne's description. (Although interesting in their own way, the versions from the original League of Extraordinary Gentlemen graphic novel, the movie's very different design, and the Nautilus from the TV film with Michael Caine are examples that do not meet my criteria.) I’ve organized the designs in roughly but not strict chronological order to provide something of an historical perspective. Most illustrations are approximately the same scale for comparison.
Some of the designers identify their creations as the Nautilus, some as other submarines inspired by the Nautilus or from the same era, and at least one as not related to the Nautilus at all. I invite you to look for the relationships among them all.

In 1999 I conducted an extensive survey of illustrated editions of 20,000 Leagues. I have added half of the near dozen interesting designs I found, dated from 1932 to 1992. These are usually identified with the word "illustrated" and are mostly 2D CorelDraw recreations. At least one of these was originally published many years earlier than the edition I saw and the same may be true of others. Because of the unavailability of these illustrations, I've taken the liberty of including small copies of some copyrighted images. I will remove any of these if the copyright holder has a problem with this.

Note that John Dutton's model and several others were done from photographs or images from several angles so the positioning and proportion of details may be inaccurate.

I've presented some of these designs in 3D form using MetaStream technology. These are simplified gray scale models constructed in RayDream Studio without frills, but by examining them from all sides in the MetaStream window you can get a good impression of the models' appearance. To view them in 3D, you will need JavaScript enabled and a MetaStream 2 plug-in, unfortunately now only available here, for PCs and Macs. Please e-mail me if you have any problems downloading the plug-in or viewing the models, or to comment on the models.

Click the small knot logo (example left) associated with an individual design below to view the model in a new window. Some models have a 360° animation created in Carrara accessed by clicking the Carrara logo (example right).

Click the wire frame image at right for general information about the 3D models.

detail from a Neuville drawing

The earliest depictions of the Nautilus are Hildibrand’s many woodcuts (of Alphonse de Neuville's and Edouard Riou's drawings) that graced the pages of the original publications. The full submarine as shown submerged matches Verne's words although details are lacking in the long-range views. The deck views show more detail, although they are not strictly consistent. Generally, the pilothouse and lantern are very small, not "medium height", and the mounted longboat rather high.

The submarine in the 1916 silent movie in the surface views seems partly based on original illustrations with a small pilothouse forward. The deck is narrower and there seems to be a prow, not unlike submarines of the time. The underwater views of the Nautilus are less accurate. Although cigar shaped, the hull is much shorter than it should be in proportion to the width. There are two sets of diving planes, one somewhat forward and one somewhat aft. The ram has been replaced with torpedo tubes. (See my 20,000 Leagues page for information on a video of this film).

Milo Winter illustrated the 1954 Rand McNally Windermere Readers edition of 20,000 Leagues under the Sea. His design features large hull plates, overlapping fore to aft. The paintings of Illinois watercolorist Winter (1888-1956) first appeared in a 1922 juvenile edition published by Rand McNally & Company. You can see the color plates in Zvi Har'El virtual library - F. P. Walter's translation. The pilothouse and lantern appear very similar, suggesting fore and aft windowed structures with lanterns set on top. All of Winter's paintings show the Nautilus on the surface and I've made no attempt to extrapolate such hidden features as salon windows, prop, or diving planes. As with all the illustrator collections, proportions and feature locations and shapes vary from illustration to illustration, so the recreation is approximate at best.

Anton Otto Fischer (1882-1962) illustrated the John C. Winston Company Copyright A.O.Fischer or J.C.Winston Co 20,000 Leagues edition published about 1932. This design features a low, eight-windowed cabin at each end of a flat deck. There is what is likely a dinghy running a good length of the deck between the cabins. A drawing of the Nautilus breaching gives a view of the spar and a dive plane far forward. Another drawing shows a rather small, rectangular window in the side of the hull. I've placed the window arbitrarily, but not speculated on any other un-pictured features.

Kurt Wiese (1887-1974) illustrated the 1946 Rainbow Classics edition of 20,000 Copyright K.Wiese or Rainbow Classics Leagues under the Sea. His design features similar large, flat, streamlined cabins at each end of the deck. One illustration shows what may be the dinghy midway between these structures and looking very much like them. An underwater view shows a square salon window that I've placed approximately but no features other than the ram are pictured. I've made no attempt to recreate un-pictured details. Wiese's Nautilus resembles Fischer's, most obvious in his drawing of the submarine breaching. There is some difference in detail, but this drawing is nearly identical to that by the earlier artist, so there can be little doubt Fischer was a source for Wiese's concept.

Henry Pitz illustrated the 1956 Doubleday Junior Classics edition Copyright H.Pitz or Doubleday of 20,000 Leagues. Pitz shows a flat deck with a single structure forward that includes a cabin-like pilot house and what appears to be the lantern. The only other feature visible is a long triangular ram. As with other illustrator recreations, I've left out un-pictured features.

Edward A. Wilson illustrated the 1956 Easton Press 20,000 Leagues edition. Wilson's Copyright E.A.Wilson or Easton Press concept combines some contemporary submarine features with those described by Verne. His Nautilus includes an extremely long, triangular ram with a flat, cookie-cutter end. The hull is somewhat spindle-shaped the the rudder-propeller arrangement and fore and aft diving planes are modern. The diving planes are actually fin-shaped as shown at right, so the overall hull has an organic look, especially with the lethal spar. The pilothouse looks very much like a modern conning tower. The two goose-necked structures appear to be lanterns and may be retractable. I don't know what the cylindrical object just aft of the pilothouse is. The salon window is hinted in only one exterior views but its size and approximate shape are clear in an interior view.

Before the Disney Nautilus took its final cinematic form it went through several variations. The story is that the Disneys wanted a simple cigar-tube hull rather as described in the novel and not unlike contemporary submarines. Harper Goff preferred an intricate Victorian appearance but could not convince the studio heads. He scratch-built this concept model over a long holiday weekend. Walt Disney was taken by the model and Goff's concept prevailed. The original model is lost but documented in a number of photos. My recreation is based partly on these photos, but mostly on Tom Scherman's later reconstruction.

Harper Goff's design for the Disney film is his own successful elaboration on Verne's design. Rather than the stark utilitarian exterior that Verne described and Neuville and Riou drew, Goff extended the ornate Victorian interior decoration to the hull and deck. He enhanced the monster impression by adding reptilian fins and protuberances and gave the pilothouse a crocodilian look. I think he wanted movie viewers to come away with an impression equivalent to that of Verne's readers in the previous century. People used to the sailing and steam ships of the mid-1800s and unfamiliar with submarines would see and remember a low sleek hull as monster-like. Moviegoers in the 1950s knew what a submarine looked like, but they had never seen anything like this Nautilus. The basic hull, exclusive of the additions, seems to have Verne's width but a somewhat shorter length. Two sets of diving planes are incorporated in the structures along the side of the hull. The round salon window is placed much farther aft than Verne's interior description allows, but then the salon, dining room and library seem to have been combined into one room. Incidentally, some details of the submarine and some scenes in the film pay clear homage to the 1916 film. (My 20,000 Leagues page has information on videos of both classic films.) This Goff Nautilus drawing is a rendering of my very early 3-D model, constructed without the plans, and does not have everything correctly positioned.

Phil Cormier pointed out this version of the Nautilus, from a 1954 three-reel set View-Master 20,000 Leagues under the Sea. View-Master took pains not to resemble the Disney movie version that was released at about the same time. Not strictly following the text, the sub is roughly cigar-shaped with the hull top considerably flattened to form a deck. A row of vicious rakers is set on each side of the deck, which has what appears to be a raised hatch amidships. Wayne Orzel informed me that the hatch conceals a retractable conning tower, not shown in my image. The pilot house in this concept has two parts, one mounted on either side of the hull. The salon window is approximately amidships and a single set of dive planes is set on the stern. The lower stern with rudder and prop (as well as the whole lower hull) is not visible in the images I've seen so the rudder on my recreation is speculative.

This design appeared on the cover of the Regent Classics edition of Copyright Regent Classics 20,000 Leagues under the Sea, published by the Thames Publishing Company in London about 1960. It's unfortunately not possible to identify the artist's name from the images I have. The hull has a tapered shape with mid-hull dive planes, as described in the novel. There is no ram. The cover art view, from above, hides the keel location. There is a vertical fin on the tail and no horizontal fins. I've chosen to extend the tail below the hull in my graphic to accommodate the rudder, but this area is also out of view in the artwork. There are two short and wide rectangular windows forward of the plane and another aft. The long deck has a large conning-tower-like wheelhouse forward and a similar but smaller lantern housing aft. There are no obvious signs of a boat or hatch on the deck. I've included a small copy of the dust jacket image for reference. The same Nautilus appears in slightly different jacket art for a Purnell edition, published about the same time. (If you have either of these books, I'd appreciate the name of the artist.)

Scottish illustrator and Francophile William McLaren (1923-1987) did drawings and paintings for the 1966 J.M.Dent & Sons Illustrated Classics edition of Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea. McLaren's drawings are not consistent, but I've tried Copyright 1966 J.M.Dent & Sons Ltd to capture the essence of his concept in my recreation. The hull is spindle-shaped but shown with rounded ends in some drawings. A four-bladed prop is mounted on the stern. One drawing shows a noticeable keel, but the rudder isn't obvious. That same view shows a blunt ram. A pair of large dive planes is located amidships and a small rectangular salon window forward. The deck, which is clearly reversed in some illustrations, has what appears to be a glass-paneled pilothouse forward and a tall, tower-mounted lantern just aft. An oval-ended deck with a round hatch extends from the aft side of the pilothouse. Since the tower allows the lantern to shine over the pilothouse, I've chosen that orientation rather than the tower-forward depiction.

Pierre Garcin sent me photos of this model, which may be from a 1960s ORTF (Office de Radiodiffusion Télévision Française) production of Mysterious Island. The model has an interesting history. Fabrice Mestrot (president of TOYMANIA and a collector of toy boats and subs) found it in 2002 at the Paris Arsenal antique show. The antiquarian at the show had gotten it in a small navy craft shop in the old harbor of St-Malo, Brittany. The owner of that shop bought it from a retired sailor and fan of Jules Verne, who told him he found the sub through a special effects specialist associated with ORTF before its restructuring at the end of 70s. (The photo from which my image was made is © 2007-P.Fautrat/Envie d'Image.)

This Nautilus, designed by Jack McCoy, appeared in a July 1987 Scale Ship Modeler article by Tom Hershey. It has a large fish tail, reminiscent of Goff's, but distinctive. Although the article describes a centerline propeller, the drawings place it below the hull. There is no launch and no deck railing. Like Jeff Phillip's boat below, the lantern is taller than the wheelhouse to light the sea in front of the Nautilus. The salon window seems to be correctly placed within the salon area, but rather high for the tall-ceilinged room described by Verne. The most distinctive feature of the design is the large, wing-like diving plane. The article had only elevation and section views, so I may not have got the shape right, but there was no mistaking the size. When I first posted this design I added this: "According to the article Tom based his design on Verne's novel, but I suspect he read an abridged version and, in part because he specified colors for the components of the boat, may have been influenced by accompanying illustrations". Since then David Merriman and Rory McLeod have independently pointed out that this design actually first appeared in the 1955 Book of Submarines by Jack McCoy (reprinted in 1966), and is in fact McCoy's design. I found a copy in my local library. Unfortunately it had been rebound and only half of the Nautilus frontispiece illustration remained, but it was enough to confirm my comment on the colors.

Bob Farrell found a small picture of this Nautilus version on the City of Nantes web site. My various attempts to learn more about this image were unsuccessful, but I found the source serendipitously in a French journal article I received from Jean-Michel Margot. Jean Gagneux constructed the detailed model, which has a complete interior based on the Hetzel edition woodcuts, and used it to illustrate the article. In the article Gagneux discusses the features of the Nautilus and offers a critical engineering evaluation. He criticizes some of the same features mentioned here, including the diving planes amidships and the location of ram. He concludes Verne did produce a workable submarine design, but alas, it could not have achieved the performance described in the novel. The model itself is simple and true to Verne’s description. The relatively unadorned, cigar-shaped hull has a small keel projection amidships and some reinforcement of the bow for a ram. There is a flat, elevated deck platform. The pilothouse faces forward and, like the lantern, has four somewhat convex windows. Jean Gagneux heard about this web site and contacted me. Thanks to his generosity you can see much more of his Nautilus model here. My illustration and MetaStream model adhere to Gagneux's plan, which differs slightly from his model. I’ve placed Gagneux’s Nautilus plan on "The Author’s Desk" at the top of my 20,000 Leagues page.

About the same time Gagneux was building his model, Jean-Pierre Bouvet was drawing a very detailed set of plans for this Nautilus. Although it isn't as streamlined as the other designs featured here, it is far and away the most complete design of any I've seen. It is completely true to Verne’s description but expands on elements the text only touches, or like a device for measuring speed, mentioned only indirectly in describing something else. The simple, cylindrical hull includes exterior sliding panels to cover the salon windows and a pilot house and lantern that are hydraulically elevated or withdrawn. Jean-Pierre has generously permitted me to feature much of detail of his Nautilus plans here. The illustration and MetaStream model here omit some detail but depict the major features. You can now also view J-P's many Jules Verne drawings on this French-language web site.

Jim Humphries' design for his rubber-band powered Nautilus model was published in the December 1987 Scale Ship Modeler, but he actually designed it in the early 1980s. Jim used the novel's woodcut illustrations as his main source and his lantern and platform are especially faithful to de Neuville's renditions of these structures. The wheelhouse has Verne's four windows and an original organic look. The large front windows facing off at an angle are reminiscent of Goff's, a very reasonable reference to that memorable boat. Jim's is a working model with the two sets of planes needed for proper operation. He started without a vertical fin, but found lateral stability required it and incorporated the fish-like tail with another nod to Goff. The model lacks a launch and the salon window is too far aft. The propeller is three bladed, an oversight that Jim intends to fix.
For those with a well-equipped woodshop, Jim sells a very detailed set of instructions and plans for constructing this versatile model. It dives and surfaces and can even be made to breach like a whale, just as the Nautilus does in "The Sargasso Sea" chapter, all on rubber-band power. Contact Jim directly via e-mail (jfhjr@flash.net) for information. See Björn Lundberg's construction from Jim's plans here.

One of the most carefully executed depictions of the Nautilus I've seen is Ron Miller's design in all his Unicorn editions. The hull has a fully tapered cigar shape and the salon windows are rectangular, which may well have been Verne's intent. The platform is slightly elevated with the longboat in the center and structures placed as Verne described them. There are a few embellishments, some I think reminiscent of Goff's Nautilus, but none in conflict with the novel. In general this Nautilus, with its retractable pilothouse, is truer to Verne than mine.

Since the publication of Ron Miller's several Unicorn volumes he's incorporated some improvements to his design. Notice the placement of the rudder out of the propeller wake. (Although Ron's illustrations usually have the deck railings lowered, I've shown them on both models for comparison with the other designs.)

This spindle-hulled Nautilus with its distinctive barbed spur was created by illustrator Joseph Ciardiello for a Reader's Digest Association edition published around 1990. Except for the relatively small, two-bladed prop, it appears to follow Verne's text well. The position of the long boat was not obvious in the drawings so I omitted it from the model.

When Greg Sharpe saw Jim Humphries rubber-band model he had to have one and Jim's design became the basis for Deep Sea Designs' first Nautilus, published several times in the early 1990s. This model can be built from detailed plans available from Deep Sea Designs. It has a non-elevated deck with a hidden launch. The wheelhouse, taken almost directly from the Humphries boat and like many of the other designs shown here, has a diamond shape with two large, canted, forward-facing windows, somewhat reminiscent of Goff’s design. The ram is a cylindrical cone rather than Verne’s triangular shape and the fish-like stern is clearly based on Goff's. There is a diving hatch in the keel near the stern very like Goff's. The round salon window is positioned too far astern for the novel’s interior description. In appearance the model resembles Goff’s but, especially with its prominent fin-like diving planes, looks more fishlike and less reptilian. Greg has a working version of this design.

Another Nautilus design available from Deep Sea Designs is closer to Verne’s description than the first. The deck is raised slightly to provide some additional space for retracting the pilothouse and lantern. Two hatches are recessed into the deck. The launch is also recessed and stowed upside-down. This permits entry from the Nautilus through a hatch in the launch’s deck rather than its hull. Of course it must roll over on its trip to the surface, causing the occupants some discomfit. There is a davit to handle it on the surface. The salon window is too far astern, although it is consistent with the interior arrangement on the plan. This is a working design with two sets of diving planes, one near the stern and the other in the fin structure at the bow.

Bjorn Lundberg sent me an interesting article from a 1996 issue of Model Ship Builder. Using numerous citations from the novel, the author, Jeff Phillips, discusses details of the Nautilus design, and raises some technical issues also mentioned elsewhere on these pages. He carefully evaluates some conflicts in the text and describes a particularly true design. Like Ian Williams and for the same reason, he places the ram above the centerline. He attempts to solve some of the problems with the lantern by making it taller than the wheelhouse. That structure still casts a large shadow forward, and Jeff suggests Nemo's design would be improved by several better positioned lights rather than one. His design has a very large salon window, filling, as he says, "most of the area of the salon". Although he scrutinized the description of the structure, he neglected the contents. Nemo's art collection requires a good deal of wall space, limiting the window size.

Stan Sanders has built a Nautilus model with some noticeable differences. The most significant feature is the stern with its low mounted screw. I originally thought Stan had placed the lantern between the deck and the pilothouse, but closer examination of the pictures revealed a second lantern astern. The illustration of the Nautilus in the cavern in the Hetzel Mysterious Island has lanterns rather like these. The lanterns and the pilothouse appear retractable and the launch is at least partially recessed into the deck. There are a couple of features clearly derived from Goff's design. I've reconstructed the design from a set of small black and white pictures so some proportions and details are speculative. The aft diving planes, typical of the working models, are prominent in the pictures, but the location of a forward set is my best guess.

Paul Wright's version in the new Eyewitness Classics children's book is based on Miller's but he has taken some liberties inconsistent with the novel. There is a horizontal tail rather like a modern submarine with, apparently, a second set of planes. The triangular ram has been replaced with a cruciform one. The rectangular salon window is now round. The most glaring revision is the raising of the platform into a sort of conning tower, perhaps to better resemble a modern sub. The deck hatch no longer opens on the platform, but on the hull. There are several other cosmetic, non-conflicting embellishments.

John Dutton has modified his working Nautilus model sub, originally built from a Deep Sea Designs plan published in R/C Ship Modeling (Vol. 1, No.1). He's incorporated numerous new ideas, including a feature or two from my design. The wheelhouse now has a forward-facing window with a headlight mounted on top. He has retained two sets of diving planes along the side of the hull, a practical consideration for any working model. Diving planes at the "center of floatation" where Verne positions them, provide less control than the fore and aft planes found on modern subs. John has told me the circular salon window is stronger and less likely to leak than other shapes. John's web site has disappeared from the Internet, but with John's permission, Didier Jaffrédo is now hosting many of the pictures of the new sub in action .

The hole punched in the Scotia's hull is described as two and a half meters below her waterline, but Nemo says he was traveling two meters below the surface when the collision occurred. This would place the Nautilus's centerline more than six meters deep. Ian Williams' design, illustrated here, addresses this problem by raising the ram to match the hole. The ram in this position also addresses a similar issue. During the trip to the South Pole, Aronnax describes the Nautilus using its ram as an icebreaker as it crosses the Antarctic ice shelf on the surface. Perhaps this could be done with a centerline ram but it seems to me the force would tend to drive the submarine beneath the ice. Ian has given the salon a much larger window than the other designs and two rudders. The rudders, meant to evoke Goff's embedded diving planes, may seem strange, but a plan of Nordenfelt's first submarine, built in 1885, shows two rudders in a similar arrangement. I found a sketch of Ian's Nautilus on his web page. He has since updated both. Visit his site for the sketch and a detailed plan and then look around a bit to enjoy the examples of his art (opens in a new window).

I have talked about my design elsewhere but here is a little more background and an illustration for comparison. I used a true cylinder with tapered ends for hull, based in part on fitting the very large salon within it. Some illustrations of the cigar ships from the mid-1800s show a more tapered cigar shape. I placed the platform directly on the hull because the text places it 80 centimeters out of the water. This corresponds exactly with Nemo's statement that one tenth of the hull is exposed on the surface.

It's difficult to find accurate provenance for this Nautilus design. Monsters in Motion sells a replica 20,000 Leagues under the Sea Nautilus Image copyright 2008 Pierre Garcin Aurora plastic model kit box although there was never such a kit. The box represents the kit model builders would like to have seen. The hull is more or less spindle shaped with a faceted cross section not unlike Goff's. The massive wheelhouse, with oddly back-facing ports making it resemble a nautilus-like sea creature, dominates the deck. Rather than a single window, a row of smaller ports provide outside views.
In 2007 Pierre-Yves Garcin commissioned Bernard Brimeur to build the Nautilus shown on the box for his Mobilis in Mobile on-line museum. The illustration at right pictures Brimeur's realization next to the commemorative box. See large photos of the box (box-art section) and the model (science fiction anthologies section) on the museum web site. The museum is viewable both in French and in English.

Leo Arnold sent me his plans and a short description of this design. The most interesting detail is the sideways mounted longboat, facilitating its launch and retrieval. The wheelhouse and lantern, spaced far apart, have upper flanges that close the deck openings when retracted. The lantern is slightly taller than the wheelhouse, partially addressing the problem of the wheelhouse shadow. The design positions the triangular spur above the centerline. The hull cross-section includes somewhat flat sides and bottom, perhaps to improve interior space utilization.

3D artist Jon A. Bell designed this streamlined Nautilus for a Sega CD adventure game. Unfortunately Sega discontinued the CD platform before production could be completed. Eric Quackenbush was the primary designer for the game, but Jon, with Eric's input, designed and built the 3D model. They were considerably influenced by the Naval Institute Press annotated edition of 20,000 Leagues under the Sea (see more about this excellent version on my Twenty Thousand Leagues page). Although the actual game design never got past the demo stage, Jon completed various proof-of-concept animations showing the exterior of the submarine and the interior rooms. His design, notable for its odd, fan-shaped propeller, includes two forward lanterns near the pilothouse in addition to the one at the end of the platform. You can see a rendering and some plans of this Nautilus here.

I found an image of Jérôme Comblat's Nautilus during a periodic web search for Nautilus designs. Clearly based on the novel, it has similarly shaped pilot house and lantern structures at either end of a subtle deck. There is a dinghy approximately amidships and a hatch just aft. The hull has no obvious ram but there is an elaborate structure with a salon window forward of a large trapezoidal dive plane. A gracefully shaped vertical fin encloses the prop and probably incorporates the rudder. There may also be a small horizontal fin component, perhaps serving as a partial prop guard. The image shows a hint of a keel structure on the forward part of the cylindrical section of the hull. A large bulge on the lower hull aft might be associated with a diving hatch. You can see Comblat's original image on his web page here.

Anthony Testa's Nautilus Anthony Testa's Nautilus uses an Image Copyright 2000 Anthony Testa exaggerated version of Goff's rakes to distinguish itself with a vicious and organic look. The hull is spindle-shaped and the wheelhouse and lantern appear retractable. Anthony has placed the launch at the end of the platform and protected the five-bladed propeller within a cylindrical guard. I produced the image and 3D model from two 3/4 forward views, so my interpretation is missing some details and probably has some errors.

Nobumitsu Kobayashi's Nautilus Nobumitsu Kobayashi's dramatic design has a raised vertical ram, like an axe blade. The wheelhouse and lantern are at least partially retractable into the cylindrical hull. The rectangular salon windows, which are placed a little far aft, are fitted with a protective grid. Nobumitsu has added what may be a set of forward-facing windows in the hull, although these may be lights to augment the lantern. The prop appears to have three blades. Unfortunately, the renderings of this Nautilus appear to be no longer available on the Internet. Other 3D art by Nobumitsu Kobayashi can be seen on his own (Japanese) pages. (The link will open in a new browser window.) Thanks to Mark Dee who told me about this design.

Michael Bianco's Nautilus Michael Bianco based his design on de Neuville and Riou Image Copyright 2000 Michael Bianco illustrations, with additional inspiration from these pages. The flattened upper surface of the hull is notable. Most designs add a raised platform, or leave the deck surface rounded. Michael uses a five-sided lantern, like Jim Humphries, but turns it around to keep the light from shining directly into the wheelhouse. Note the window atop the wheelhouse that provides a sternward view when the structure is rotated into the hull for streamlining.

Illustrator Didier Graffet's Nautilus is showcased in the richly illustrated Gründ full French text Vingt Mille Lieus sous les mers, published in 2003. Although not strictly following the text, his design is reasonably true to Verne. Graffet's Nautilus At the same time he has incorporated elements from Goff and many other sources. Notable features are a partially retractable control room forward of the small wheelhouse, a folding exterior ladder in the aft keel below the dive hatch, a downward looking window at the bottom of the main, spiral stairway, and additional lights fore and aft on the lower hull. The very large fins are distinctly fishlike. One of the more interesting details of the design is his overlapping the hull plates top-to-bottom, rather than bow-to-stern as some others have done. The images here are of my model based on the plan and drawings in the book.

This is Jesper Kurt-Nielsen's original spindle-hulled Nautilus concept. The deck details reflect the Hetzel edition illustrations, like many of the designs. The stern features an asymmetric rudder. His original art included Aronnax standing on the deck in the classic Riou drawing that, according to Walter James Miller in The Annotated 20,000 Leagues, Verne posed for himself.

Jesper Kurt-Nielsen added ornamentation to his second Nautilus and changed to a symmetrical stern. You can see his color renditions of both designs including the Aronnax figure on his Danish Virtual Verne web site. (See Riou’s Aronnax on Zvi Har’El’s Illustrated Jules Verne pages.)

Frank Chase has conceived a Nautilus that calls Goff's design to mind but is very different. Frank began from Verne's text but has taken a few liberties. The result is a graceful but powerful appearance. His 3D model, which can be viewed on his web page (also linked from my Nautilus page), has a full interior laid out very much as Verne described. I find the appointments and machinery somewhat modern, but the detail is incredible and the result impressive.

Frank Chase's web site also features interior views of his second Nautilus. Although resembling his original design, Frank went back to the text for this version. The Goff influence is gone. The deck is clearly Verne but the ram is set high like Ian Williams. The salon window is rectangular like Ron Miller's.

Robert Kelley misses a few details of Verne's description in this version Image copyright 2003 Robert Kelley of the Nautilus, but I like the rough and tough look. The sinister wheelhouse and light, shown in their retracted positions, remind me of pill box gun emplacements. Kelley's lethal blade-shaped ram, inspired in part by Ron Miller's design, might have caused Nemo to say "like a knife through butter" instead of "a needle through sailcloth". The renderings I’ve seen, soon to be available on Kelley’s web site, give an impression of toughness and violence. This sub could have easily terrorized 19th century seas.

The Adventure Company game Return to Mysterious Island features a Nautilus surprisingly true to the novel. The design is clearly inspired by an illustration in the original Hetzel edition with details suggested by other sources. The image at right, produced from a published screenshot, Screenshot © 2004 DreamCatcher Europe shows two searchlights imbedded in the deck, matching the Hetzel illustration shown as an inset. (Close examination of the original drawing shows the lights are imbedded in the superstructure, but no matter.) The design has two dinghies, one on each side of the deck, a nice improvement on my own original Nautilus. The pilot house and a pilot house and lantern are similar to several designs in the catalog. The nicely detailed hull uses overlapping plates just like those of my new Nautilus, except that they are much smaller. My recreation image of this design at left speculates on parts such as the salon window and dive plane not visible in the published screenshot graphics. The published interior screenshots show a recurring chambered nautilus design motif similar to the raised emblem on the bow. Such decoration might extend to the outside portion of the window.
Additional information and screen shots can be found at this game web site or by a web search of the game title. You can buy the game at amazon.com but check out some reviews first to know what you are getting. The submarine does have passages from the deck to the complete salon but unfortunately no other interior rooms to explore.

According to a capsule history provided by John McEwan, his Victorian Science Fiction Submarine Narwal was built by the French in 1889 using information that Aronnax, Image © John McEwan 2003 actually a French secret agent, collected during his sojourn aboard the Nautilus. It has many of the features described in the novel and improvements similar to other designs featured in the Catalog. John acknowledges Ian William's Nautilus as an inspiration. The lantern is mounted atop the wheel house. In addition to the helmsman's windows, the extended wheelhouse includes a set of portholes on the sides of what might be a full control room. A launch is located in the center of the deck forward of the main hatch. There are aft dive planes in a set of horizontal fins and the expected hull-mounted planes planes are moved forward of the large salon windows. A double rudder is set in the vertical fins very similar to the Williams Nautilus and the triangular cross-section ram is set high. The four bladed prop is protected by an annular shroud attached to aft fins. McEwan's Reviresco war gaming company features some other images and a paper card model of the Narwal on its web site.

Jean-Marc Deschamps’ Nautilus includes all the details described in the novel. The hull is asymmetrically cigar-shaped with a rounded stern and a pointed bow. The ram has two fins that, combined with the extended keel, would make a triangular cut in the hull of an attacked ship. The pilothouse and lantern have the same shape and appearance. You can see photos of Deschamps’ model and a detailed plan on the NemoTechnik web site.

Christian Zaber’s Nautilus has a sinister, organic look. It's not only Victorian era seamen who might mistake this lethal ramming machine for a sea monster. The design is less true to the novel than most in the catalog. It has a long boat set in the hull a little aft of amidships. The hull, composed of several intersecting and cut-off ellipsoids, is not topped with a deck, but there is a small promenade just forward of the wheel house and a larger one aft of the long boat. Both are reached by hatches. Instead of a lantern there are a pair of searchlights on the lower forward hull. The salon window amidships, the raker arch, and the two large wheel house windows are reminiscent of Goff, but there is no real resemblance. See many images of both the exterior and interior of this Nautilus on Christian's Ultra Mondes web site.

This is Philip Heinrich's interesting fishlike Nautilus. Inspired Image copyright 2006 Philip Heinrich some by Dave Warren's design, but based largely on calculations from the novel, Philip's Nautilus has the look of some prehistoric fish with overlapping scales. He admits his unique positioning of the propeller forward of the large, flat tail, while looking very good, might not work. It calls the original cigar steamer's midships propeller to my mind. That boat had a frame that held the forward and aft hulls together. Missing that, Philip's design requires a hollow propeller shaft surrounding a central, non-rotating structural shaft to keep the tail stationary, as well as rudder controls. It would be complex and difficult engineering, but perhaps not beyond Nemo's genius. Philip created his Nautilus in Carrara and kindly provided all the images that appear here. You can see hi-res renderings of this Nautilus on Philip's art page on his web site.

Leelan Lampkins’ Nautilus combines features of Greg Sharpe’s first design with Ian Williams’ ram. He’s added a cutwater forward of the pilothouse and incorporated a tall lantern in a dorsal fin for protection during ramming. He's moved the salon windows forward in keeping with the internal dimensions of the novel.

William Burningham's Nautilus echoes many of the designs shown here but particularly resembles Jim Humphries' boat. His design includes rotating davits that operate like those I've planned for my new Nautilus and animated on my dinghy page, with the dinghy stored inverted, but flipped during launch. These look very much like those on the Return to Mysterious Island Nautilus but those are not positioned to operate the same way. Burningham markets 3D models under his KuroKuma professional name. See more of this Poser-ready 3D model at DAZ. (The Poser model includes a texture-mapped OBJ file that can be imported into many other 3D modeling programs.) (My Carrara animation was made after importing the Poser model with TransPoser.)

Greg deSantis started with the idea of recreating Nemo’s Nautilus but decided he didn't want to be limited by the novel, opting for the freedom to create his own ultimate Nautilus. The result, an imposing Victorian submarine, includes large, ornate salon windows, a deck-mounted launch, and an elevated cable-braced spar. Greg deSantis' Nautilus The two-sided pilot house with center lantern is unique, but an interesting frog-head extension of Goff's big windows. The design owes more to Goff as well, with its flat-plate, polygonal cross-sectioned hull, fish-like tail and horizontal hull extensions, but in the end it is all Greg's. Perhaps most interesting is the attention to detail he's put into the model. It looks as good close up as from a distance. See a few more images of Greg's "Improbable" Nautilus at his Museum of the Improbable website. Except for the standard side view, which Greg provided, the images were shaded and rendered in Carrara.

Lee Krystek built this Nautilus for an on-line graphic novel version of 20,000 Leagues under the Sea. The design is unique, with a deck that runs nearly the full length of the hull and a cigar shaped hull with a truncated stern. A cruciform vertical and horizontal fin structure is attached to the stern and the long spar appears to have a diamond cross-section for most of its length. The two diving planes are mounted somewhat forward forward of the hull center. There are three windows on each side of the hull although only one appears to be in the salon. (Actually, the salon apparently combines the salon, library, and dining room.) The retractable wheelhouse with a searchlight lantern mounted on either side and a large hatch amidships are the only noticeable features on the deck. The boat is stored in a deck compartment forward of the wheelhouse, and doesn't appear to be lauchable underwater. The blunt end of the hull combined with the fin structure that encloses the prop neatly protects it during a ram attack. You can see more of this Nautilus in the 20,000 Leagues graphic novel (made using figures from an earlier version of Poser) on Lee's "Museum of Unnatural History" web site.

Jiri Chytil sent me images of his Nautilus. He has been very Image Copyright 2005 Jiri Chytil faithful to the text. His design features guards in front of the dive planes, rather like the Hunley, to protect them during a ram attack. The salon windows have external covers, again for protection and his ram is the most massive of those pictured here. The boat is designed as a weapon. Jiri didn't include a description, but the dinghy appears to be mounted to the side similar to my original design and probably for the same reason.

Didier Jaffrédo sent me a copy of the April 2005 issue of the French Laisney's Nautilus boat modeling magazine MRB that features André Laisney's article "Le vrai Nautilus de Jules Verne". The two-part article, inspired by Jean Gagneux's earlier work, includes a comprehensive analysis of the text of 20,000 Leagues not unlike that on these pages and detailed illustrations of a powered model built by the author. It includes a full plan (including interior) that I used to create the 3D model for the images shown here. Laisney began with Gagneux's design and added salon window covers, diving plane guards, and a longer keel. He modified the ram and the rudder, and used a slightly elevated wood deck to account for the curvature of the hull. Other small differences are apparent on examination, but the Gagneux pedigree is clear.

Didier also sent me a page from the February/March 2005 issue of Bateau modèle showing this Nautilus. M. Claude Martinet built his model based on Michel Métivier's "Monographie du Nautilus". The design used the the shape of the 1863 French submarine Le Plongeur, often cited as an inspiration the Nautilus, for the hull. Martinet added the features described by Verne in the novel, including the salon window, wheelhouse, lantern, and deck. Le Plongeur had a torpedo spar but this Nautilus has a ram that is integral to the somewhat triangular bow. I have unfortunately not seen Métivier's monograph, but the magazine article indicates the large number of port holes in this design are true to it. Read about Le Plongeur and see some images for comparison on Wikipedia.org.

John Whitesel says of his Nautilus that he tried to keep away from Jules Verne's design, but staying in the technology of that time period it's hard to come up with anything that doesn't look like the Nautilus. With Whitesel's disclaimer I won't comment on the design, which I like. It looks like it could sit on the bottom as Verne's often does in the novel. I do see elements of real and proposed 19^th century submarines. Note the keel construction resemblance to the Zédé model below. John has created 3D models and animations for various projects and historical documentaries as can be seen on his web page here.

John Ott sent me his impressive Nautilus. Sacrificing some authenticity, he designed it for "looks". The bow, with a lethal ram and massive rakers reminiscent of Goff, makes this clearly a "ship killer". Ott cites real 19^th century submarines Gymote, Peral's Spanish boat, and others as inspiration for details of the stern. The slightly raised deck casing accommodates retraction of the wheel house and the lantern without penetrating the inner hull and provides room for an 8-meter catboat that could serve as a lifeboat for the entire crew. The design includes a full interior with a cigar-shaped inner hull and more cylindrical out hull.

Image Copyright 2006 Greg Rico Greg Rico began from the perspective of Civil War ironclads when he conceived his Nautilus. The ironclads were built to take a pounding and give it back. That succinctly describes this very "steam punk" design. Greg has designed an upper attack deck as a superstructure set on top of a normally submerged secondary, utility deck. Both the pilothouse and lantern housing are retractable more for the practical purpose of protecting them during an attack then to streamline the submarine. The ram is more brutal and functional then in most designs. The large, round salon window is positioned just forward of the nearly amidships dive plane. The dive hatch is placed in the keel, rather Goff-style. The prop and rudder are well protected by a beefy set of guards. Click here to see more of Greg's Nautilus drawings.

Pierre-Yves Garcin conceived the design of this Nautilus, extrapolated from the original © 2007-P.Fautrat/Envie d'Image Hetzel illustrations, evident in the wheelhouse, lamp, and deck details, but with some deliberate differences. His version has a six-bladed propeller, several small portholes, and no spur. Pierre's intent was to bring Verne's vision closer to the reality of such early submarines as Zédé's. Pierre had his vision realized in a one-of-a-kind 60-cm model, built for him by Bernard Brimeur, who works for Disney, MGM, and various other film companies. (The photo of the model at right is © 2007-P.Fautrat/Envie d'Image.) See more photos of this model on the Mobilis in Mobile museum website.

Leelan Lampkins is in the process of refining his Nautilus. The obvious difference is the redesigned tail. Noting that Aronnax thought the monster might be a giant narwhale, Leelan was looking for a surface profile more like a whale than a shark. The new tail fin is normally below the waterline and in any case not obvious even when rolling seas expose the propeller.

Feature film Concept artist and Digital Matte Painter Meinert Hansen sent me his interesting, somewhat organic Nautilus design. The spiral screw propeller isn't from Verne but was in fact conceived and patented as a propulsion device for vessels in the late 18^th century. It is technology that Nemo might have considered when he designed the Nautilus. This propeller is consistent with the flowing, fluid, fishlike appearance of the forward part of this design. The shape of the hull and the propeller call to mind a Paleozoic nautiloid ancestor of the modern chambered nautilus, the namesake of Nemo's submarine. Nautiloids, predators like the Nautilus, propel themselves backwards, their tentacles trailing. The fin-like ventral rudder and dive planes evoke the body of a squid, and the spiral prop might be its fins. The giant squid attack is Disney, not Verne, but the association is fixed in popular perception, and Meinert captures it nicely. See a color, undersea image of this Nautilus on Meinert's Fiction Science Design web site.

3D modeler Helmut Schaub's Nautilus calls to mind a number of other designs. Schaub's Nautilus The basic hull shape and appearance remind me of the Greg deSantis Improbable Nautilus. It shares external anchor chains, a three-part salon window, and the basic deck structure with that Nautilus. The tall conning tower wheelhouse, which resembles Gino d'Achille's illustrations for the 1983 Random House Step into Classics edition of 20,000 Leagues, the signature ornate tail (characteristic of other Schaub creations), and tiered centerline ram give it a distinct appearance. Upper and lower rakers on the bow continue the ram tiers but also recall the classic Goff design. My facsimile drawing doesn't do justice to the details of the original, hinted in the render at right. See more of the model on the Cornucopia-3D web site (follow the links near the bottom of the Cornucopia page for other images).

Starting with the hull of a The diorama - Copyright Jim Smith 2007 Japanese model and adding bits and pieces of designs found on this page, Jim Smith created a simple, but recognizable Nautilus consistent with a story he conceived. Jim features his Nautilus in the diorama pictured here. He provided this narrative to explain it: "On June 25, 1961 while on a routine test dive at 900 feet near an exploded volcano in the Pacific, the USS Nautilus finds what the crew thought was something that was only from the pages of a book. Chills went up their spines, yet there she lay, still intact, and stranger still, fully operational: Captain Nemo's Nautilus!"

Every once in while a strikingly different Nautilus appears. A very different Nautilus - Copyright 2007 Hugh Marchant Film Production Designer Hugh Marchant has created such a design. Jules Verne described a nearly featureless vessel that appeared suddenly, attacked, and disappeared as quickly. Its monstrosity was in the impression it left behind. So different from ships of the time, it could only have been a sea monster. Most of the designs on this page are simple interpretations of the novel's text, imaginative elaborations on Victorian Age motifs, variations on a sea creature of great size, or some combination of these. Although there are hints of all these in Marchant's Nautilus, it is unique. To me this design is skeletal, sinister, a very different kind of monster

Greg Rico sent me a second version of his Nautilus. Although similar to his first this one has cleaner lines - a little less steam punk and, I think, a little more art deco. The attack deck is much less pronounced and the deck housings have more of what I'll call the Jim Humphries form. The ram is unchanged from Greg's first but the design of the forward hull, with fewer rakers, is much less brutal. This Nautilus is less a warship and more a luxury yacht.

The NAutilus model deleivered to 7 Saville Road This Nautilus appeared on the public blog of La Legion Fantastique, a theater group whose shows bring the worlds of Jules Verne to life. You can read the posting and see photos of the Nautilus model o the No.7 Saville Road blog. I created my image from those photos so it is somewhat distorted. The submarine has a lethal-looking ram, backed up by four large fins with rakers, slightly reminiscent of the Harper Goff Nautilus. There is no doubt that this Nautilus is a warship. The only other element that might be traced to Goff is the long wheel house with its goggle-eye windows. There is a rectangular salon window with what may be a smaller circular window just forward and what appears to be a hull-mounted light just aft. There is no deck-mounted lantern and no obvious boat. The tale has a ventral fin and two horizontal fins and an elaborate fin-mounted rudder. Like the bow fins, the upper part of the tail is fitted with rakers.

Phil Benson based his design on late 19^th century submarines in Image Copyright 2007 Phil Benson addition to the text from the novel. He began with an approximately square cross-section hull that tapers to rounded ends. Protrusions on each side give it an almost conventional submarine appearance. Phil placed the lantern on the hull forward of the deck and mounted four additional lamps below the centerline on each side of the hull for underwater illumination. He's placed a second deck house aft, defining a narrow promenade deck between the houses. The boat is recessed in the deck extension aft of the second house. Covered by panels, it is launched and retrieved on extendable rails. The tall structure near the middle of the deck is a telescoping air vent. The ram, inspired by the narwhale's horn, is mounted just a bit above the centerline. Phil supplied the photo of his small prototype model at right. He's planning a larger scale version.

William Wardrop also drew his inspiration from early submarines as well as Verne's text. Except for the distinctive Confederate Pioneer hull shape, most everything in this design traces to Aronnax's description and other information in the novel, down to the undersea excursion hatch and ladder in the lower aft hull. See a photo of William's Nautilus model and take a look at some of his other creations on his Steam Noir web site. His work, modeled in cardboard and the result of years of research, presents innovative and eccentric vehicles of the 18^th, 19^th and early 20^th centuries.

Alan Moore's graphic novel, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, features a giant, double-hulled Nautilus. This original concept, with one hull in the form of a giant squid attached to a second whale-shaped hull, has little to do with Verne, but the sequel, The Black Dossier, includes a small image of the first Nautilus with illustrator Kevin O'Neill's cut-away drawing of the second. O'Neill's spindle-hulled design has a massive ram backed up by large raker fins. It appears he has moved the lantern just forward of the wheelhouse and placed a large porthole in the lower aft hull, but most everything else matches the description in the novel.

Didier Jaffrédo has completed his N. ANNULATUS Radio-Controlled submarine. As described on his web site, in addition to carefully reading the text of novel, Didier began with Ian Williams' design and modified it some per John McEwan’s Victorian Science Fiction Image Copyright Didier Jaffrédo Submarine Narwal and other sources. Jaffrédo's design differs from Williams' in a number of particulars. He re-envisioned the ram to resemble the Whitemargin Unicorn Fish (naso annulatus) "nose" and named his submarine accordingly. To improve control, he moved the dive planes far forward and added a second set aft within the horizontal fins, similar to the rudders in the vertical fins. He replaced the single propeller with two smaller shrouded props at the aft end of the fins to improve stability. The deck details differ, especially with the addition of two large ventilators to facilitate Nemo's replenishment of air when on the surface. Lastly, Didier has eliminated the salon windows. He justifies the changes with speculation that Nemo continued to improve the Nautilus in the years after the events of 20,000 Leagues under the Sea. See much more about the ANNULATUS at Didier's Reve de Sous-Marin site. Click the small button labeled ANNULATUS on the upper left. The pages are in French but with many pictures most things are readily understandable. Click around a little because the links to some sub-pages, such as the details of construction (including many photos), are not obvious.

Do you know of a Nautilus design not featured here? Please e-mail me.

According to Jerry Pavano, Gustav Zédé constructed this interesting model "in collaboration with Jules Verne" in 1868. Maybe not, but if the date, a year before Verne wrote 20,000 Leagues under the Sea, is accurate, this model might be a forerunner to the Nautilus. Although considerably smaller, it has the cigar shape, the central diving planes, longboat, wheelhouse, lantern, and deck platform of the Nautilus. The boat is at the aft end of the platform and the lantern is located on a tower just behind the wheelhouse, an arrangement I find especially interesting. The model also has two metal rings on the deck, apparently on the hatch. Aronnax and his companion castaways clung to just such a ring when the Nautilus deck when it got underway early in the novel. There are no side windows or ram and the keel is very large relative to the hull. Jerry has written an article about this model for the Subcommittee Report.
See photos of my scratch-built replica and other views of my 3D Zédé model here.

You can build a Nautilus or own a detailed plan
Deep Sea Designs 841 Leslie Drive Victoria BC V8X 2Y3 Canada	Greg Sharpe's Deep Sea Designs sells very nice Nautilus plans for the two designs featured above. He's working on a third design that incorporates features from some of the other designs here. Contact Greg by e-mail, at the address at left, or visit his web site.
Please note that the low-resolution graphics and models on this page don't do justice to the rich detail on the plans.

Updated 26 Oct 08