how do you guys make your ships look good and function well?

[solarapple]

There are plenty of threads of effectiveness but not really about building plans or simple details. How do you guys decorate ships inside and outside?

 

[Orphaniel]

I often get asked about this kind of thing, but it's hard to provide a definitive answer, the two easiest point I can find to communicate are:

1) Details - Sometimes called greebling, this is the insertion of small functionally pointless details like irregular patches of hull, air vents, pipes and other small devices generally used to fill up the space between a ship's larger details

2) stick with it - If you look at your work in progress and it doesn't look as you imagined it, do not give up, just keep on working on what you see in your mind and eventually -sometimes very suddenly- it will look awesome!

 

[psteiner]

Just adding on:

3) Light stuff- Use lighting to outline important reference points. ie. thrusters, shield gen, hallways, power conduits, hangers, comm towers, etc...

4) Conform some spaces to ship shape- Have observation decks, or just any rooms with windows conform directly to the hull of the ship. You also may want to consider these spaces when designing your ship. Especially when finding the scale size of it, as you want to be able to fit a few floors in.

5) Have a designation for your ship- If you want a carrier, then ensure that you have room for cargo space. If you want a battleship, ensure that you design your ship around some weapons. You may also want to consider designing a big gun then fitting a ship around that in some cases.

6) Do some framework- Building a general frame out of hull is a quick and creative process that improves the overall shape of the design. It allows you to fit your ship around the shape you want from the start and start thinking where things will be going as well. I would highly recommend this for any ships bigger than a corvette.

7) Design your hallway, color, and lighting style beforehand- I find that developing a pattern for hallways and corridors, then having an overall light and hull (interior and exterior theme) color can give your ship a personality. Most builders that really go for it have a defined style for color themes. Personally, I build with 45 degree angles and a black/glass/blue lighting theme with long hallways.

8) Stick with it- I will just state this to instate the importance of this virtue once again.

9) Use admin commands to acquire supplies- If you are playing in single player, use "/giveid Playername itemId amount". For example, for 100 ship cores, I would type "/giveid psteiner 1 100". If you are building in a multiplayer server either a; import from single player, or b; ensure that you have more than enough supplies to build that ship.

Note: Any ship bigger than a corvette might need some serious consideration on turret installation

10) Use advanced build mode- By pressing CTRL while in build mode, one can add in symmetry planes, replace blocks, and place large quantities of systems. This is one of the most important things to know about the building process.

That's all I've got folks...

 

[starhaiden]

Point 9. is a bit out-dated there is creative mode which only admins can use.

 

[Orphaniel]

I'm pretty sure players can access creative mode too within shipyards?

 

[starhaiden]

I don't think they get infinitive resources though.

 

[Nauvran]

I don't think they get infinitive resources though.

When building inside a shipyard you do have infinite resources as what you are building is just a hologram, it's a design.
You only need resources when you want to construct the ship and use it outside the shipyard
[DOUBLEPOST=1443357800,1443355566][/DOUBLEPOST]On another note. A good way to make the exterior of a ship look good is by adding depth and shape to it, for example the ship in my signature.
If you look closely at all the popular ships you will see they have a very interesting and characteristic shape to them and some good depth detailing to them.
Every character, station, or ship, as in this case, needs a distinguishable shape to them, so even if you just see the silhouette your brain automatically says: "hey I know that ship/station/character, it's from ______."

When it comes to interior design you need to think about having it fit the exterior design. It wouldn't really work out having alien interior in a human made ship. And depending on how roleplay related your ship is you can go deeply into details with the interior and the exterior. You can add exhaust-ports, big orange fuel tanks and so on. With interior you need to try and keep it simple as Dave is only 2 blocks tall, so a simple wedge is a big enough chair.
Of course you can go "crazy with the walls, floor, roof and so on if your ship is big enough.
I will suggest you try and download some roleplaying ships and look at the interior and exterior of those ships. Though it might be best to start with looking at small ships as large ships as Orphaniel's The Black can be a tad overwhelming with the amount of glorious details and shapes.

Hope it helps

 

[Panpiper]

This may be stating the obvious for many, but 'wedging'; Learning to do good wedging can with one stroke take a ship that looks like absolute crap and turn it into something elegant. Heptas and tetras are your friends. Learn to use them and use them whenever you can.

In my opinion (note this is my own very subjective 'opinion'), greebling is over used by many people. I find that if a ship is too 'busy' it simply becomes noise to me. I like to see lines, I like for turrets and other areas of functionality to be clearly visible as to what and where they are. Over using greebling can hide elegance of lines and loose the true functionality in a mess of superfluous, non-functional detail.

 

[Nauvran]

In my opinion (note this is my own very subjective 'opinion'), greebling is over used by many people. I find that if a ship is too 'busy' it simply becomes noise to me. I like to see lines, I like for turrets and other areas of functionality to be clearly visible as to what and where they are. Over using greebling can hide elegance of lines and loose the true functionality in a mess of superfluous, non-functional detail.

Exact reason why I mentioned characteristic shapes and depth. Grebbling as you say can and have been overused by many, even great builders have overused grebbling.
There is an important thing to think about when making anything at all, yes you need details, you need to make it look good and have interesting places to look at but you also need resting areas, places where the eye can rest and have a moment to relax.

Someone who I have no idea who is once said "Too much detail without a break ruins a design"

 

[Gasboy]

This may be stating the obvious for many, but 'wedging'; Learning to do good wedging can with one stroke take a ship that looks like absolute crap and turn it into something elegant. Heptas and tetras are your friends. Learn to use them and use them whenever you can.

In my opinion (note this is my own very subjective 'opinion'), greebling is over used by many people. I find that if a ship is too 'busy' it simply becomes noise to me. I like to see lines, I like for turrets and other areas of functionality to be clearly visible as to what and where they are. Over using greebling can hide elegance of lines and loose the true functionality in a mess of superfluous, non-functional detail.

And to build upon Panpiper's point, wedging (wedges, tetras, heptas, corners) can allow you to not only make your ship look prettier, it can also allow you to create more internal space. Might only be a few extra blocks, but sometimes that is all you need.
[DOUBLEPOST=1443360681,1443360556][/DOUBLEPOST]

Exact reason why I mentioned characteristic shapes and depth. Grebbling as you say can and have been overused by many, even great builders have overused grebbling.
There is an important thing to think about when making anything at all, yes you need details, you need to make it look good and have interesting places to look at but you also need resting areas, places where the eye can rest and have a moment to relax.

Someone who I have no idea who is once said "Too much detail without a break ruins a design"

And it also depends on the ship you're building. A fighter doesn't need all that much in pretty details, you need a cockpit, and a seat, and you've fulfilled the RP requirements of a fighter's internals. Fighters don't really need greebling. A carrier, on the other hand, can benefit a lot more from greebling and RP internal spaces. Folks need to keep that in mind when planning and designing their ship.
[DOUBLEPOST=1443361426][/DOUBLEPOST]

There are plenty of threads of effectiveness but not really about building plans or simple details. How do you guys decorate ships inside and outside?

The best way to do this, now, is to use a shipyard. It will allow you to design your entire ship without worrying about the materials needed to build it. Build your ship as if roleplay (generally the reason why people build internal spaces) and looks were not important. Get the shape of the ship down, and get the weapon systems and other systems set the way you like it. Test your ship using the test function of the shipyard, and figure out which Isanths (or custom designs) are best to use. If you're testing a picket ship, a ship used to screen for larger fleets, you might be testing it's anti-missile turrets, so you would consider summoning the M- and Mm type of Isanths, for example.

You could, at this point, consider building your ship, and testing it out against other player's ships. You would only lose materials to battle damage, for the shipyard can eat your ship and save all the blocks to its storage units. Be sure to give your shipyard at least 6 storage units, more if you're building truly titanic ships or ships with many colours of blocks or systems.

If your ship performs to your liking, you can now start figuring out how to fit internal spaces. Hollow it out and start expanding it a little, make it wider and longer, but only enough so that you can fit the internal spaces you want.

Once you've done that once or twice, you'll have a lot more knowledge in your head of how you want things to go. You'll be able to plan out in your head your RP spaces beforehand, and you'll be able to design your ships with those in mind.

As for greebling, I'm not a huge fan. I think it looks cool when done properly, but to me it's more effort than my patience can manage. I prefer just to smooth my ship out as best as possible.

 

[Reilly Reese]

9) Use admin commands to acquire supplies- If you are playing in single player, use "/giveid Playername itemId amount". For example, for 100 ship cores, I would type "/giveid psteiner 1 100". If you are building in a multiplayer server either a; import from single player, or b; ensure that you have more than enough supplies to build that ship.

Creative Mode exists now. /creative_mode psteiner true
[DOUBLEPOST=1443363327,1443362534][/DOUBLEPOST]Personally I use armor plates on my ships outer features. My ships also sometimes have exterior hull in front of something else like this...

The body of the ship that has the extended section protecting it has glowing vent like structures and such while the part that is not has reinforced armor plates.

 

[aceface]

 

[Gasboy]

Whoa, you need to get that block on the right checked out. Some serious disease going on there. XD

 

[Nauvran]

And it also depends on the ship you're building. A fighter doesn't need all that much in pretty details, you need a cockpit, and a seat, and you've fulfilled the RP requirements of a fighter's internals. Fighters don't really need greebling. A carrier, on the other hand, can benefit a lot more from greebling and RP internal spaces. Folks need to keep that in mind when planning and designing their ship.

You can easily make a fighter sized ship detailed without ruining it, it's mostly about the shape and keeping it simple.

Spoiler: Examples on small ships

If you look at my samples you can see that I am trying to use different shapes and depth to add details to smaller builds. Details are not necessarily specific blocks or shapes as radars or antennas, it can also just be how you have made the hull of the ship.

 

[Gasboy]

You can easily make a fighter sized ship detailed without ruining it, it's mostly about the shape and keeping it simple.

Spoiler: Examples on small ships

If you look at my samples you can see that I am trying to use different shapes and depth to add details to smaller builds. Details are not necessarily specific blocks or shapes as radars or antennas, it can also just be how you have made the hull of the ship.

For most of those ships though, it's just colour variation. Stuff that looks like greebling, if you peel it away, is actually the shape of the hull and you'll find systems directly underneath. Where as true greebling, when peeled away, is found to be added as decoration for the most part. Which was my point really. To add a few hundred blocks of greebling to a 3k mass ship is nothing to that ship, where as even 10 blocks of pure greebling on a fighter can really affect its performance.

 

[Nauvran]

For most of those ships though, it's just colour variation. Stuff that looks like greebling, if you peel it away, is actually the shape of the hull and you'll find systems directly underneath. Where as true greebling, when peeled away, is found to be added as decoration for the most part. Which was my point really. To add a few hundred blocks of greebling to a 3k mass ship is nothing to that ship, where as even 10 blocks of pure greebling on a fighter can really affect its performance.

I didn't say it was grebbling on those ships, I said they were detailed. There's a difference. The use of colour variation is also a way of making details and if you look closely you can see that I used different types of blocks to create depth so that they are interesting to look at while still being enjoyable to they eye.

Aye, grebbling on larger ships means almost nothing to it's performance, except of course if those grebbles are really big but then you would be able to fill systems in them anyway.
Smaller ships need ,as I have said too many times now, shape to them to make them "beautiful".

 

[Winterhome]

Remember that you can make interior spaces feel bigger by replacing segments of walls with wedges. They still cover up whatever is behind the wall, but they work as a nice visual negative space object.

 

[Drakkart]

i'll just copy and paste what i replied on the reddits for the same question... leave a like if you agree thanks

Let me try by asking "define effectiveness". The thing is, stuff changes a lot with patches, so there is no real measurement of a ship of size x has to dish out y dps otherwise it does not fulfill the "effectiveness" requirement for rating z.

So in essence each of the aspects effectiveness and design are a task of it's own First i suggest learn how to build aesthetically pleasing ships, learn about design, lines for the eye to follow, patterns, greeble, depths and try to apply them to every build you do.

Then start building in a way that you think of what are interior walls what are hull/armor and build them into each other only touching where are windows or airlocks or stuff like that so where both hulls touch. Interior follows different rules, here everything is about creating an environment that is believable to suit a purpose for the crew. Imagine people would have to live in there, how long will they be aboard? What do they need? How would they be organized to operate this ship? Regarding needs there are obvious stuff like toilets, showers, beds, (i guess aliens are not really different in that regard though other naming conventions) but also food and healthcare is a concern, healthcare also includes places to gather and hang out with to keep morale up. Depending on ship size yes a tennis court would be totally viable to be found on a carrier. - you get the idea. Create space as you would love to be living in or at least you would consider fitting for the purpose, a fighter does not need any of that for the pilot will be just in there for short trips. But cockpit design is probably the hardest to do in small scale.

Create an interesting hull around it, also keeping the ships purpose in mind. what is it, a personal transport? Then don't go overboard with stuff and build something fast and agile design wise. Is it a hauler? Well make sure you also design docking cargo boxes and such stuff... and make it believable it is able to carry a few of these either docked to the ship or inside. Destroyer/cruiser/carrier yeah you better go big or go home.

Tip from me, always start with the bridge/cockpit for it is the most crucial element for a ship it is a point where ship hull and interior meets with the additional demand that the pilots seat needs to have perfect vision out of a window. "Pilot" being all important crew members of the bridge which require to have a look outside. Also you better not obscure their vision by later built parts of the ship (why the enterprise for example is a horrible design from a tactical standpoint, not being able to see what is below the disc = fail but well in the movies they obviously always used vision through cameras...)

Then when you have a ship designed for a purpose from inside and outside just balance it's systems, probably start with energy, and some energy storage then do weapons you think would suit the ships size. (suggestion before you start doing systems safe the build! for you might need to redo it over and over for big ships at least that is how i approach them) then thrust maybe and then as last step fill everything between with shield and shield regeneration. Make sure you have created a good percentage of space between outer hull and interior. Small ships are really hard to make for interior and hull have to be very close together so everything that allows you to squeeze in a few more system blocks might be welcome. Big ship give you the challenge of figuring out how big your weapons actually could be before they get too big. So to keep up with energy demand for all your systems and balancing out for example i want to be able to fire the main guns while being radarjammed and strafing... is the interesting aspect here and you surely will run into the energy limitations of the game building at that scale.

Also have an image of what you want to build in your head. try to use it as guideline but also look at what you have already and check wether it "asks" for something. Some when when you have build al ot you look at something and it says i.e. "give me a long wide narrow tail and i'll look awesome" then try such stuff see if you can make it work and suddenly you will develop a natural sense for lines and patterns... also develop a love for detail.

so i hope this helps...

 

[Orphaniel]

I tried making a video guide at one point, but it ran super long and was (to me) not interesting enough. Perhaps I should revisit the idea?

make a ship from scratch, as well as taking an existing ship and shwing how it can be made more interesting?

Worth the bother do you think?

 

[hzzzln]

I tried making a video guide at one point, but it ran super long and was (to me) not interesting enough. Perhaps I should revisit the idea?

make a ship from scratch, as well as taking an existing ship and shwing how it can be made more interesting?

Worth the bother do you think?

I'll watch it from start to finish. I had actually quite some ideas about making a video of my own, or even create a website for people to post and vote on style guides. Or upload screenshots, have them tagged with keywords like "turret" or "engine" and whenever you need some inspiration on these topics, you could search for the keywords and have a gallery full of suggestions.