Help Creating Good Looking Ships

[Neon00]

Hey everyone, this is my first post in ages, so I should probably be more worried about making the new features like Warp Drive work. However, as I've tried to build ships, they look disgraceful, with the whole thing either being blocky or a whole mish-mosh of ugly shapes that don't go well together, and don't exactly look good in the first place. Can anyone help?

 

[jayman38]

I recommend only a rare use of pentas and tetras. Mostly as shape-connectors. My lesson from using large quantities to build angled walls was a somewhat ugly-looking hatch pattern and to avoid creating that in future builds. (The hatch pattern only becomes visible in certain lighting circumstances, but it's not hard to duplicate the problem.)

I think a good start to get help would be to post some pictures (embarrassing, I know) of things you aren't happy about, with a brief description of why you aren't happy. Then people can start discussing specifics.

One last suggestion: Go into the Community Content section as a student. Download what looks good to you, bring the blueprint into the game, deconstruct it and built it back up. Get a close feel for why you like that build. Then you can start integrating those features into your own original builds.

 

[KiloZulu]

Don't be afraid to tear a ship apart to fix parts that don't look right. I've seen often enough where players just say, "I'll live with it."

Do some google searches for images of sci-fi ships and study their shape, proportions, and details. Use what you like about them in your own designs.

Draw out your design on paper beforehand. This is harder to do when you're new to ship building, because you won't have the experience of how the parts interact - how big the turrets will be, how many power blocks you'll need, etc. Still, it's a good exercise in planning the look of the ship before you spend a lot of time in build mode and end up frustrated.

 

[Saber]

Don't be afraid to tear a ship apart to fix parts that don't look right. I've seen often enough where players just say, "I'll live with it."

Do some google searches for images of sci-fi ships and study their shape, proportions, and details. Use what you like about them in your own designs.

Draw out your design on paper beforehand. This is harder to do when you're new to ship building, because you won't have the experience of how the parts interact - how big the turrets will be, how many power blocks you'll need, etc. Still, it's a good exercise in planning the look of the ship before you spend a lot of time in build mode and end up frustrated.

^This. Even if you're only sketching out one part of a ship, it can inspire the look of the entire rest of your vessel. I've sketched out a cockpit before, and come up with an entire ship off of that one rough idea. You don't have to be good at drawing, just enough to remind yourself of the image in your head.

 

[Thalanor]

Best advice for me: start small. Do not be afraid to redo a 50m ship 500 times until you really, really like it. Once you have a small ship design you love, borrow parts, aspects and general style from it to create your larger ships.

 

[Shadar]

Don't be afraid to tear a ship apart to fix parts that don't look right. I've seen often enough where players just say, "I'll live with it."

I think that's sound advice, and I took heed of it yesterday. I wasn't satisfied with the way one of my project ships was turning out, as it resembled something that's more likely to be hung on the display wall of a dildo store. After tearing down a part of it and rebuilding, it's looking much better now.

 

[KiloZulu]

Having been there myself, I think a lot of people think of the time it took to build a particular part, and don't want to spend even more time fixing it if it's wrong. Something to keep in mind is that a lot of the time (or what felt like a lot of time) comes from trying to figure out the shapes the first time around. Once you have seen what is wrong, and have a better understanding of what you actually want it to look like, the second try goes a lot faster.

Also, if it helps, remember that you're going to spend a heck of a lot less time rebuilding something that isn't right than you will spend regretting something that is wrong. Or it will be a complete waste of time because you'll scrap the ship when you decide you can't stomach looking at it any longer...