The Bronco

[MikomDude]

This is the Bronco, a ship that in the beginning looked like it was going to fail in design quite horribly. I drew at least three different concepts which were all... well, let's mediocre would be a compliment in this case.
However, shortly after, I had a new flash of inspiration and this design was born:

[Saul]

I drew at least three different concepts which were all... well, let's say mediocre would be a compliment in this case.
However, shortly after, I had a new flash of inspiration and this design was born

I am interested in how you can know the difference between a 'mediocre' concept and an 'inspired' one in the case of a spaceship?
I can know the difference between a mediocre wine bottle and an inspired one 'cos i have seen a lot of them, drunk a lot of them and when i want to make one in 3D on a computer i can measure it and check it's correct.
How to do that with a spaceship?
The spaceShip 'looks' good though, perhaps looks are it?

[Finis]

That's cool Mikom. At first I thought the nose was too flat but then I could see that it is right. I like the pattern of the light and dark areas, the angle of the tubes with the back, and how the sharp corners contribute to the flow of the curves rather than contrast with it. The fire cones are too clearly 3D objects. They could use some work.

Saul, your question reminds me to ask Dragneye for permission to use a paraphrase of something he wrote about artists. It is the most inspired thing I have read about artists. It won't answer your question but thanks for reminding me to ask him. (D. I'll PM you for permission.)

[MikomDude]

I am interested in how you can know the difference between a 'mediocre' concept and an 'inspired' one in the case of a spaceship?
I can know the difference between a mediocre wine bottle and an inspired one 'cos i have seen a lot of them, drunk a lot of them and when i want to make one in 3D on a computer i can measure it and check it's correct.
How to do that with a spaceship?
The spaceShip 'looks' good though, perhaps looks are it?

The difference is noticeable in the horrible way I drew them. Nothing but random doodles. Whereas this design stood out and had potential. Building spaceships isn't much like modeling winebottles, for one you can never really get a proper reference and just have to think of everything yourself.

When I make a spaceship design, generally don't bother much with superficial detail. To many spacehips nowadays have that.
Take these two ships for example (ship 1) (ship 2). They both have a lot of superficial detail but lack detail in design. This ship on the other hand lacks in superficial detail, is practically just a plain material and yet the design itself is much more complex than the previous two ships. In 3D terms, you could easily make the two ships with some primitives and without a whole lot of modeling. The way you can check a design for simplicity is basically by looking at the silhouette, a good design has a complex silhouette whereas a simpler design has a silhouette you can make by drawing triangles, squares, rectangles and circles.
That's why when I make a design, I generally go for flowing shapes that can't easily be defined/modeled with just a triangle or rectangle. I like mixing elements too, take the main body of this ship for example, it's a rectangle with edges pulling inwards towards the bottom, and yet the very shame shape from a different angle is a flowing round shape growing bigger the further back it gets.

That's cool Mikom. At first I thought the nose was too flat but then I could see that it is right. I like the pattern of the light and dark areas, the angle of the tubes with the back, and how the sharp corners contribute to the flow of the curves rather than contrast with it. The fire cones are too clearly 3D objects. They could use some work.

Thanks Finis. And yeah, I probably could have done something about the exhausts.