Help with Modeling a Hard-surface Spaceship

WiredminiMike

So I was given a assignment at school to model a spaceship. The only requirements was that the ship was no more than 2500 tris.

I decided to work off some concept art that I found of the internet. Here is the image:


!!All credit for the concept goes to Steve ChinHsuan Wang!!

I started to break the model in more simple shapes and block everything out. Now I would Like to create a high poly and put all the details that the concept has into my model. But maintaining proper edge loops/flow seems to be next to impossible! In addition I can't get the nice sharp edges that the concept has. Everything comes out so smooth.

Does anyone have any tips and tricks as to how I can properly model this? Or is this out of my league, and I should focus and developing more fundamental modeling skills?

Here's my blockout/wire-frame: Please note I am not trying to be 100% accurate!

Dethling

For HighPoly Modeling complexe shapes (like the ship) I try always to breakdown the model into several objects (using the real "objects").
Here I would seperate into the following parts:
- Nose
- Side Engines
- Wings (connect them in the rear)
- side plates
- Cockpit Glas
- maybe the upper engines as well

I would start here with a paint-over to figure out the different objects the ship is made of.

Also keep on mind that the edge flow don't have to be "clean", what counts is the look of the High Poly end result (and don't bother about Polycount in your highPoly Model^^).

skyline5gtr

The ship would be built as multiple parts, try to duplicate that

WiredminiMike

So I did a quick blockout paint over. Would love your guys crits. Do you think I should have less or more components?

skyline5gtr

i think that looks about right and how i would approach it

beta_channel

I do have a question. Why aren't you trying to be 100% accurate? Isn't that the point of concept art? I mean, if you're given concept art you're expected to follow it as closely as possible in most studio environments. We don't pay concept artists to come up with ideas, iterate on those ideas, and then lock down a final design so the modeler can change it. You should be shooting for making that thing exactly as it is.

Which, btw, your upper wing shape is way off. Look at the right wing.

FelixL

The design of this ship is so angular and sharp that it's going to be a pain to do with turbosmooth, bake it down and have the edges and bevels read properly.
Having a 2500 tri limit sort of implies the texture won't be super high-res as well. I'd consider doing the highpoly without turbosmooth and using multi-segment chamfers instead.
Or even directly model the lowpoly with multi-segment chamfers and texture it with tileable textures.