Designing Spaceships for Games

Interior & Exterior Vehicle Design Using Blender & Photoshop with Jort van Welbergen

Take an in-depth look at how Jort van Welbergen designs detailed spaceships for games such as Star Citizen and Star Atlas, where everything needs to work and make sense. Jort reveals his complete design process from start to finish, including both the interior and exterior design, using Blender and Photoshop.

As the most important part of any design process, the workshop begins with a discussion and analysis of a brief, with the goal of achieving a client's vision. From there, Jort kicks off the 2D sketching portion of the workshop, initially exploring shapes. He discusses how to create a mindmap and narrow down your ideas before moving on to blocking out the exterior and interior of the spaceship in 3D.

During the 3D modeling stage, Jort demonstrates the importance of ensuring all the design elements are functional, with any moving parts laid out properly according to the story, brief, and gameplay requirements. Jort’s 3D workflow is broken into several stages, the biggest of which is the exterior hull refinement. From there, he continues fleshing everything out and perfecting the overall look. The workshop concludes with the creation of marketing renders that showcase the design in the best possible way. 

Throughout the workshop, Jort will discuss his mistakes and learning process, and offer tips and tricks for getting unstuck in your own design projects. This is an advanced tutorial aimed at mid-level concept artists who want to push their design skills to the next level. By completing this workshop, you should have a good understanding of how to approach your own vehicle designs and how to think about grounding your elements and shapes while designing.