where do modelers get their inspiration on a new model?

[Avatar]

Definately...  I tend to stick to chamferboxes and trapezoids, and do a lot of face building manually, because that's how I started and how I learned.  Other people do all organic nurbs and curves for the same reason...

There are also some basics that have arisen after decades of sci-fi tv, movie, and video games...  basics which can be pretty well summed up in terms of Babylon V... 

You have your Earth tech.  Lots of plates, mostly big, squared-off ships that look like guns, rocket tubes and big guns.  Lots of variety, from ships that look like moving scaffolding to giant balls and cylinders making up a space station.  You can see the rivets, and while not overwhelmingly powerful they do have some punch in large numbers.  Human tech often advances rapidly during the course of a story, especially when in contact with advanced alien races.

You have your Vorlon tech.  Smooth, rounded, semi-organic, no visible means of defense or propulsion, but slightly retro with what looks like big solar sails and energy vents.  Not very numerous but VERY powerful and mysterious and ALMOST where we are going to be...  their tech is what we aspire to but they don't share.  Like the difference between a 1950's big bakelite telephone and a modern cell phone, you can tell their tech and ours are related but that there's a lot of distance between them.

You have your Shadow tech.  Dark.  Mysterious.  Insect-looking.  Might be alive, for all we know.  You never get a good, solid look at them and there's virtually no variety but they're VERY good at what they do so they only need one model...  deadly and very much out of reach.

-Av-

[Nielk1]

I start using random deformations and doing lots of extrusions. Some of my models start as mere cubes. Others start as cylinders, that get Boolean operationed to form arches, that then get modified using extrusion and other Boolean operations. Sometimes things I make change from other things, like the Orbital Support AWACS I've made. It started out as an archway tunnel, but then became an upper plate for a ship, and then the lower ship extruded from that, and the engines took shape (at first as a cockpit) and then the ship was reshaped slightly to be wider at the now front, and an AWACS dish added, and a cover plate booleaned to the main body followed by a few vertex movements, welds, and headaches.