Anyone have tips for new builders

[Battlegrinder]

I'm trying to improve my building skills, and its not going well (everything is still coming out rather ). I imagine that there are several other people on this forum besides myself who would also benefit from any tips or advice that older and better builders have to offer.

[morganm]

These forums
- In particular this sub-furm (Bricks) and the Armory. Look at what people are building and try some of the same things. If you can't see how something is built or joined; ask! Most people are willing to explain or show pictures.

Mobile Frame Zero forums
http://www.mobileframehangar.com/index.php
- Mobile Frame Forge sections. Look at stuff, ask questions, and try to replicate.

Go to see real life exhibits. This can be more tough as they aren't as common. However look around your local (or closest) city for AFOL groups, Lego events, anything that displays Lego in person. It's amazing what you can see in these displays. I've got several cool ideas seeing these things up close and personal. One of my local AFOL groups has a display they show every month; it's huge and every time I see it I notice some other cool thing they did that I had never thought off.

There are several great sites out there to see other peoples work for inspiration but being able to ask questions is really the key. Once you can replicate other peoples techniques you can use them to build your own cool stuff. You start to branch out and grow from there.

Oh and the travesty brick is descended directly from the Stud God; it makes all awesome things possible. For the un-learned it's the 1x1 with studs on all sides. Buy a grip of them off Bricklink like... right now. All bricks with 1 stud or socket on more than 2 sides are great to have in quantity.

[motorhead fan]

I'm trying to improve my building skills, and its not going well (everything is still coming out rather ). I imagine that there are several other people on this forum besides myself who would also benefit from any tips or advice that older and better builders have to offer.

several other people, in other words: me

[Zahru II]

Hard to give guidelines really (but I suppose 'just do whatever you like' is not very constructive either), usually I do the following:
Browse brickshelf/flickr, you can always stumble upon really cool ideas that could be useful for future reference.
Never shy away from experimenting with those 'I wonder how X and Y part would combine' type build and connection ideas, even if you might not get any useful results at the end of it.
So yeah, look up cool stuff and tinker around with ideas. Eventually everything should click and you'll wind up with something great.

[Gungnir]

Look up other people's builds online. Draw inspiration from them.

[Silent-sigfig]

Try to cram as many details in as tiny an area as possible.

[Alex]

I second looking around on brickshelf for inspiration. I've seen so many people there combine bricks in really interesting and creative ways. The armoury and bricks forums are also good sources of inspiration in this respect. Another thing I'll do is just mess around with parts, particularly if I've just gotten a new set or two. The idea here is to just combine pieces until they start to resemble something cool. I built my steampunk fighter in this way. This is also how I create characters and armies about half the time. I just make someone who looks cool and then try to invent a backstory that seems like it fits with their appearance.

[Brikguy0410]

I'm trying to improve my building skills, and its not going well (everything is still coming out rather ). I imagine that there are several other people on this forum besides myself who would also benefit from any tips or advice that older and better builders have to offer.

Same problem here

[Maverick]

I'm trying to improve my building skills, and its not going well (everything is still coming out rather ). I imagine that there are several other people on this forum besides myself who would also benefit from any tips or advice that older and better builders have to offer.

Same problem here

Brickguy, have you even GOT building skills?

[Nimja]

My thoughts exactly.

[Brikguy0410]

I'm trying to improve my building skills, and its not going well (everything is still coming out rather ). I imagine that there are several other people on this forum besides myself who would also benefit from any tips or advice that older and better builders have to offer.

Same problem here

Brickguy, have you even GOT building skills?

Somewhat, how ever my bricks are mixed color wise to the point if i want to have a color scheme build I don't have enough briks to do it

[Itxi]

Practise makes perfect, maybe if we held some building challenges? Like 'Build an all-terrain vehicle' it would challenge you and seeing other entries would give you some inspiration/ideas

[Battlegrinder]

Practise makes perfect, maybe if we held some building challenges? Like 'Build an all-terrain vehicle' it would challenge you and seeing other entries would give you some inspiration/ideas

That might be interesting.

[piltogg]

it would depend a lot on what you are trying to build. if it's brikwars specific, suggestions might differ from lego in general. Building mechs requires a different strategy than building a castle for example. There's a lego building school that might be able to get you started in a more general sense though.


http://swooshable.com/buildingschool/

come back and ask questions after you get through all of that.

[Falk]

Try finding instructions of things that people have made or just look at the pictures they have of it and then make it, even if you take it apart right away then you might have found a couple new techniques. If you don't have the bricks then use LDD.