How To Make Models?

I’m self-taught with a non-traditional style so definitely no expert and in no position to be teaching others lol but I have been asked this multiple times. Alas most people would start with Blender because it’s free and good but I skipped that so I don’t know how to use it. What I can share is this, the core idea of all sculpting: make a basic shape then add detail to it. Here’s a visual example using a Vong Miid Roik ship I made inspired by the cover art for the book 'The New Jedi Order: Dark Tide I: Onslaught'. (Cover) (Example Model). More complexity in design = more shapes, when you’re speed sculpting like me you don’t bother with actual shapes for a lot of it though you simply use brushes and patterns to approximate them. I highly recommend FlippedNormal’s youtube channel for tutorial videos.

People starting out often seek a general tutorial to sculpt minis specifically from start to finish, but that isn’t how it works. Everything sculpted is the same core idea of shapes and detail so all tutorials for the tools used are relevant. Search for what action you’re specifically trying to do, not what your goal is to create. Want to create a great hammer for a character? A cuboid for the head, a cylinder for the handle, edit those shapes how you like and then add details to them, bam you have a greathammer. This can be applied to life size props too, just be more subtle with more fine detail, though still exaggerated.

For 3D printing specifically exaggerate the hell out of the detail, anything too subtle simply won’t show when printed, and ensure you make the final model boolean as is proper preparation for printing.

All of my models are boolean! What does this mean? It means no interior geometry, one single unified mesh, ie one single surface which makes up the entire model. This is how all models intended to be 3D printed (Resin or FDM) should be prepared, simple as that. I have had some FDM users confused by this, in their slicer it somehow looks hollow, however a boolean mesh is completely solid, for something to be hollow it must have walls, which these do not. In the digital space everything is a surface and doesn't have physical density, therefore if you slice it open there isn't anything inside to see like a real object, just the other side of the outside surface. It all makes sense once you wrap your head around that idea.