Shipbucket

I want to begin making a different fleet of ships from a different world. Does anyone have advice on how to design them, whether on paper or MS Paint? Thanks.

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Current Project:

USS Samuel B. Roberts, DE-413, "The Destroyer Escort that fought like a Battleship"

Do it in MS paint, rubbing out don't leave a mess on the paper mate.

And get a program that supports layers like Paint.NET

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“Close” only counts with horseshoes, hand grenades, and tactical nuclear weapons.
That which does not kill me has made a grave tactical error

Worklist

Source Materiel is always welcome.

In other words some kind of AU? There are plenty here on the board if you want inspiration.
The first thing you should decide upon is which time era you want to work in. Then you should look into ships of that time era. Then decide on what ships you want your navy to consist of.
And then... well, start designing. One of the best things to do is read through different threads in the beginner subforum here on the 'bucket. That way you'll learn what mistakes not to make, since they'll be demonstrated, noted, and rectified(I include my own works in this ).
If you want to make calculations for a design, I'd suggest you get Springsharp.
And yes, using paint is probably the easiest.

The best advice I can give is draw a real life ship first and when you have learnt to draw a bit then do your AU. The hardest things to do is design your own ships, and you have to learn to walk before you can run.The other thing that looks easy but is a nightmare to get right is kitbashing which is a lot harder than it looks. Look forward to your drawings.

Thanks. I plan on beginning with USS Samuel B. Roberts, DE-413 and then branching off from there.

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Current Project:

USS Samuel B. Roberts, DE-413, "The Destroyer Escort that fought like a Battleship"

If you want to design ships from the pre-dreadnought era to the end of WW2, look up Springsharp. It helps a lot. I can't tell you how many wacky ideas I've had that never got drawn because Springsharp pointed out the flaws.

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Worklist:
FFG Halifax Redraw

This is code for giving yourself carte blanche to do whatever you feel like, so why are you asking for advice in the first place?

What other programs/websites are okay to draw in? Any you would recommend?

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Current Project:

USS Samuel B. Roberts, DE-413, "The Destroyer Escort that fought like a Battleship"

we all use a program called Paint/msPaint. it's a program every windows computer have. and it is very easy to use. some members have over time changed to other programs like Photoshop, Gimp, PaintNET, etc.but as a beginner I would recomend to use Paint, since it's a very simple software and easy to use. after you have get the felling of doing pixel art and starting to know what you are doing. then you can start to looking to other programs.