The thing that really separates builders from good builders to great builders, is really patience and practice.
Patience, because you need to put the time into every build and not give up easily. Looking at the builds subjectively and dating ‘what is it missing?’ and more importantly, the patience and willingness to experiment.
Practice is simply when you have done all the above several times so that it becomes easier to see what is missing.
However, having good planning is a necessity as well.
Researching what you want to build, finding good references (ideally blueprints), looking at a few varying styles aswell as what other users creations to see how they have accomplished the task.
This may not seem fun at first, but one you get a rhythm for doing this and seeing is result, it makes it fun to know that you can make and possibly add to a creation.
Have you tried learning blender? It’s a fantastic tool with many capabilities, which if you practice really well, you can make a living or land a job in the future with it!
Don’t give up, be patient.
Research, reference, rebuild.
I’m not going to give that motivational mumbo jumbo, ROBLOX building is one of the most simple denominations of building possible, if you find it hard just keep practicing more, implement more plugins to speed up workflow. There’s not a lot the community can do to help you if you don’t help yourself first.
The main question you’ve got to ask yourself is “Why do I always resort to using free models?” In the past I’ve heard many justifiable excuses that are the following:
“It’s too much work” an attempt to justify laziness.
“I’m just not a builder” An attempt to justify self doubt.
“Everyone else is better than me, why bother?” This happens whenever you set expectations for yourself that currently can’t be met at your skillset, this is especially common in perfectionists.
Regardless of what your reasoning is, it all ends the same by pushing to improve yourself. If you truly want to become a builder you’ve got to push yourself to improve. As for the steps to help you improve, it’s tedious work yet it’ll show improvement over time.
1). Finding your comfort zone. By this I’m referring to getting yourself into a more relaxing state of mind before you start building. My preference is music in the background with no distractions, i’ll completely isolate myself so I can focus on a single build.
2). Getting the right set of tools is essential to a builder. By this I’m referring to your plugins, every builder has their own personal preference. In the past I’ve gone through hundreds of plugins before deciding on what I’m the most comfortable with.
3). Don’t put yourself down if the final result isn’t what you anticipated, your skillset hasn’t been optimized compared to the competition. Those that built before you failed countless times before they were successful they’ll just never acknowledge their failures since people naturally suppress negative memories, we only want to remember the positive in our lifetime.
4). When you ask for advice, you’ve got to go into it open minded. If you’re validating yourself on compliments than you will never succeed, we cannot make you listen. Believe me I wish I could tell you it’s easy, that there’s this magic button you press to instantly get EBR building standards yet there isn’t. Building is time consuming, it isn’t easy nor is it for everyone.
That however must be decided by you, look deep within yourself and ask this question “Am I cut out to be a builder?”
Honestly, giving up as bad as it is sounds, does lead to failure but it is not a deadend. It allows you to try different things that perhaps was better for you anyways. However, like you many others experience their fair share of slump in the learning curve, that’s not when you want to give up, quite the contrary you should get out of the slump before you take a decision to change expertise.
Building, just like with any other artistic skill, is something you need to practice a lot in order to master it. It is not a science like math or physics where there is usually a clear line between right and wrong. It’s more like trying to assemble a hand-made bouquet of flowers by planting a lot of seeds in your backyard. Some people have a bigger backyard so they can grow more flowers, which means they are more likely to find pretty flowers. Others live in a climate where certain flowers take longer to grow or do not grow at all, so their bouquet will end up looking different. Some people might not even have grass in their backyard and need to plant some first. But if you put in enough time and effort, you will be able to assemble a nice looking bouquet of flowers.
Point is, everyone can become good at building. It takes a lot of time and effort and you will need to experiment a lot to figure out what your strengths and weaknesses are. Mentality also plays a big role. If you stare at your screen for 2 hours without actually making anything, then you won’t learn at all.
My personal tips? Pick a theme you like and start experimenting. Grab some reference material as well that you can study. Do not copy reference material. Instead try to observe what details define the thing you are trying to make. A house needs windows, a tree needs branches and a sword needs a shaft. For comparison I have lately been trying to come up with a simple style for buildings. Here’s what a section of my workspace looks like:
In there are like 15 different roofs, 25 different walls, 15 or so fences, 15 stairs, different color palettes and a lot of other small things. There are also many designs I was not happy with and have deleted as a result. I am not a magician who is naturally good at building structures. It is in fact something I have historically struggled with. But after pushing myself through the phase of “I can’t do it”, I have slowly started making progress and now I am at a point where I think I’m getting somewhere.
In your post you made one simple error. You said “I can’t get good at building things.” Literally anyone can build and build well, it just depends on how much practice you put in and how much patience you have with yourself. Personally, I started building about 5-6 years ago and I’m still not content with where I’m at. But, when I go back and look at my first builds and compare them with what I’m doing now, the difference is amazing. My recommendation to you would be to:
1: Stop using free models for building. You’ll never learn how to build something yourself if you just use free models.
2: Save some of your current projects. Looking back on these projects in a year or two will give you all the inspiration that you need to continue.
3: Don’t get discouraged with yourself and say that “you can’t build.” Literally, everyone can if they put in the practice. All of the popular builders and front-page game developers probably started out right where you’re at. Practice and hard-work separated them.
I hope this helps and good luck with your future projects!
Practice Makes Perfect!
Just like @Zomebody’s post. I practiced for years during spare time in Roblox from 2013 and beyond. Yes, it was fun messing around with games using stamper building or btools. Although everyone, if not most of them, sound like a big shot, they actually have weaknesses in some areas and they can find room for improvement.
Giving Up?
Discouragement is not an option. True inspiration comes from the art of dreaming and finding your comfort zone(in building). Firstly, break the ice. It looks like you’re holding back yourself from knowing what and how to build. Do not compare yourself with others. It will demotivate you if you do. Secondly, plan your builds as if you were an architect who were to draw a blueprint of a house for a family. Ultimately, save the builds you really admire of that you’ve built as if they were an achievement of success.
If the anticipation was not as thought, it was probably that you did not write down the idea in the first place and the descriptions. Recently, I found my modus operandi for all forms of development and there I found my entire skill set to use; I used to be only a builder.
Talent?
Practised the skill in a rough method and found new techniques(both planning and actual building) which actually streamlined my entire development. I have seen talented people and admired their work, which then built up my motivations to “mimic” their technique.
Hmmm…
Apparently I have left a ton of unfinished projects in my local files. I should probably go and work with them or re-use the assets and rework it.
Just think of some ideas that you and others may like then build like a starter.
then after you have done that, look at it and make another one to see if you can improve your building you never know you probably get something out of it that you and other players may like!
READ THIS:
This very post is a test. You probably looked at this post and said I am not going to read this, it’s too long. This is literally a test right here. Are you going to break that boundary and read this, or are you going to pass it by and give up?
Building is like any form of art. Practice = Perfection. First of all, I am a bit shocked at the title of this post. “I can’t get good at building” This is your first mistake. This immediately shows me that you are discouraged and down, but if you want to improve you need to keep up your positivity and instead use titles like How can I improve my building? Looking in the positive direction will always be of help.
Stop using free models:
“I’ve tried for years, and I often resort to using free models.”
You are not going to get better if every time you get close to improving, you give up and resort to a free model. If you want to quit something, you just need to quit it. For good. Stop using free models and push your self to figure it out on your own. Break that boundary, don’t flee from it.
first you need to decide on what you want to build or have a clear idea
“I want to build a house”
If you feel like you don’t have a clear image of that house you want to build, look for reference images.
Later on, once you improve you can start building based on your own imagination and you’re own made up image. But right now, build of reference images so you develop the habit of following common architectural styles.
Watch videos:
Building is visual. You can’t read about it, you memorize it, you just have to do it. Watch other people build, see what they do. And look out for certain things like:
How they begin a build
How they vary detail throughout their build
Where do they add detail
How do they add detail
What is their workflow and how does it help them be efficient?
Here are some good videos to watch:
REMEMBER YOU CAN SLOW DOWN THESE VIDEOS.
Use a dummy character:
One thing I hear so many builders complain about, “I got the sizing wrong”. This is an easy to avoid mistake. Simply use a dummy from the toolbox in your build and keep the dummy next to your build so you can continuously compare your sizes to the dummy. This way your proportions will be much more accurate, and you will get things like height, door size, window size, etc. looking better.
This will also make you more efficient, so you do not have to go back and fix silly sizing mistakes.
Work from the ground up:
This one can be debated, but this is the method I’ve always found helpful. Don’t build the entire thing quickly as an outline, then add detail too it, go back and fix things, don’t do any of this. Start from the ground up and start small. Begin building the shapes and details at the same time.
Many people say don’t start with details, I disagree. Starting with details makes you more quicker and efficient, and still gives you quality work. Add detail as your building and making the shapes.
(You do not entirely have to follow this suggestion, if you want to follow another building style from a popular Youtube video or something, go ahead)
Stop giving up:
You won’t learn to draw if you stop picking up the pencil. You won’t learn to paint if you stop picking up your brush. You won’t learn to build if you stop trying.
Push your self to build. If you find a boundary, break through it and never look back. Build, and keep building. Never give up on your self, or your imagination.
I love what @PurpSinister said at the start of his post.
I do not believe there is any better way to put it. The way PurpSinister said it is beautiful and true. Don’t give up and even worse, don’t give up and try to justify it.
And please, never use talent as an excuse. Talent comes from hard work.
Every single developer on this website is here because they tried.
I used to have the same issue when I was older. I used to be rubbish at building and mostly included a lot of free models. But I just started to watch YouTube videos were other developers build and most time inspired me to practice and I have definitely got much better. So I think you need more practice and try and watch someone build and try and rebuild it and you will get better.
Building is one of those things where it comes naturally to some people and not so much for others. Everyone started where you are now, even the best developers. However they all have one thing in common, lots of experience behind them. Every developer that has a front page game has had at least 5-6 years of experience prior to making that game. Remember you click the same upload button as those top developers so if they can do it you can.
When you are learning to build I wouldn’t compare yourself to those top developers but instead use them as inspiration, a role model. Go and look at their places and see how they have built them, see if there is any common themes between the places. Maybe go around and look at a few showcases for inspiration and for ideas:
Both of these showcases are very good places to get inspiration and ideas from. Both of these developers have similarities and differences in their build styles and the way they portray ideas and themes. Having lots of inspiration from existing builds will help you understand how and why developers do certain things and how developers get their ideas from their head.
Top tips for learning to build:
This may sound super obvious but you should keep practising as much as you can, keep experimenting with various building methods. The more you practice the better you will get at building.
“The greatest teacher failure is” - Yoda. If you fail that mean you are trying, no one succeeds the first time they do anything. A lot of the top developers have failed lots of time and learned from those failures. If your build looks horrible think about how you could improve it for next time.
This ties in with the point above, don’t give up. The worst thing you could possibly do is give up because if you do you will learn nothing. Remember, don’t be afraid to fail because you learn from your mistakes.
As you said you often resort to using free models. This is a bad habit to get into, free models are only useful as learning resources. To get out of this habit pretend that free models don’t exists. This should help you get out of the habit of using them.
The last tip is to stretch your self by building things out of your comfort zone. Don’t set your self a task that is way out of your skill level but one that is slightly out of your skill level. If you fail first time try again and again until you make what you wanted to make.
If it was self explanatory then we would not have been seeing this thread.
People do it all the time, iv met hundreds that do it. Its not very good, its themselfs that are holding back their true potential.
I believe OP is capable of many things. Basically the topic says hes given up. If he cant get good then why bother helping?. It should be he can get better but hes holding himself back.
Dont do that
Iv contributed something, thats more than nothing
If you know yourself your capable of great things, be happy about it. If you need help, call out for it. But no way in any shape or form think you cant do it.
That feeling is dangerous, going down that road, you will never recover out of it
I dont want OP going down that road
Patience is always key to becoming good at something. Take your time and as stated, if you don’t have a clear image try looking for a something you can build on the internet. Start with something small and slowly work ur way up to big houses.
Good job, using and designing from free models was one of my steps to enhance my building skills and it helps.
I’m not against free models, they’re there because Roblox wants us to use them, or think of it as a complimentary feature. I learned to script from free models too, so it’s not bad at all. People think free models are trash, well it can be, but it also have some uses too. I used to take free models out and see if I can recreate them on my own, of course the easy ones, like doors or chairs. Not buses or planes.
Practice, practice, and keep practicing. You have to know the essential skills of building on Roblox Studio, and it doesn’t come instant. It could take years, months, or even just days if you put a great effort and not give up.
Throughout my building journey on Roblox, it is very important to know about:
Getting used to the Roblox development environment
Just like other places, you need to adapt and be familiar with your new editor. You should know how to move around with ease, the shortcuts as it can save time, and finally know how to swim around the Roblox Studio area.
Tools
Use it properly, and know which one to use based on your needs. Know how to change the increments for the move or rotate tool and make sure it’s suitable for your work. The Roblox building tool is not just limited to create new part, move, rotate, or scale but also to use CSG. Learn to use union to make more complex shape and experiment them. Utilise the combination of these tools to craft a design.
Plugins
Yes, like tools, plug-ins help too. It can make your manual work get a lot easier. For example, I use this CSG Curve Cutter to help me make smoother CSG parts. There are other great plug-ins, such as Roundify, which helps you create a timeless and modern user interface. Be careful when picking them though, there are some sketchy plug-ins that could put your game in danger through viruses.
Referencing to images and ask feedback
See Google for ideas if you lost track on what you’re building. Or ask for feedback, from friends or devforum.
Trying the strange designs
Experiment with easy models at first, perhaps a desk. It may seem trivial, why would you build a desk? You can do a lot, make it artistic, try it with different materials or colour. A desk is not just a desk, it can be a piece of art. Don’t just make a four-legged desk with flat surface, that’s boring, and that’s not what I’m talking about. Try making a unique-legged, or uneven yet realistic surface. Incorporate textures or decals, if you didn’t know what texture is, it works like the Roblox material. Trying to create weird but likeable things can build an artistic sense in you, I guess.
Planning things when you have a big project
Depends on your personal preference, you can choose to draw or write it or even do both. It helps remind you of what you need, you can see other articles how to plan your build. Don’t stress over it though.
Having spirit in you and keep it on fire
Don’t easily give up. Don’t force yourself into building if you don’t feel like it, but when you want to build, just open Studio and mess with the tools.
At last, remember that it is very achievable and good luck!
Try to identify what your biggest issue or main issue is and start working from there. I’m not that great at building either but I’ve gotten a lot better compared to when I first started because I realized that my biggest issue when I build is that I have no idea how I want my build to look like. Nowadays, I usually have a reference point whether it be another build that I like or an image which has helped me improve my building drastically.
Hmm, let me see… I recommend that you watch some building tutorials, first. When you first build, it is just like being a small child lost in a maze. Alternatively, try Google Searching what you want to build, and replicate it in Studio. Try using plugins as well. Try using Building Tools By F3X or Studio build suite.
Of course, I have been building for years! These are the methods I use for building.
