I had a few meshed submitted to me and I wanted to get a third party opinion on the look of the mesh and the texture:

http://www.FreelanceGames.com/Graphics/Dex.jpg

When it comes to meshes you have two choices:

Low poly with excellent texturing

or

High poly with average texturing

Anything else will look pretty poor. Unfortunately, that mesh you supplied is low poly and has some of the worst texturing I've ever seen (no offence to whoever created it). They made no attempt to create a texture for the mesh, they simply slapped on a metallic texture coloured blue. What the model needs are lights and windows, and other details (insignia maybe?). And the textures need to be created for it and aligned to accent the shape and details of the model.

Then again - was this submitted to your for free? If so, you get what you pay for. :/

The mesh would probably be adequate with some nice texturing.

Currently, the texture is, well.... horrible. It's a primary blue colour with no real texture work other than slap-dash shapes.

Slap-dash... hmm.. for some reason, a certain name comes to mind.

Wayward, would Mr. S. Lavache mean anything to u?

Anyway, texture work of this standard is more of a hindrance to your project, than a help.

No offense to the creator, if reading.

I would have another pass on the starfield, too. It's looks a bit "gritty" at the moment.

The modelling is ordinary. It would be nice to identify forms with function, like boosters, landing gear, weapons, shields, scoops, etc. Maybe the texturing is making the model less readable.

The texturing is bad. I don't even know where to start. It's just wrong. Choosing a strong primary colour destroys any lighting and makes it look very artificial. The texture is too high-contrast and it's getting confused with the modelling. The attempt at 'space hulk' plating might work without the black lines.

The lighting isn't helping either. In space, you have a single strong directional light (a sun), and no ambient light at all, so you get a a bold contrast between the light side and the dark side. You may have local lighting in the form of engine glows and windows. Nasa has great reference for real space. If you go for a more exotic sci-fi lighting then you may have multiple suns, reflected light from planets and nebulae, but keep the ambient light black.

My advice to the artist is get some reference material. Collect images of spaceships (like screen shots from existing space games) and build style sheets as a guide. Once you have a clear visual goal then creating it will be easy. And take more time. Good art can't be rushed.

@Sausage: Yes, I remember Slap Dash Lavash.

Ick. If I saw that thing in a game's screen shots, I'd write the game off as hopeless and move on. It has no obvious front or back end, and a slapped on generic panels texture map. It's clear that no care was taken when making it, and no effort was put into making it look good.

I pretty much agree with the others. The mesh doesn't appear too bad (bit hard to tell with the texture) but crikey the texture is bad. Are you sure this is correct and not something gone screwy?

The stars could do with some work as well. There's too many of them not subtle enough and it kinda gives me a headache looking at it.

Well it would appear that I pretty much got the answer to my question.

Here is a screen shot from my game; the starship meshes do not belong to me. However, there was a comment made about lighting in space and the skybox texture used in the image in the previous post.

It might be useful to hear feedback the following screen sooner than latter (excluding the starship meshes of course):

www.freelancegames.com/Graphics/StarCry-S4.jpg (http://www.freelancegames.com/Graphics/StarCry-S4.jpg)

is that at the bottom a Whitestar from Babylon5?

In both screenshots meshes looks amateurish. It's clear there weren't much effort spent on the modelling. The main problem - they are just some shapes put together. I work a lot with real objects models on my day jobs, and I see the difference very clear. The main problem- models are not functional, just thought out. Take a 3d model of real tank or gunship, or plane. The model
1. functional - that each detail have functionality (even if it's pure estetic function}
2. evolutionary - it have some basic shape, to which enchancment added step by step.
To have "real looking model" you have to start from some basic shape, and add detail, keeping in mind functions of each detail and if it's physically possible and functionally useful to put detail into specific place. It doesn't matter if palyer wouldn't know the functions of detail - the looks will be functional. After that you will have high-poly model, and can reduce it to low-poly, replacing some details by texture. To start from low-poly is a mistake.

Originally posted by gilzu
is that at the bottom a Whitestar from Babylon5?

Yes, like I said the graphics are from the Net and I have no plans to use them in the final game. The WhiteStar is really well done though.

Here's some intimidating reference:
Homeworld Screenshot Archive (http://www.strategyplanet.com/hwshots/)
Homeworld 2 Screenshots (http://images.filefront.com/48;0)
Starfleet Command III (http://www.strategyplanet.com/sfc/sfc3/sfc3_screen.shtml)
The Darkspace Connection v2.0 (http://dynamic6.gamespy.com/%7Edarkspace/site/screenshots/)
O.R.B. (http://www.strategyplanet.com/orb/terror/)
Galactic Civilzations (http://www.galciv.com/index.asp)
Star Wraith (http://www.starwraith.com/)
Freelancer (http://www.microsoft.com/games/pc/freelancer.aspx)
Independence War 2 (http://www.independencewar.com/products/IWAR2/screenshots1.htm)
Star Trek Bridge Commander (http://www.bridgecommander.com/visuals/index.htm)
Space Pod (http://images.filefront.com/543;0)
Space Empires: Starfury (http://images.filefront.com/970;0)

Intimidation; I see inspiration!