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Yay! Hope you made it through the first blog post about basic depth. Click here if you missed it! In this article, or browse my collection of tutorials I made/like: here. I want to cover some more advanced concepts in detailing, as well as some techniques that aren’t necessarily incorrect, but can look a bit derpy. I’m gonna try to explain these build concepts like I learned biology <3 I’m going to explain first in terms of “microscopic,” or individual pieces of detail, and then work my way into “macroscopic”: the fact that larger pieces of detail should flow rather than just kind of being there.
Before we get started: *Disclaimer* I’m not the best at building, so if you need to correct me, do so! Furthermore, building trends are dynamic, so at some point in time, I will likely be very wrong about some things! I also want to credit some trinityde and unpealed_banana and that_old_kid’s streams because they helped me learn some of the concepts in this article (learning from a community really does help!)
One of the most important concepts in building techniques is FLOW. While I like to call it flow, there are many different ways to explain this idea. For example, I’ve heard someone explain the concept as PURPOSE. Having flowing detail helps emphasize depth and makes structures look sturdy.
At the smallest level, you should try to make your detail FLOW by actually having blocks’ edges, rather than tips, connect. It also helps to build with a PURPOSE to the detail.
So let’s look at this build that I made… a long time ago. I actually have it posted here. This is one of my early builds, I think 2nd plot, so of course, it has a lot of examples of poor detailing. In the picture, do you see how the slabs aren’t really connected? They’re kind of just, well, there? This is a bad example of flow because they are touching each other diagonally, but they’re not really together. In the background, you can see a cobble wall connected to a fence connected to a slab... Yeah… At the time I thought it made the detail flow but it’s just another example of suckish flow. It’s almost floating in midair and isn’t really connected to the building itself. Connecting this to PURPOSE, the detailing isn’t doing much, it’s just there. While it’s not a rule and more of a guideline, when you detail, you should have a purpose as to what you’re building. Is it a supporting wall type of thing? Is it a balcony? A window? A decorative wall-piece?
Here’s another example of detail with little flow. While it’s technically not wrong, it looks a bit derpy.
This wall design is good in the sense that the cobble walls and stairs add depth. However, see how the cobble wall kind of protrudes inwards more than the part of the stair that it is connected to? That makes it look a bit derpier and not as well-supported. Another thing that I threw in to show detail that does not flow is the arch at the top. The edges of the slab connect to the stairs, but, it looks really flimsy because the slab does not look well supported by the wall. In order to solve this problem you could just add slabs or something on top of the upper stair blocks. Depending on what you’re building (if you’re building a tiny house, for example), sometimes you may have to have detail that barely connects, and since players are looking from close up, it’s a bit more okay, but generally, you should detail with stronger connections between blocks.
Components of your detail should also flow. Again, they make the build look sturdier, and less “superglued on” (haha someone said this in the old pwego-insomnia server which I found really funny). Poetically, your detail show be in harmony, or be one, with the build itself.
Here’s an example of a recent wall I made with decent flow and purpose within detailing. It’s not that amazing that it makes me cry, but I think I did ok on the detail. Each part kind of has its own purpose. There’s the base, and then there’s the window, which has a small roofy thingy. There’s a little decorative strip of detailing on top (w/ a pillar in the middle 4 supportz) And I have a balcony thingy at the top. (And yes, this is my build on vadact with only gray wool and ice hehe).
Ok, so now that we understand detail a bit more, I want to talk about a more controversial topic- overdetail. My stance on it is pretty lenient – you should detail enough so that there’s depth, but, you should really not overdetail so that you have so many lines and shapes that you can’t tell WHAT IS WHAT. You really don’t need to cover up an ENTIRE build completely with detail if you don’t want. Just be reasonable.
I’m going to go into more DEPTH *BA DUMP CHHH* about overdetailing in the next article, since this post has been kind of lengthy already! In part II, I guess you could call it, I’ll explain some detailing guidelines (they’re not strict rules), and I’ll show you a few examples of better/worse detailing in my old builds.
Before we get started: *Disclaimer* I’m not the best at building, so if you need to correct me, do so! Furthermore, building trends are dynamic, so at some point in time, I will likely be very wrong about some things! I also want to credit some trinityde and unpealed_banana and that_old_kid’s streams because they helped me learn some of the concepts in this article (learning from a community really does help!)
One of the most important concepts in building techniques is FLOW. While I like to call it flow, there are many different ways to explain this idea. For example, I’ve heard someone explain the concept as PURPOSE. Having flowing detail helps emphasize depth and makes structures look sturdy.
At the smallest level, you should try to make your detail FLOW by actually having blocks’ edges, rather than tips, connect. It also helps to build with a PURPOSE to the detail.
Example of no detail flow (click to reveal)
So let’s look at this build that I made… a long time ago. I actually have it posted here. This is one of my early builds, I think 2nd plot, so of course, it has a lot of examples of poor detailing. In the picture, do you see how the slabs aren’t really connected? They’re kind of just, well, there? This is a bad example of flow because they are touching each other diagonally, but they’re not really together. In the background, you can see a cobble wall connected to a fence connected to a slab... Yeah… At the time I thought it made the detail flow but it’s just another example of suckish flow. It’s almost floating in midair and isn’t really connected to the building itself. Connecting this to PURPOSE, the detailing isn’t doing much, it’s just there. While it’s not a rule and more of a guideline, when you detail, you should have a purpose as to what you’re building. Is it a supporting wall type of thing? Is it a balcony? A window? A decorative wall-piece?
Example of little detail flow (click to reveal)
Here’s another example of detail with little flow. While it’s technically not wrong, it looks a bit derpy.
This wall design is good in the sense that the cobble walls and stairs add depth. However, see how the cobble wall kind of protrudes inwards more than the part of the stair that it is connected to? That makes it look a bit derpier and not as well-supported. Another thing that I threw in to show detail that does not flow is the arch at the top. The edges of the slab connect to the stairs, but, it looks really flimsy because the slab does not look well supported by the wall. In order to solve this problem you could just add slabs or something on top of the upper stair blocks. Depending on what you’re building (if you’re building a tiny house, for example), sometimes you may have to have detail that barely connects, and since players are looking from close up, it’s a bit more okay, but generally, you should detail with stronger connections between blocks.
Components of your detail should also flow. Again, they make the build look sturdier, and less “superglued on” (haha someone said this in the old pwego-insomnia server which I found really funny). Poetically, your detail show be in harmony, or be one, with the build itself.
Example of components sort of coming together (click to reveal)
Here’s an example of a recent wall I made with decent flow and purpose within detailing. It’s not that amazing that it makes me cry, but I think I did ok on the detail. Each part kind of has its own purpose. There’s the base, and then there’s the window, which has a small roofy thingy. There’s a little decorative strip of detailing on top (w/ a pillar in the middle 4 supportz) And I have a balcony thingy at the top. (And yes, this is my build on vadact with only gray wool and ice hehe).
Ok, so now that we understand detail a bit more, I want to talk about a more controversial topic- overdetail. My stance on it is pretty lenient – you should detail enough so that there’s depth, but, you should really not overdetail so that you have so many lines and shapes that you can’t tell WHAT IS WHAT. You really don’t need to cover up an ENTIRE build completely with detail if you don’t want. Just be reasonable.
The size of your build, and palette affects how much detail there seems to be (click to reveal)
Whether or not a build is overdetailed is also dependent on what it is for; a build view closer up will obviously have smaller detail than a megabuild, so you should just detail what you think is reasonable. Overdetailing also depends on your textures. If you have too many intense textures (like bedrock, cobble, soulsand, etc.) together, that will likely look overdetailed. Thus, controlling your palette for detailing influences how detailed your build looks.
Using texture to create fake depth! Yay a trick! (click to reveal)
The fact that texture plays a large role in detail leads me to another technique, detailing with texture, or “fake depth.” If you have more space left in a plot, or don’t have much space for depth and detail, sometimes, the best way is simply to give the illusion of depth by juxtaposing (putting next to each other) blocks with lots and little detail. In this plot that I made, for example, I tried to use this technique a lot by putting stone and stone brick next to each other, as well as stone with bedrock. Because of this, I detailed some of the smaller walls without using too many blocks!
I’m going to go into more DEPTH *BA DUMP CHHH* about overdetailing in the next article, since this post has been kind of lengthy already! In part II, I guess you could call it, I’ll explain some detailing guidelines (they’re not strict rules), and I’ll show you a few examples of better/worse detailing in my old builds.
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