Can you sticky a starting out tutorial thread?

[alienspacepirate]

I'm interested in getting into KSP part modding. Made a few things before in sketchup, but not uber experienced. Seen in some threads that sketchup isnt the thing to really use for KSP for conversion issues.

I've found multiple KSP modding threads, but they are pretty old (2013-2014). Can someone sticky a general "where to get started" forum post that has the general steps required, and is updated so its not for KSP circa 2013??

thanks

[lo-fi]

Check out the "mod development links" sticky curated by Cpt Kipard. There shouldn't be stuff in there that's wildly out of date, so you're pretty safe. Steer clear of anything really old that suggests loading a .dae directly into the game. As long as the workflow involves getting the model into unity, then using part tools to compile the model into a .mu, it's still relevant as the process hasn't changed much since part tools came out. Sketchup is fine for making models, though I believe it doesn't give you a way to set up UV mapping for your textures, so you'll have to shift to something else like Blender to do that bit. But don't let that put you off rigging an untextured model up and getting it into the game to get used to the workflow before you invest the time in learning how to unwrap and texture. Good luck!

[Fengist]

This is in the list of tutorials, but here it is again.

http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/entries/3232-Part-Modding-Tutorial-1-5-Modeling

It's a Wings 3D tutorial but if you don't need all the features (and insanity) of Blender, the link in my sig shows the results of following this tutorial. It's where I got my start. If you have any questions about Wings, Beal is always around and is happy to answer questions. Or, you can shoot me a msg and I'll tell you what I know.

[alienspacepirate]

Hey guys thanks for the input. I watched the sketchup to KSP tutorial on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=71CIu-Pkn3k Looks very complicated I'll give it the best college try hahah. I will look around at Wings3D and just see if I can learn blender. If I find a good process I'll make a vid. My channel is fritzbuild3r, and have a few KSP vids.

My goal is to find a workable pipeline to part creation because I want to do more than just a 1 off part. My idea is to build on for more station parts like Nertea's http://forum.kerbalspaceprogram.com/threads/91814 , and station science. I really get into building stations in space (and colonies). I want to create station parts that are modular and have docking ports built-in. I find once you get multiple station pieces in orbit all those part joins make things very unstable. So the idea is to have pre-built sections you launch and then connect in orbit, and can rearrange and change later on the fly. Also, my goal is to make parts that have a minimum amount of surfaces to not bog down the game for big stations. So much of the detail may be textures etc.