16 Essential Tips to Become a Better Builder In Minecraft

Building in minecraft is so much fun and is by far  my favorite aspect of the game i can literally sit   there for weeks if not months just building and  building non-stop building up a town or a village  

And just watching it grow and one of the most  common questions i get asked is how do i come   up with so many unique designs and how do i make  each one different from the last so today we’re  

Going to go over some of the basic principles that  i follow and talk about my thought process along   the way so let’s start with step number one build  ideas and inspiration now this step is going to be  

Super important especially if you’re building  up a town or a village and you want to come up   with multiple ideas for different buildings so  that things don’t look the same so you’re gonna   need a lot of ideas and a lot of inspiration for  building with in general this can be done in two  

Ways you can take the realistic approach or the  non-realistic approach for me personally i don’t   build in a realistic manner i build more  in a sort of fantasy medieval style manner   so this is not a realistic approach of building  when i say realistic i’m talking more about  

Historically accurate side of sort of realistic so  if you want to build medieval or fantasy then you   want to use concept art concept is going to be  the best way of searching if you want to build   something that’s very realistic then you want to  take a look at realistic buildings that actually  

Exist in the world today i would head over to  google images or pinterest and we can do both   searches this way it doesn’t matter whether you’re  a realistic builder or a non-realistic builder   where both of these can be done exactly the same  way the only difference is for a non-realistic way  

We would use the word concept art in the search  we head over to pinterest or google images or some   imaging site like that where we can do a search  for images and you want to search for the type  

Of building you want to look for for me that’s  generally looking for medieval buildings medieval   houses medieval castles um or something like that  but you can do this for any style of building   you could be searching for spanish villages or  castles or houses in the mountains small cabins  

Winter lodges or something like that you can  search up so many different ideas and you will   come back with hundreds if not thousands of  image ideas for references like i said for me   i will always put concept art after the word  i’m searching and generally these are the sort  

Of images that i get coming up on screen now these  are the kind of things that i search and look at   and for these we can take many different ideas  and put them into a single build we haven’t  

Necessarily got to try and copy this building we  can use many ideas to make our own so we could   imagine that we like the base of a house from one  building we like the layout of it but we want to  

Change the upper levels so we’ll look for some  some better buildings that have a nicer upper   level maybe a different looking roof um maybe we  want to add a tower so have a look at some towers   maybe you want some different entrances so take a  look at some different entrances or stairways onto  

The buildings and take all of these into sort  of account save the images that you like and   keep them it’s easy access so that you can look  at them while building and what you want to do  

Is you want to take these ideas and try and  implement them into a single build with your own   sort of take on it at this point you don’t want  to pay attention to colors because colors are  

Not what we’re looking at right now what we’re  looking for is shape once you’ve got enough images   and you’re ready to start building we can head  over and start doing some sort of planning but   first of all just make sure you have plenty of  reference images so that you can take ideas from  

Each one and switch things up as you please to  make a build that suits what you’re looking for   step number two block palettes and colors now  this step can sometimes be quite daunting because   there’s a lot of blocks to choose from in game  and it’s not always easy to know what sort of  

Colors you want to go with so what i tend to do is  i will build up a bunch of different builds with   block palettes and i tend to do these in layers  so i will make a little base which is going to be  

Either a single line across the bottom of the  build or the entire bottom level of the build   and i will just do a single strip at a bomb just  to get an idea of what it would look like as you  

Can see from the examples in front of me we have  a little strip that is different at the bottom   the colors you see at the top are what i generally  tend to use for the rest of the building or the  

Upper levels now don’t get me wrong we can divide  more colors up into certain parts of the build we   haven’t got to stick purely to the block palette  if we have an area of the building that sticks out  

We could change the color to that as well  but this is just to give you a general idea   of block palettes and the colors that work  well together for walls so this is a good way   to kind of mess around with the colors until  you decide of a choice that you actually like  

When it comes to building a build i generally  divide it into three ways the bottom layer or   the base the upper walls and the roof and i choose  different colors for each but what i tend to do is  

I like to vary up my builds on towns and stuff so  i don’t like every build to have the same colors   so i generally choose between sort of three  to five different block palettes that i’m   going to be using throughout the build so i will  choose several base designs several wall designs  

And several roof designs and then i kind of mix  and match them up as i please through the builds   to kind of create a bit of a natural flow another  thing we can also do is work with gradients  

Radians are like a tall wall where we can  start from darker colors at the bottom   and blend them into lighter colors at the top  now working with gradients we need to make sure   that we’re using the same color tones so that  we can blend a wall nicely these work great  

On large buildings such as town halls castles  and also things like churches because they have   high walls so we can blend them as we go up from  the bottom step number three lay out some framing  

So this is a part where so many people get it  wrong now of course you know the basic layout   on the ground is pretty simple you lay out a  few rectangles make sure that any of the long  

Walls you’ve got you’ve got some little stick out  sections and make sure you don’t have too many   flat areas where you’re going to have flat walls  that are going to be difficult to detail later on   now you want to make sure the build  overall has a very good shape on the base  

But the problem is as we work up the build this is  where people often run into issues a lot of people   will create these little stick outs and jet outs  off the sides the back and everything else to make  

It look nice but then what they do is they raise  it all to the top of the roof to the same height   and that just doesn’t look right because  everything else is still stuck on that one  

Level and you need to create a bit of a variety  on the build you need to have those different   levels that are visible to really sort of make  the build stand out so as you’re building up   the levels make sure that you’ve got some roofs at  different height variations if you’re finding that  

Most of your roofs are sitting higher try and  find other ways to detail on the lower levels   for instance creating a overhang on the porch or  creating a balcony that sticks out on the side   now of course at this point we are only framing so  we’re not really planning or building the details  

But we do want to make a base layout to make sure  that we can see where everything is going to be   it’s important here that you don’t start filling  in your walls and stuff like that until you are  

Happy with the shape that you have make sure that  you’ve got your walls all covered you know what   details are gonna go on them where you’re gonna  add balconies where you’re gonna have overhangs   so that you can come to those and build them  straight up without any issues and without having  

To build the wall and then realize later on that  it doesn’t look right you know you don’t want to   have to be coming back and then having to change  over a whole part of the house now this point you  

Can see we have two different colors one for  the upper level and one for the lower level   one way to really add a good bit of detail without  really doing anything is to make the little areas  

That stick out at the house the same color as the  upper level of the house what this does it makes   them stand out from the color of the base with  a different color and it just gives them almost  

A separation so that they look like their own  separate builds but they’re not they’re still part   of the same house and it just creates a really  nice variety in the build and really adds to the  

Detail so i highly recommend giving it a try as  it really adds a lot of detail with minimal effort   step number five fill in walls and details now  for this part i like to use what is called the   kiss approach now don’t worry i’m not  going to tell you to kiss your build  

But this stands up for keep it simple stupid and  the reason i say this is because there are many   people who go crazy on the details and they always  show you a picture from a nice distance looking  

At the build and yeah the build looks great but  what happens when you get up close to the build   it looks a total mess and it doesn’t make no sense  there’s blocks randomly placed there’s odd colors  

There’s big gaps and you can’t make two sense of  what the build is supposed to look like up close   this is why i say to use the simple approach which  is adding simple details and plenty of them this  

Way the build will look nice up close and it will  also look nice at a distance so you get the best   of both worlds when it comes to texturing a build  there are simple ways of texturing the build and  

There are awkward ways of doing it the awkward way  which a lot of people will like to do is try to do   it all at once where they randomly place their  textures and build up a wall full of textures  

Which is very randomized and yes sometimes it can  turn out good other times it might not look great   what i personally like to do is keep it simple so  i will use maybe sort of three four blocks at the  

Most in the texturing choose one of those blocks  to be the main block say for example a stone wall   i would then texture the walls with my additional  blocks this would mean placing no more than two  

Or three in a closed patch and making sure that  they are diagonal from each other and not side   by side or above each other because we don’t  want them to look like they are in one clump  

What this will do this will allow the wall to  look more even and make sure that your textures   are evenly coated through the wall and you’ll  have your main base wall as a rain color and   it just looks better in general rather than having  scattered blocks all over the place to create your  

Texture just go ahead add a few of them together  and make them evenly spread throughout the build   and it would look so much nicer in the end at this  point we need to remember to give the outside of  

The build as much love as we give the inside of  the build by this i mean things such as small   balconies small porches chimneys windows on the  roofs we can add little bushes outside of windows  

If you place a window put a little ledge there  add a flower pot put some flowers in there   add some color to the build these sort of things  are going to be the things that really make the  

Build stand out in the long run and don’t  be afraid to make any mistakes of it because   if there’s details that you put down that you  don’t like you can always remove them you can   always change them and add something else so mess  around of it add plenty of details and make sure  

That if you have anywhere like a large section  of wool make sure you do something to cover up   so that it doesn’t look so large and plain that  can be as simple as adding in a couple of windows  

And then maybe using some leafs to make some vines  up the wall to sort of fill in some of the area so   it doesn’t look like one big large blank spot  so adding in small details and scattering them  

Throughout the build is the best way to fill  it in and really bring that build to life now before we go i just have a few last  finishing tips for you so first of all   when you’re making your plans your builds  prepare for your odds and your evens for this  

I usually tend to use mostly odd numbers but there  are times when even numbers do work better for   example if you’re planning to build a whole wall  and you want a bunch of two-wired windows there   it’s likely that that wall is going to  work out better with the even numbers  

Now if you’re building a doorway and you  want it to be based around a center you’re   likely going to need an odd number but what  if you want to create a doorway with two doors   if you want two doors you’re likely gonna  need an even number for that doorway  

So you need to plan these in advance and make sure  that you make space for your even numbers and make   sure that your odd numbers for your centers  for your roof peaks and other things like that   now most of you are already gonna notice one  but leaves and flowers are your friends that  

Use them everywhere because they add so much to  a build now i say use them everywhere but there   are also a few things that you should be careful  with for one don’t use leaves for too many things  

For instance don’t use the same leafs that you’re  gonna use for building up the side of a house as   vines as you are gonna be doing hanging vines on  a house as you are going to be doing bushes and  

Trees and everything else don’t use all of the  same leafs make sure that they are varied for   instance i tend to use different leaves as vines  on a house compared to leaves i use in trees  

And different leaves that i use for bushes around  the house i do this so that we can see the break   in the textures and the variety in the different  leaves for different things which makes them stand  

Out and look more unique when it comes to using  the flowers make sure you don’t over do too many   colors in one area i like to use maybe two to  three colors of flowers and no more than that  

In one area if i move to a different area we  can change up the colors that’s not a problem   so if you’re doing one house and then you’re  doing a different house you can do different color  

Flowers on each house but around that one area of  the house just make sure you stick to sort of a   few colors and not too many because it just starts  looking a little bit too much and a bit too busy  

The next one is quite a common question i get  on the channel and that is people ask me how do   they texture exactly the way that i do now there’s  not really an easy way for me to tell you how to  

Texture exactly the way that i do other than to  just texture carefully with with minimal amount   don’t overdo the texture and try and add too many  blocks you know a little goes a long way when it  

Comes to texturing just make sure that it’s evenly  coated throughout your walls but the best thing i   can tell you is don’t be afraid of making mistakes  when it comes to texturing or any form of building  

You know we grow as people and as a builder and  anything else in life when we make our mistakes   mistakes are where we learn we learn from our  mistakes and we improve down the line so don’t   be afraid of ever making mistakes because  that is where you’re going to learn the most  

Now above all this guys i just want to make  it clear that no two builders built the same   way everyone has their own way they like to  build and their own way they like to do things   there is no right and there is no wrong so  above everything the most important thing is  

That you enjoy playing the game you enjoy what  you’re doing and it encourages you to do more   so have fun enjoy the process and  i’ll catch you in the next one