I'm sure the devs already have heard the "We need better ship design" comments from various people—so that's not my purpose here, but rather to think up new ideas and places of inspiration from which the devs can pull:

Many of the ships in vendetta seem aircraft-like—I think these are some of the cooler looking crafts (vulture, IBG), and I think most will agree. However, there are some other ships that look more insect-like (Valkerie, Marauder)—they've got more weird projections, limbs, or antennae-like things (cannons on the valk). These are also very cool.

Some areas we don't see yet in ship designs, I think, are sea-like ships—base designs off of jellyfish (ie Man of War), squid, angelfish, and stingrays. These could make for good Itani designs, I think, since they are smooth and advanced-looking.

Spinier, boxier styles seem to belong to the Serco (and, in a different way, to the UIT). For the Serco, perhaps some plated, Samurai armor-like hulls, with the spines and nodules of more nasty-looking sea creatures could be used (ie, Anglerfish).

For the UIT, I'd suggest the something along the same lines, but more for cargo-hauling purposes than warfare. The UIT has the history of tinkerers and random builders, so perhaps they should have the least amount of coherent design in their ships—much like the Maud, but even flying "upright" (Slave-1 style), with asymmetrically piled boxes used for extra cargo space.

Post your ideas!

The UIT should have ships that appear somewhat modular, as if one person designed them and then others have added to it without fully intergrating it into the original ship. This would go along eith their stations which are built in the same way.

I always thought the valk should be more sleek looking. The current design always reminds me of a muscle car...

Yeah what Crip said.

yeah, I want the serco to be big, with thingys point off.

the wraith is the nerest thing to water ships.

I've seen the ship design contest, I think it's a great idea. Sadly my modeling skills are constricted to Bryce (big constriction) and Bryce doesn't export 3DS readily.
As for this post, my point was to create more of a think-tank operation for the modellers—some of them struck me as just a little bland. Maybe this topic should be a post in that thread, but it seemd mostly dedicated to contest entries instead.

i'd like to see some variant models for existing ships. for example:
the sky command prom could have a diferent engin configuration from other proms.

similarly the hog teratorial defender could have a longer cockpit.

subltel things like that that would add to the variaty of the game.

other than that, i'd definately like to see a sea-turtle inspired ship.

A saucer like ship twould be cool.

Or just a sphere...
and a transport consisting of a set of spheres, like LPG transports (http://mdn.mainichi.co.jp/national/0411/1118oman/ship.jpg)

Yes, Bryce is a huge disability.
http://www.evula.org/anubis/screenshots.html
"All of the ships, outfits, etc were modeled and rendered in Bryce 4."

well Bryce is a disability when it comes to game graphics, because it does not handle models in terms of a mesh. It handles objects in terms of primative objects that get booleaned to form more complex shapes.

I have this belief that different ship variants should have slightly deferent designs.

If you think about it, each variant could look different just by adding another engine or a bubble on the hull or an extra cannon.

Like the SCP should have 2L & 2S while the original Prom can have one gun where the turret is since it has only 1L.

Now you're probably thinking that this is a moronic idea because people never get close enough to recognize the details.

Simple, just make all ships large in size. Double the size of some ships. Besides many people are complaining about how the ships could obviously not hold a pilot and everthing else. SO make some ships bigger.
The REV C unlike the normal centurion has two gun ports so why not make it slightly fatter to show it's power.

~Cpt. Overkill~

Wow, that's impressive, Lemming. Bryce at its highest level indeed!

…

I like the variant idea. Perhaps the only problem there is that you'd need a seperate model for very small changes on the variants, and if the Devs've set one model for multiple ships that could make things take… longer.

I like the idea though.

A note on capital ship designs that I forgot about:

I think the capital ship we currently have is a great Serco design, aesthetically. Depends on how spiny you want Serco ships to be, but it's very jagged and very knifelike. Give it a red coat of paint and there's your Order of Akan killer.
As for the Itani's, what if we created a Eilon-like ship (Abbot of Eo from the Backstory)? The description was that it was giant, long, black with gold designs, and very smooth—Itani Capital ship. Or, you could go for the Crescent Warship design from EV Override (warning, 100x100, terrible: http://www.andrew.cmu.edu/user/dsghosh/evosite/images/ships/cresw.jpg ). Make that thing bigger than the current Cap, give it a matte black smooth hull with then cystalized, shimmering blue garnishes from the tip of the fuselage down to the joints of the wings.

I may crack open my old copy of Carrara and try to recreate that thing, if only so everyone can see it in a better view.