July 7, 2026: Please Pass The Greeblies

You may not be familiar with the word greeblie, but if you've seen a sci-fi spaceship, you've likely seen greeblies in action. They're the small details used to add complexity to a shape.

 

Adam Savage was a professional model maker for Star Wars movies, so he has a lot of experience adding greeblies to projects. He has a great deep-dive video. There are greeblies in that video too, but he speeds through adding them without the deeper insights of the first video.

 

Handmaking is the traditional way to make these kinds of models (and is a lot of fun), but digital tools have expanded what's possible. Digital sculpting tools and 3d sculpting get better every day, and a perfect example of what has become possible recently is this video from Tabletop Time. They built a diorama of the Death Star trench run with a combination of digital sculpting and traditional greebling. There's a flash of NSFW text in that video, if that matters to you.

 

I've used bits of Adam's advice when customizing toy vehicles for Car Wars, and you might find some of the advice in these videos useful for your next project.

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