[BrendanB]

A lot of people view powdercoating, anodizing, or painting as the standard for an attractive robot but teams like 233, 254, 696, 1538, and 118 add quality and attention to the small details that really make their robots attractive.

233, 254/696/1538 with CNC'd or waterjet parts & careful attention to detail on how they route their wiring completed with nice lexan paneling. They see the product through to completion and it shows.

118 seems to outdo themselves each year with their unique designs coupled with throwing their team number/logo in as many places as they can. You also can't beat that Nasa white and gold finish.

Teams like 2056 skip the color but still have beautiful machines by focusing on the quality of the product in every part they make.

Many teams push making the machine look good over getting it completed and performing which is a slippery tradeoff. Some teams overcome this by making the practice robot first while the competition robot gets colored and modified based on what they learn from their practice robot. Other teams (like some of the teams above and others) have integrated the coating process so well into their season that they can drop parts off in the morning and have them back that afternoon for assembly so it doesn't slow them down. Every team does this program for various reasons but you need to ask yourself what is more important: making a beautiful robot or making a performing robot. It is possible you can do both but for most teams with lower resources or experience doing both is harder.