This Lego A-Team Van Ideas project has come a long way. Below is a Lego Digital Designer (LDD) screenshot from early on in the design process. The version used to launch this Lego Ideas project hardly bears any resemblance to these humble beginnings. When designing, I use the Extended mode, where all the pieces are red until you recolor them. Usually I will "sketch" out a basic design using bricks, then keep refining. Each time I make a change, I make a copy of the model, so I can go back to the previous one, or compare them side by side. When LDD starts getting slow, I will delete the copies, and start the process over from the most recent iteration.

The above screenshot was about one week into the design process. Originally the van was going to be 6-wide. Then I had a change of heart and decided to make it 8-wide, so minifigs could sit side-by-side. By making it 8-wide, I pretty much had to start from scratch, but it opened up lots of new possibilities, including room for the double-hinged door mechanisms, a more accurate looking front grill, and better design of the roof lights. Changes to the 8-wide model were happening so quickly, I forgot to take more screenshots. Three weeks later, the Lego A-Team Van Ideas project was ready for its debut.

In the almost-final version, the visor was not part of the removable front roof panel. (That panel is removed in the above screenshot, hence roof lights are not visible.) I made a few more design changes after receiving the parts from bricklink.com, and I actually started building it. The final changes are present in the LDD instructions download.