What do the transformers (autobots/decepticons) look like before they take the form of a vehicle?

Like before they scan a vehicle to transform into it, do transformers just look like regular robots with no vehicle parts?What do the transformers (autobots/decepticons) look like before they take the form of a vehicle?If you mean the movie Transformers then Yes and No. Every Transformer changed into something on Cybertron, but underneath every Transformer is a Protoform, their original body that can scan and obtain a new transformation any time.

The ones who came to earth as a comet did so by transforming into a flyer mode. They shed their outer layer which would be most of their alt. mode when they fly through space. Space debris and other matter (space dust, forming ice) gathers and creates a protective barrier for re-entry into a planet's atmosphere. Once landing the robot scans a new alt. mode and, using nearby raw material and/or whatever metal they have gathered on their body, create their desired transformation.



Megatron is the big exception, his Cybertron mode was an alien jet and he followed the All-spark to earth all the way from Cybertron. His entry on to earth made him so red hot that when he landed in the arctic the ice melted beneath his feet and trapped him.

The Decepticons who joined the battle in the dessert didn't get alt. modes because they were created to die, nothing more, don't worry about them.

Starscream's Cybertronian mode was his space flyer mode, and Optimus' was a flying truck-thing shaped like his flyer mode



In the original story Transformers have a transformation that's part of their body, but after coming to earth they were given disguises that mimicked earth technology, but also resembled their original transformation. Optimus Prime was a Cybertronian truck with optional camper-trailer but when he came to earth he was given a Semi and trailer vehicle mode. Megatron was a tank but was given a (mass-changing) Walther P-38 hand gun transformation due to his body's gun barrels.

Hundreds of years later in the Beast-era Transformer bodies began life as a fine nano-bot shell containing their Spark (Transformer life force) called a Protoform. When their stasis pod scans for a suitable transformation an outer body is formed and the robot comes online. The protoform looks like liquid metal but it's actually millions of fine tiny nano-bots that will adapt and comprise their new form (one of the ideas Michael Bay lifted for his movie but changed)What do the transformers (autobots/decepticons) look like before they take the form of a vehicle?I can only come up with one time when we see a Transformer before they have scanned/received any alternate-form, and that's in the Beast Wars episode "The Spark." Before she comes on-line, Airazor is seen as what appears to be a mass of silvery liquid metal, which stabilized into a rather featureless robotic form.



The only other instances I can think of where a Transformer did not have a locally scanned alternate form, they were at least implied to have had an alternate form native to Cybertron, which gave some definition to their robot mode even if we never saw the alternate form in question.What do the transformers (autobots/decepticons) look like before they take the form of a vehicle?duhhh