Square panels in a subdivided mesh
Over the past year or two I've been slowly building a model of an obscure aircraft for my dad, with the intention to print it for him. Now I'm mostly at the end, I'm realising I built it more for rendering than printing, and the STL is very faceted when exported.
My problem is, after applying a suvdivision modifier, I'm struggling to figure out a way to maintain the panel details. I'm currently using creases, but I've played around with edge and bevel modifiers before the subdivision, without being able to get any satisfactory results.
What's the best way to keep the panels and other details I have already added in without completely restarting from scratch? I feel like I'm missing a major chunk of knowledge after years of mostly just messing around with blender.