The Mercedes-Benz F 800 has style written over it, no really they even included it in the name.  So it must be stylish, right?  You should be able to come up with an attractive vehicle when you combine Audi, BMW and the new swoops of Hyundai.  Yes I just threw in Hyundai when talking about a Benz.  It is exciting though to see a relatively stodgy brand create a vehicle with such emotional surfacing.  The future is looking bright and curvaceous for the brand with the biggest front emblem.

The basic theme lines of the car are nothing really new but are executed in a precise manner.  The complex surfacing looks like Bangle stopped by to touch one more car.  If everything in between these lines was simplified the vehicle would result in a much classier execution.

The rear three quarter has a cool laid back appearance enabled by the downward arc of the DLO and fender crease.  The DLO does appear to sag a bit much in the rear and pinch the front quarter panel.  I think they took this line and added too much crown to it.  The rear lights are clean and simple but mimic too closely Audi and BMW.

The overall proportion of the side view is exciting.  The lines could use some more refinement though.  The front fender crease comes and goes causing some awkward twisting of the surface.  The rocker panel crease appears too flat and loses any dynamic quality.

For a design exercise this is a great attempt by a very conservative luxury player.  Some more refinement will do wonders and help bring in a whole new demographic of buyers.  Let the sport luxury wars begin.

[pics via Serious Wheels, Car Body Design]

The Limited Edition 2010 Rendered Hope Charity Calendar is about to finish printing.  There is only 2 weeks left to order!  This year’s calendar has already been a great success and surpassed last year’s sales.  The children at the Detroit Children’s Hospital are grateful.

Just a reminder that the calendar is full of transportation artwork from designers across the country and 100% of the profits go to the Children’s Hospital. This will truly be a collectors edition showing Sangyup Lee”s last sketches from GM.   He is now Chief Exterior Designer for VW at the Santa Monica Studio.

Click here to order yours today!!

Press Release after the jump….

Car Design Fetish Announces 2010 “Rendered Hope” Charity Car Design Calendar

Automotive design and enthusiast website coordinates with Children’s Hospital of Michigan and to provide toys for children at Detroit Medical Center from sales of the unique calendar.

Automotive design enthusiast website Car Design Fetish (www.cardesignfetish.com) has announced the availability of the limited edition “Rendered Hope” 2010 Charity Car Design Calendar, with all profits going towards the purchase  of toys for the Children’s Hospital of Michigan at the Detroit Medical Center.

With support from established designers at companies such as General Motors and supplier Johnson Controls, as well as design firm Future Elements and publisher Design Studio Press among others, the calendar contains beautiful artwork of vehicles in the artists’ individual art styles.  High-quality images of hot rods, race cars, and futuristic vehicles adorn each page along with a short biography of the designer.

The professional designers and artists who have supplied artwork for the calendar include Micah Jones, Scott Robertson, Dwayne Vance, Dustin Shedlarski, Arvind Ramkrishna, Raza Bashir, Sangyup Lee, Brian Stupski, Mark Weaver, Wayne Manista, and Charlie Smith.

Car Design Fetish will utilize the profits from the sales to purchase gifts for the patients at DMC’s Children’s Hospital of Michigan including Hot Wheels and other toys.  Sized at 11″ x 17″ the limited-edition calendar is on sale through December 31st, after which it will be removed from sale.
The calendar retails for $22.99 and can be ordered online at www.cafepress.com/cardesignfetish.416898679

————-

Car Design Fetish is a website blog aimed at sharing information, trends, news and tutorials amongst creative designers in the automotive and product design industries.  The website can be found at http://www.cardesignfetish.com

It’s here!!!  The 2010 Rendered Hope Charity Calendar featuring transportation artwork from professional designers.  This years calendar has a great mix of work from OEM, Hot Rod and Entertainment Designers.  There is feature artwork from the hot Camaro, Corvette Stingray Concept, Scott Robertson’s crazy ships, west coast Hot Rods and more!

Just like last year 100% of the profits will go toward buying Hot Wheels and toys for the Detroit Children’s Hospital annual Snow Pile Event.  This is a great cause that you surely want to support.

Head on over to our store at Cafe Press and buy the gift that gives 12 times a year!  This is a large calendar too at 11″ x 17″ with thick card stock and full bleed printing.  Very high quality.

The calendar is a limited edition print and will be on sale now through the end of the year.  So spread the word and get it while you can!

Buy It Here!

Here is a fresh dose of Automotive Sketch P*rn.  Enjoy the selection of loose sketches/ renderings to more dramatic paintings.  We will start off with the sketch of the new Fiesta.  Tomorrow we will be heading to Ford to review the new U.S. production version due out early next year.  Stay tuned for our review on it.  For now enjoy the P*rn!

We all know the amazing Syd Mead and all that he has brought to pleasure our eyes.  I came across an interview done by Adam Craft from InspireID.com.  Craft was able to speak to Mead about his vision before he puts pen to paper and how he immerses himself into the subject matter.  You can check it out here.  It is an interesting read but what really caught my attention is the slides how that was also provided.

It is also great to see a Master with 50 years experience let you in on his process.  His renderings always put you into a different world with his attention to detail and dramatic renderings.  Enjoy this slide show documenting Meads’ masterful rendering process.

While not sketches, per se, this latest video trailer for the upcoming Forza Motorsport 3 game is undoubtedly car porn.  Featuring my personal favorite vehicle to cause mayhem in, the V10 Audi R8, the teaser showcases some of the incredible in-game racing video.

And in case you’re wondering:  Yes, I already have it pre-ordered.  XBox Live Gamertag: kewlrats

There isn’t really much to say about today’s Sketch P*rn, other than it is the GREATEST COLLECTION OF CAR SKETCHES IN THE HISTORY OF EVER.

There, now that my initial glee has subsided feel free to have a look at this incredible collection of sketches courtesy of Marek Simko that includes work from designers, students, and enthusiasts across the industry.  From initial hand sketches to glossy renderings and everywhere in between, Simko’s wall of wonder is a great source of inspiration and technique.

My personal favorites include some of the BMW form studies, the highly-technical Audi illustrations, and the marker & ink work that appears ready to be hung on a wall.

Simko also coagulates his vast collection of sketches into a semi-regular (and limited-edition) art magazine for sale.  Carr Magazine includes high-quality versions of the sketches on his website, and makes for some great coffee-table fodder.

Check it out at www.simkom.com/sketchsite

Recent CCS grad Dave Owsen has posted his renderings to Coroflot for the Hyundai Swap concept, a vehicle whose interior is hot-swappable.  Using simple linework and shading, with color only where needed, Owsen’s sketches pop off the page.  The renderings are almost whimsical in nature:  the vehicle comes alive, is friendly, and has a nice stance all with his use of clean graphic breakups.

The thick linework has an almost cartoon feel to it, and coupled with more detailed renderings for the interior create shots that are nice design studies without overdoing it.  Students: sometimes you don’t need to go balls to the wall with a rendering.  Leave a little to our imaginations.

More images after the break.  [via core77 and Owsen's Coroflot page]

Here is a great article writen by Brian from Problem Child Customs (PCK) talking about the lack of excitement in photochops and 3d models that we see all too often in car design.  What about the emotional sketch?  This is where “Gonzo” comes in.  Read on to find out about Gonzo Design.  This is something we all need to get back to…..

Gonzo Hot Rod Design

19 JUN 09- Some years ago, I was introduced to the work of a journalist named Hunter S. Thompson. Bear in mind that this “introduction” came at a pivotal point in my creative career, and I was completely drawn to his style of not only writing, but his almost renegade technique of forming a story. Here was a journalist who not only covered the news at hand, but worked in a personal angle, often thrusting himself so deeply into the event he was covering so as to alter its outcome! “Absolute brilliance”, I thought! Not mere “coverage” or “reporting”, but LIVING it! This was just too much… This guy GOT it! To a student of Fine art, this was the epitome of “creating” anything: the EXPERIENCE… being a PART of what you’re creating!

Thompson’s style of news came to be known as “Gonzo Journalism”, and the name packs the energy rightfully reserved for this all-out, sensory attack, in which the writer himself becomes an integral part of the story. Somewhere between the facts, self-interjection and commentary, the truth lay in wait. This was the sort of writing I had done since I could first form sentences… I had found someone who had paved the way before me, and man, I was digging this. Taking something that has always been deemed as objective, and beating it into something much cooler and entertainingly subjective… showing that a subject or event could have an effect on the writer, and then, at times becoming a part of that story was just simple logic to me… After all, how interesting is just blowing some facts all over a sheet of paper or computer monitor?! Stirring in (or up!) some emotion is key to creating compelling content. Anyone can say “gee, Stan… there was this one guy, and he said this, and the other guy said that. Then they shook hands.” Wow. Not sure about you, but I’M drained from that story. What a cathartic experience… or NOT. Thompson would become the center of his work, very often blurring the line between “reporting” facts and “influencing” a story. He interjected opinion, an energy, and most of all, an experience.

That said, I began to look at this field of automotive art that I work in, and feel a bit depressed. It’s gone from the fun, energetic industry to a machine full of photo-real, computer-generated imagery lately. The landscape is littered with 3-D models and tracings of the same-old, same-old.

Does anyone just DRAW anymore?!

The creative projects… the REALLY wild customs and out-of-the-box hot rods are the ones that inspire and push the hobby to that next level… they’ve become fewer and further between. It’s become… well, “safe”. We’re flooded with near stock-looking blah-mobiles drawn with a lack of personality, often with the actual car being just the same bland cookie-cutter crap over and over again. Wow… a photo-real 3D model of a ‘69 Camaro on aftermarket wheels… just like those other ones! What the hell happened?! It was as though Henry L. Mencken’s “bathtub hoax” had brought new life in the car community. As though someone started the rumor that renderings needed to be sterile, lackluster depictions of some uniform style, and by golly, the whole group jumped the bandwagon, eating up the words and carrying it right into the common belief system they’d developed. Worse yet, I saw it start to occur in my own work as well from time to time, and it made me take a step back, and in doing that, I had a moment of absolute clarity.

I took the past couple of months and began heading back to what made this whole automotive illustration gig so appealing to me at the start: The ENERGY!! I pondered just what makes a rendering so valuable to a project, and beyond the financial (sponsor opportunities, press, etc) and communication (illustrating the modifications) value, it all boils down to CREATING EXCITEMENT! Simply looking at a photograph of a car can be cool, sure, but you’re seeing something COMPLETE, FINISHED… and it removes the emotional response, the natural impulse to IMAGINE… To look at the idea SUBJECTIVELY!! By leaving just enough to the imagination, just enough room to interpret something, some part as YOUR OWN, you don’t just LOOK at the work, you EXPERIENCE it!!

This is why I leave some loose lines among the tightened concepts, some free-form areas to chance… I’m not nailing down parts, bit by bit from some “rule book” (“18’s and 19’s? Check. Suspension lowered exactly like every other car on that forum? Check. Billet parts here, here and here? Check. Correct valve covers so as to avoid the wrath of the “Traditional Police”? Check, check!”), I’m inventing a concept to be shared, interpreted… EXPERIENCED by not only the owner or builder of the car, but anyone who happens upon it. Anyone (and I repeat ANYONE… you, your kids, your neighbor’s Grandmother) with access to a 3D model, or some tracing paper and a few pencils and markers, or worse yet, Photoshop, Google and some time can bash out a lifeless, non-creative turd, and have it celebrated by the easily duped masses… but the ones who can hammer down a concept, and show some life in the lines, some ENERGY… man… those are the pieces that stand up to time, and drop their pants at the lesser crap. Compare a Charlie Smith rendering to some Photohack from a guy in a forum. Name your three favorite Harry Bradley renderings, or Steve Stanford concepts, or Larry Wood designs. Easy, right? Now try to do the same for three photochops or 3D models. That’s a pretty tough one, huh? And do you like those pieces you named because the artist kissed your ass on some online forum, or because the work stood out, elicited a RESPONSE in you? Pretty creepy realization, huh?

I’m not about to fall victim to this absolute “dumbing-down” of the hot rod and custom car industry… Rather, I’m adopting the “Gonzo” style, and going at it with the passion that brought me here to begin with. What’s great is that I’ve never really fit in to begin with, so if anyone takes offense or has their feelings hurt by my shift in priorities, I certainly don’t have to hear the whining, or fear some drop in the number of cards sent my way over the Holidays. It’s just me, my art, and the drive to push it until the son of a bitch breaks from the altitude. I’m not about to fall victim to trends… to having the need to be accepted because I’m doing the same thing fifteen other guys are currently latching onto. Never had a trendy hairstyle or shoes or pants, either. I think I’ll manage without being “in”.

Our pal Hunter (from the start of this whole mess) stated that “he that is taught only by himself has a fool for a master”. Grand advice… and a central theme here in the Studio. Draw inspiration from as many sources as possible! I’m often looking to objects or art forms so removed from cars that even I begin to wonder how they’ll apply… and it’s a blast! I’ll look at a painting and consider the brush strokes, and experiment, seeing how they might work in a current or future piece. Perhaps there’s a rhythm in a song that just makes sense when laying down the lines on some graphics… It can come from almost anywhere. The key here, though, is KNOWING YOUR SUBJECT.

INTIMATELY.

Simply hacking a few photos together, or painting some digital model or tracing a picture doesn’t grant you any more knowledge of designing a hot rod or custom car than does accidentally bumping a car in the parking lot with your shopping cart. When you take time to know the car, to understand the parts and pieces that make the whole… to look into the designer’s mind and grasp where he was going and WHY, well, you’re starting to grasp the idea. You’re in no position to modify that car until you understand it. Going back to Dr. Thompson for a second (after all, he’s the reason we got rolling on this anyway), he once wrote that “Fiction is based on reality unless you’re a fairy-tale artist, you have to get your knowledge of life from somewhere. You have to know the material you’re writing about before you alter it. ” Incredibly wise indeed, and the big “why” that so many of these sterile, cold “renderings” lack that “punch”… the thrill, the excitement of a GREAT piece… the ones that make you take a step backward and yell “BITCHIN’, MAN”!!

I want MY work to be like that!

With all of that strewn on the table, I’m going to go back into the Studio and tear the next project a new one. I challenge you to go and do the same in the shop, and wow the snot out of everyone who experiences your Gonzo build.

Sketches done by PCK

I’m a sucker for cool automotive vehicle surfacing and renders.  Bruno Delusso has added to that addiction, bringing forth his incredibly hot Bugatti Stratos concept done in Alias.  Did I mention it’s hot?  Yes.

Utilizing influence from many classic Italian veehicks, Bruno incorporates some flame styling into the tension of the lines on the bodyside, incorporating graphic breaks via outlines and shapes strewn throughout the surface.  The shapes and break-ups capture a bit of old iron: Art Deco locomotives would feel right at home with this as a sibling.  The Bugatti cues are there, as well as the love of streamlining and speed forms.

It’s waaay out there as a design, but sexy nonetheless!  Check out the sweet images after the break, and then go on ahead to Bruno’s website to see the rest of his great work, including his gaming, non-automotive, and graphic design projects.

[Images courtesy Bruno Delusso via Autoblog]