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Cleveland Institute of Art Spring Show

Posted by Dustin Shedlarski | Comments : (1)

Category : Design, Events, Sketch P*rn, Student Work

Tags: car design, cleveland institute of art, school, sketches, spring show

The Cleveland Institute of Art Automotive students put on a great show this year with a wide array of talent and skill sets. The work had a nice range from production ready concepts all the way to futuristic / entertainment designs. The show took place at the Peter B. Lewis Building on the campus of Case Western Reserve University. This building was designed by Frank Gehry and was quite an atmosphere to have a design show. The work shown was some of the best in years. Best of luck to the students in this hard time of finding design jobs.

If anyone has interest in the work shown and would like to inquire about the newly graduated, contact us and we can get you connected. There was a lot of work to look at so there will be two posts for the show. This way we won’t slow down the page loading.

Check back later for round 2.

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More pics after the jump…..

Lambo Toro A-GoGo!

Posted by Dalibor Dimovski | Comments : (0)

Category : Student Work

Tags: lamborghini, student, toro

Leave it to us automotive designers to rediscover the heritage of automakers through fun school/freelance projects! Jason Battersby, an industrial designer out of Canada, has dived (diven?) into the history of Lamborghini to uncover its sordid FARM-EQUIPMENT (GASP!) past! Battersby brought that full-circle in his concept for a modern Lambo tractor, named the Toro. Including all of the naughty bits of the Lambo aesthetic, the vehicle certainly appears as if it will be the fastest tractor on the lot. Of note, take a gander at the sweet theme exploration sketches leading up to the actual 3-D surface (and paper model).

Images below and after the break.

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Japanese Aesthetics in Design

Posted by Dalibor Dimovski | Comments : (0)

Category : Design, Student Work

Tags: aesthetic, Japan

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The one thing we can always count on in Japanese design is that aesthetics are important not only in the design industry, but also in the lifestyle of the citizens. From the culinary arts, to religion, to fashion, the visual aspect of life is an important part of Japanese culture. How a food is presented is just as important as how it tastes, if not more. It is then important to note how much aesthetics are important in the automotive industry of Japan.

Leon, an automotive design student at RMIT in Melbourne, Australia, has broken down the basic principles of Japanese aesthetics, and how they can help us better understand and work to Japanese design. Read the excerpt and follow the link for the full article.

Below are (one of the) four main aesthetic ideals/principles and their relevance to the nature of design and form:

WABI-SABI:

The aesthetic defined as the beauty of things “imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete”. This is the main principle that defines the way in which Japanese people view and design their material world. This ideal can be applied to all living and innanimate things in that it speaks of the transience of things- nothing is permanent and this is reflected in a Japanese person’s preference for something that is in bud or in decay as opposed to something that is in full bloom.

The full article can be found at Vehicle for Change

Cleveland Institue of Art: Class of 2009 Preview

Posted by Dalibor Dimovski | Comments : (5)

Category : Student Work

Tags: cia, cleveland institute of art

The Cleveland Institute of Art (CIA) will be holding its annual Spring Design Show from April 22-24 this year, showcasing some of the brightest young design talent from its graduating class. The work ethic enforced at CIA in recent years has begun producing some of the best fresh-out-of-school designers in the industry.

That’s why we were thrilled to have a peek at this year’s graduating class and their work. CIA sent along their 2009 graduating class’s preview, featuring a quick look at the work of the 9 class members. The format of the booklet is great: simple & clean, image-filled, and easy to find information on each student.

Follow the link below for some images and the full PDf file (with hi-res images) detailing the class, as well as the invitation to the Spring Show.

(Thanks, Brian!)

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The Lexus Nuaero: Part Sideview, Part Alias Exercise

Posted by Dalibor Dimovski | Comments : (0)

Category : Student Work

Tags: Lexus, student

Starting off with a sideview when sketching a car is always a smart thing to do. Now how you translate that to an actual vehicle, in actual 3-D, with an actual design theme can be a bit of a challenge.

The Lexus Nuaero is a sweet-looking side view. Translated into a full-on vehicle doesn’t work so well. The idea behind this concept from student Jon Rådbrink is of a new, highly aerodynamic philosophy that works like a hydrofoil on land. While it actually does have some Lexus brand in it, it also tends to sway towards the less-believable side and delve into wishful thinking.

Once again, great sideview sketch. I like the sensual lines that define the body silhouette (something that Lexus has lost over the years as it became a Lincoln/Caddy fighter) and the ovular glass reveals the occupant in a nice way, but the interior is lacking that extra finesse that the exterior does. A little more work and this could’ve been a great perspective sketch as well, but not yet. Some tweaking is needed.

One Software to Rule Them All

Posted by Dalibor Dimovski | Comments : (0)

Category : Design, Product Design, Student Work

Tags: adobe, illustrator, western washington university

Photoshop. Autostudio. Painter. Illustrator.

We all have our favorite software to design with. Each one is a versatile tool that, when used correctly, affects not only the visual communication of a design but the design itself.

Jason Morris, professor at Western Washington University’s ID department, compiled a research study (based on job postings on IDSA’s employment section of their Perspectives newsletter) over the last year & a half or so (March ’07 to Oct ’08) to deduce which pieces of software are most crucial, most used, and most demanded in our little industry. Now, the software used obviously changes depending on what part of the industry you design in, whether it is product, automotive, interface, etc, but the compiled list is a great generalization of the most prominent across all disciplines.

The champ of design software? Adobe Illustrator, by a slim margin over Photoshop. The top 3-D modelling software is Solidworks, which is gaining momentum in the Design industry.

Check out the full details of Morris’ study here.

Local Motors’ First Vehicle: Rally Fighter

Posted by Dalibor Dimovski | Comments : (0)

Category : Concept Car, Production Car, Student Work, Websites

Tags: Local Motors, rally fighter, sangho kim

Hot sketches? Check. Giant wheels? Check. Aggressive styling? Check. Production vehicle? Check..? Yes, CHECK.

Local Motors has released information on their first build, the “Rally Fighter” by recent winner Sangho Kim. The concept was born of true open-source thinking via LM’s Design Process community section of their website: Designer creates concept, community critiques concept, designer refines concept, community critiques again, and so on. To designers, the process is reminiscient of every college design course (and every succesful design studio) we had, with weekly critiques of our designs in efforts to make it better. (We’ll have more on the Design process in a future article). Kim’s concept was one of the first to utilize the Design Process, and did so effectively, evolving over the summer into the vehicle that you see in the images below.

The vehicle, although it will have to slightly morph to fit today’s safety and manufacturing standards, is a take on the stylish not-so-off-road genre that BMW, Audi, and even Hyundai are starting to take a look into seriously. Dubbed a “larger lighter-weight” car that is fuel-efficient, the Rally Fighter had it’s roots as a BMW-inspired concept, picking up the look of the X6 and eventually evolving the proportion and form language to become more unique. While not as outlandhish as many concepts we see come out of other design competitions (and other start-ups) the Rally Fighter has a clean, modern aesthetic that will aim to help define the Local Motors brand language.

If the final vehicle retains much of the “sketch on wheels” appeal of Kim’s concept, then the Rally Fighter will be a winner. With the help of LM team members such as Ben Messmer (Lead Designer at Local Motors) and their engineering staff and community, the project looks promising, and will be a nice way for the design communityto showcase itself in the increasingly open-source world that we live in. Congratulations to Sangho Kim, who’s having one heck of a summer!

Official press release (and a few more images) after the break.
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IED Students Design BMWs for 2015

Posted by Dalibor Dimovski | Comments : (3)

Category : Student Work

Tags: africa, BMW, ied, snug, turin

Recently completed by third-year students at Turin’s Istituto Europeo di Design was a BMW-sponsored project aimed at visualizing concepts for what a BMW would look like in 2015. With the theoretical deadline just a short 7 years away, the students reached as far as possible, stretching their creaitivity.

The project was overseen by BMW Design Chief Chris Bangle himself, with help from Thomas Plath, Director of Model Techniques and Process Management, and Anders Warming, BMW Exterior Design Director. The 35 students were divided into 18 teams to develop the vehicles, of which 12 were selected to be completed. Of those 12, 8 were turned into 1:4 scale models and 4 were CAD.

The specifications of the project included maintaining BMW’s design heritage, with an emphasis on nature (wind, the sea, flowing movement) and emotion (music, socializing, etc). While this Design language may seem very similar to the recent Mazda work being done, it led to several varied takes on the direction, from concepts that mimicked the “living” BMW Gina concept to vehicles straight out of “I, Robot”. Students had to focus not only on the exterior, but the interior as well.

BMW ZX-6 Concept by Jai Ho Yoo and Lukas Vanek

Take a look at several of the concepts after the break.

[Thanks to CarBodyDesign.com for the images and information]

Cleveland Institute of Art Spring Show

Posted by Dustin Shedlarski | Comments : (2)

Category : Design, Events, Student Work

It is always fun to see the ideas students bring to the world of design. Their unpolluted minds give a fresh perspective on what the youth of today wants in their driveway.

This years show consisted of almost 100 students (sophmores thru seniors) showing automotive, product, toy, and interior design. This translates into a lot to take in for one day.

The school year is over in a week or two and many already have internships lined up at companies like Honda, Toyota, Johnson Controls, Fisher Price and many product consultancies. This proves that it was a good show and the students have a lot of talent. Most of the pics in the gallery are from the junior class which shows they will be the ones to watch for next year when they are looking for full time positions.

Check out the gallery of the show and stay tuned as we visit the College of Creative Studies Show next week in Detroit.

Cleveland Institute of Art Spring Show

Lambo Toro A-GoGo!

Japanese Aesthetics in Design

Cleveland Institue of Art: Class of 2009 Preview

The Lexus Nuaero: Part Sideview, Part Alias Exercise

One Software to Rule Them All

Local Motors’ First Vehicle: Rally Fighter

IED Students Design BMWs for 2015

Cleveland Institute of Art Spring Show

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