What kind of car design blog would we be without our own slew of Camaro pics. We didn’t want to be the only ones left out, so we headed over to Royal Oak, MI where there was a rumor that the Camaro would be out for show after the official unveiling at the GM Tech Center. Sure enough there she was with a crowd of people drooling uttering the word, finally. This is one great looking car that America should be proud to show off. There couldn’t be a better time to boost morale with the way things are right now.

On the design side, the car is clean and fairly simple. No tricky flame surfacing here. The interior also has a fresh look to it. Simple lines creating a nice flow of surfaces combined with great details push this interior to the top of all GM cars. There is also great attention paid to the start-up experience. Ambient lighting reacts to the ignition when starting the vehicle. You can check out a demo of it here.

Pricing has not been announced, but if they can keep the entry level around 20 g’s the Mustang will have a lot to worry about. As for the Challenger, this is not the same buyer so there is not much of a comparison. Fat and bloated compared to athletic and taught usually doesn’t win over. We also appreciate a new design with an innovative interior rather than a reskinned, regurgitated design and a poor interior.

As tired as we are of hearing about this new ride it is one of the few bright spots in the industry. It will be fun to see how fast and well this car takes off. Check out all of the pics in the gallery.

Due to the summer being a typically lackluster time of year for new vehicle releases (unless you’re Chevrolet) design studios tend to branch out and, err, TRY a few things.  It is this time of year that we see all manner of products come from these studios, usually as a Design House in collaboration with some other product entity.

We’ve seen LaCie’s Porsche-designed hard drives, watches from Ducati, bobsleds from Lotus, and even foosball tables from Audi.  While this has been a regular part of the design world for decades, we are seeing the current crop become all the more “in our faces” as the automotive market remains in a lull and the studios look to work outside of the auto industry.

Which brings about a great question:  When is it too much?  Or, is it EVER too much?  Should auto industry studios be MORE involved in the rest of the design world, spreading their talents into areas where Design is sorely missed?

Let us know in the comments, and click the link for more images.

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So this weekend I had the privelage to drive a 2004 BMW M3 SMG which my brother had just purchased.  This M3 is pre flame design and some would say the last good looking Beemer.  Styling aside the real hoot with this car is the almost infinite settings to drive it.  Currently we are bombarded with NAV, radio, HVAC,…..settings to customize our driving experience.  But what about actually driving it?

Many cars now have the “automanual, or triptronic” transmissions to allow you to “shift” when you are in the mood.  The shifts are usually slow and better off just leaving it in D mode. Read more

It’s not often we dive into the world of the ridiculously rich and famous, as our Design instincts regularly tell us that great design doesn’t typically float in their oceans of gaudiness.  However, to further along my inability to tell a story with very, very bad boating-related puns have a look at the latest creation from Philippe Starck: the Motor Yacht A, designed for Russian uber-billionaire Andrey Melnichenko and his uber-hot wife Aleksandra.

Melnichenko, the bad boy of Russian wealth (aren’t they all?) commissioned Starck to create this epic yacht design, throwing away the typical rules of boats of the redonkulously rich in favor of a vessel that can scare the bejeezus out of paddle-boats in its way.  Opting for a sleak, streamlined design, with a more enclosed body (read: none of the crazy amounts of open decks), we can only imagine that Starck’s vision was for a menace on the ocean, able to conjure up images of Battlecruisers and war boats of the 40s.

Leave it up to us Designers to throw a monkey wrench into yet another industry, and leave it up to Russian billionaires to use that wrench in excess.

More photos after the break. Images courtesy YachtSpotter.com and SuperYachtTimes.com.

(Thanks, Sean!)

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BAM! The pics of the 2010 production RS Camaro reveal were picked up early by our friends at CarTribe, and are about to break the internet.

We’ve seen the concept at the NAIAS, and the mules on the road.  Now, we get to see this beauty all fluffed up and purrrrty!  Strictly focusing on the styling, this car is excellently designed.  From the aggressive retro design, to the tight lines, to the graceful tapering of forms, this design is memorable and instantly iconic.  The individual groups of dual tail lamps are done well, although it would have been nice to space them apart a little more.  The front end follows the trend of modern muscle cars to have the wide horizontal break-up with inset head lamps.

The only real issue I see here is thecrazy section of the side where the surfaces door, windows, and body all come together in an awkward corner.  It creates a slightly forced cut line there.

The interior is all Camaro, placing (sometimes needless) gauges everywhere.  The dual guages in the IP are a nice design touch.  The seats are exciting and fresh.

Overall, I have a hard time disliking this vehicle.  This is the peak of modern muscle car design, and will remain a great design for years after.

Full pics after the break.

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No, this is not the Aquada water car. This is the Luso Motors LM23.
Luso, not generally known for exciting new concepts, released the first images of their LM23 roadster to the public recently.  Our first thoughts were “this car is Product Design, not Automotive Design,” but after a second examination we had a different opinion.

First and foremost, the vehicle images are still just glossy renderings, not actual prototypes.  This instantly takes away credibility from a new product launch — so much more to a vehicle’s appearance relies on the build, as things can change drastically from data to sheet metal.

The vehicle is a giant graphic, thanks to the horizontal color separation from color to black along the sides.  The details are interesting, as the twin exhaust pipes are up high.  The slits along the back behind the seats are an interesting feature, but overall are used to just break up the space.  There is a lot of geometric form language on the vehicle, with no real elements to tie it all together.

Overall, this vehicle has an aesthetic rating of: “meh”.   It’s a departure from traditional vehicle designs, but not in the “OMG I WANNA BUY IT” kind of way.  Nice little details could be carried over into other LM vehicles.

Click the link for more photos renders.  All images courtesy Luso Motors.

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This weeks WOTW (or should we just call it “WOW”?) is Yanko Design. One of the top design sites out there, I’m amazed that we haven’t really posted much about it in the past. Yanko is focused on Designers showcasing their own work. By sending an article, info about your design, or images over to the crew, Yanko posts it or posts about it. The fantastic thing about that is its constant influx of Design-related information: Yanko typically gets information about a product before anyone else.

Think of it as a way for Designers to pimp themselves. Get on Yank = instant notoriety for you or your product.

Great site, great product design focus, and great way to kill an entire Friday afternoon.  Check them out at www.YankoDesign.com

If the auto industry ever wanted a fresh start……I mean when the auto industry begins reinventing how they do business, Apple would definitely be a company to look into for guidance.  I can’t think of too many companies or products now a days (except for the Wii) that can form waiting lines for days to buy a product that has already been out for a year.  Imagine if cars were that sought after.  There’s a thought, get people to dare I say “Lust” after cars again.

Check out the article below from Advertising Age.  They do a great job of aligning the auto industry with Apple.  Let us know what you think after you read it.  Would it work?  It is a great article and a good end note to end the week.  What if the industry……..

What the Auto Industry Can Learn From Apple

IPhone Stampede Offers Lessons in Total Transformation

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“And here we…..GO!” With the Dark Knight movie exploding into theaters July 18, there is plenty buzz about how incredible this movie really is! The latest for the Caped Crusader throws him under the deranged claws of the maniacal, homicidal, psychopathic killer known as the JOKER!

I remember watching the campy 60’s movie starring Adam West and Burt Ward in “Batman” with my older brother for the first time. I was probably around 7 or 8. We would “surf” through the channels, all 13 of them, ripping through that sundial shaped channel knob on our state of the art Zenith TV. Suddenly!!! An out of shape middle aged man in tights and blue satin, dawning the prominent symbol of the bat, along with his panty hose wearing boy wonder side kick, Robin, were climbing the side of a fake Styrofoam brick building. My brother and I looked at each other in complete shock and awe, not because Batman had forgotten to take few laps around the track, but because we could not believe we were watching an actual Batman movie!! We had read the comic books, purchased the action figures, but never saw him in real life!! That was the coolest thing!
Ahhhh….those were the days. How things have evolved and progressed….or in some cases…digressed if looking at director Joel Schumacher’s movies. Recently resurrected from the grave in 2005 with the successful Batman Begins, the Batman Franchise has undergone numerous transformations through the years starting with the campy 60’s series (not to forget the early series in the 40’s as well) starring Adam West and Burt Ward in Batman. Twenty three years later, the world was given a true visual treat with Tim Burton’s perspective on a serious, dark, and gothic rendition of the Batman in 1989.

No matter how campy, serious, or ridiculous the script was; the creators and designers for the vehicles and props were always dedicated to providing the audience with the best they had to offer. Each batmobile had evolved to bring to the audience something new and exciting. Let’s take a look at these films.
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Baseball, apple pie and Chevrolet are all things you associate with the great U.S.  Another big one is our military.  When you think of weapons, tools for the military, what comes to mind…….Hummer.  In my opinion Hummer is one of the great American Icons and is a great way to tie our troops and their contributions to our everyday life.  You can not help but think of them whenever climbing in and out or looking out those squatty windows of a Hummer.

Just like we support our troops, why can’t we support our brands.  This whole talk of selling off Hummer really pisses me off.  I know this is now a global economy, but an American brand owned by a company from India…c’mon.  I guess we should get used to this kind of thing.  I just heard that Budweiser was sold and is now owned by a Belgium Company.  Sure the Belgiums make a better beer, but Bud, the King of Beers is as American as mullets.

Back to Hummer, GM has a gold mine waiting to happen.  Yes, I know about the whole gas thing but hear me out.  Read more