I saw this video today and it is really something to see. The KillaCycle is the world’s quickest electric bike and on their website it states, “It is the quickest electric vehicle of any kind in the quarter mile”.
The power and the speed of this bike is one thing but what else is interesting is the silence. Being electric it doesn’t make any noise as it waits for the light, which makes for a usual scene for a dragstrip.
Imagine trying to decide which color combination on a new Ferrari California will look the best in your driveway. Wouldn’t that be a nice problem to have? Continue reading Color-Up Your Own Ferrari California
It was a busy weekend but I wanted to follow up on the BatSmart auction on eBay I blogged about earlier. The auction ended last Thursday as a no sale, with the reserve not met at $16,100.
I saw today that the BatSmart concept car that I blogged about earlier which was featured at the 2008 SEMA Show is now for sale on eBay. Per the eBay description George Barris, the designer of the original Bat Mobile, acted as a consultant to Hurley Motorsports who built the concept.
Find out more about Hurley Motorsports.
Do you like vintage speed decals as much as I do? I came across this posting called “The logos of Speed & Power” by Ryan at JalopyJornal.com. In the posting Ryan laid out 69 of his favorite old logos.
But the fun doesn’t stop there. If you go to the bottom of the page and click “Comments on the H.A.M.B.” you will see even more logos posted by members of the H.A.M.B.
Whether you are an automotive artist or a graphic designer these logos are a great source of logo reference and inspiration.
If you know of any other places to see logos like these please add it in the comments or contact me.
In the Hemmings Newsletter this week I saw that Dean Jeffries has a new book out called “Dean Jeffries: 50 Fabulous Years in Hot Rods, Racing & Film”.
Dean is a legendary car builder who was behind such creations as the Mantaray, the Monkeemobile, the Green Hornet’s Black Beauty plus a lot of other cars.
The write up about the book says it gives Jeffries’ own account of the circumstances behind the famous TV and movie cars as well as his relationships with personalities such as A. J. Foyt, Steve McQueen, James Dean, Bruce Lee, Parnelli Jones, and Elvis Presley. In the video Dean talks about doing some of the movie stunts.
I think this book will be a definite must have. If you already have a copy, tell me what you think of it.
I just finished this artwork of a Maserati Ghibli. I like the Ghibli because of it’s long low shape and it’s shark-like front end. Below is a quick video that will help give you an idea of what I am talking about.
The Maserati Ghibli was styled by Giorgetti Giugiaro and debuted in 1966 at the Turin Motor Show.
Under the hood Maserati used a detuned version of its quad-cam V8 racing engine. The engine used dry sump lubrication, which meant that the oil is held in a separate tank and pumped around the engine.
For more information about the Maserati Ghibli check out Wikipedia.
The Bosozoku car craze in Japan could best be described as a cross between an anime cartoon and an art car. While the modifications aren’t what you would consider performance enhancing they do come with a certain level of creativity. I came across this post “Video: Japan’s Bosozoku roll deep, phat, loud and weird” the other day. I looked around for more information and found this video. What do you think about the Bosozoku craze?
It looks like Batman now has a gas-saver to run around Gotham.
George Barris is showing his new “smart” concept of the Batmobile at the 2008 SEMA show this week. Based on the popular SmartCar, I guess Batman could use it driving around picking up parts for all his cool tiny gadgets.
I grew up a big fan of the 1960’s TV show and I’m a big fan of George’s work. I once met him at a World of Wheels show.
Read and see more pictures about BatSmart on Autoblog.com.
Find out more about George Barris at his website.
In a news article I read recently, automotive paint supplier PPG issued its annual forecast of popular automotive colors and they predict that blues will take on an important role in car styling. The article also stated that DuPont has seen a resurgence of blue being used.
Knowing color trends are important when creating concept artwork. When I was doing research on colors to use for the TATA Nano concept artwork, I noticed a lot of blues being used on many of today’s customized imports. In fact, the purple Nano in the artwork was originally blue until I changed it after deciding to use blue in the background to compliment the TATA logo.
So if blue is going to be the color for the future, what are the top colors now? As far as the top color, silver wins out over all others. The colors after silver are white, black, and red, in that order.
I tried to found more information about PPG’s report on their website, but couldn’t find anything. To read the news article I read, check out “Paint maker PPG sees blue as car color of tomorrow”.
