Car design is harder than I had thought... help please

Which one? I know that Ed Wickham and Hideo both were at AiReseach at LAX and Dave Bell was at Burbank before moving up to the Oakland/Berkely area.

Jeff

 

Mike Reese
don't remember the name of his company,but IIRC,he was based out of Texas

 

I loved that car!

Thanks for the story/example.

 

Yup. Probably the richest out of any of the graduates from their design work. Last I knew he even owned a Hawker 800 of his own. Reese Design of Austin, TX. Did Adnan Khassoggi's DC-8 and then ultimately a string of aircraft and helicopters for the Sultan of Brunei. Massively expensive designs for the Sultan and paid handsomely above and below the table for each over the course of about 15 years. G-IIIs, G-IVs, 5 x G-V, A-310, several A-340s, 2 x 747SP, 747-400, 767, an assortment of Sikorsky Blackhawks.

Jeff

 

well I wasn't going to get into that.............but when I read how much $$ he gave to the school.........made my eyes water
sure beats drawin' cars for a living!!!

 

His donation had him on the Board of the school for a while too. Don't know why he left the board.

When Reese Design disolved all the senior people walked away with over $1mil; some with much, much more. It was like a Kiretsu of all the suppliers that worked on the various projects. They talk about which ring of how close to Michael they were which meant how rich they got doing his projects.

Jeff

 

He is a talented designer,no question.He & I were in the same classes till @ 5th semester,then he stayed in Product Design while I went into Trans. Guess I just had to be a car shader.....he went where the $$$ was.

 

i will, thank you

John, how do you start /define a project for students? ...is it more general or pretty detailed from the get go?


Jeff those are cool! ...i worked for a spell in the mid-east, so i can see it in there, it's different than western tastes for sure
i obviously went in the wrong line of work, by the sounds of $ a few guys have made

 

I can only speak for my class,but I teach the Seniors that are either graduating,or have 1 more semester to graduate.So,the Senior Studio class almost always has a sponsored project from an OEM.Toyota,Honda,Chrysler,Lincoln,GM,Nissan,and a number of other mfg. sponsor the semester's project.Generally,the OEM will give the class a design brief that sometimes is very specific: design a Lincoln for 2025,or sometimes very open-ended:design a car for Gen Y for 2025.Last semester Chrysler gave the Junior Class the assignment to design a race car for whichever type of racing they were interested.Some chose land speed record cars,F1 cars,Indy cars,off road racing trucks,etc.There were some very cool solutions.
Each student then has to come up with what I refer to as their "big idea",i.e.,what is the design solution all about in 2 sentences or less!How does their solution solve the design brief.After they have completed several weeks of research,problem solution,etc.then & only then do they start sketching.Paper or digital.They also at that point start to develop the package we referred to earlier.Design should take place from the inside out.
Once they have their package,big idea,research,sketches,we choose their direction with the help from the designers that the sponsor company provides.As you might imagine,some companies get very involved..........some not so much.Once there is agreement on a direction,the students develop their clay models.Once the models are finished & painted..........presentation to the client/sponsor.Usually it's to the VP of Design or their rep. and members of the sponsoring companies Design staff.

 

John, hope the folks aren't spending too much time on the "define the audience" presentation boards. Yes, they need to have a feel for the target group but all those boards with clippings from an assortment of magazine was one of the most insane activities I could ever think of. First, there should be a reasonably intrinsic understanding of the audience and overall trends anyway. If it takes too much effort to explain why something makes sense or looks right then it probably doesn't. Chuck Jordan was probably right - the designer that uses words in lieu of designer needs to be somewhere else.

Where I would give some credence to some of the thought process that goes into the "style board" would be if there is a different market segment that the group is not intrinsically familiar with. As an example, suppose someone wanted to make a new super luxury entrant in the Bentley and RR arena. It might not be reasonable for the young designers in a studio to be familiar with big corporate jets and 150'+ yachts that would be normal for these people. Examples of this stuff is not just sitting out there for the general populace to see. But it doesn't take a lot to grasp some of this quickly. Instill the learning into the designs not design the presentation of how one can define the people.

Jeff

 

I'm with you %100.However,the students are taught early on to make use of the "inspiration" boards.Some of that is fine,but there is a tendency to define a very specific customer:"Joe Belchmore from E.Jesus,Iowa" who likes cats,walks on the beach,and has 2 kids,etc.For me,that's wayyyyy too specific.Just figure who the users are,figure out what they like,what they do,etc, & move on.One of the trends these days are for design/research people to actually go into customer's homes,and see how they live,get them to talk about cars,and figure out what they want,but don't know it yet.IMO,the old focus groups are a waste of time & $$.Everyone wants to please the moderator,and not talk about what they REALLY think.Tell you one thing........then go out and buy/do just the opposite." I want high milage,safety,green,reliable,blah,blah,blah",but uh,i'm not willing to pay for it.

 

Big yep! First, asking the general public to define the future 5 years out is a farce. The ultimate falacy of the focus group is that the sample is going to be able to look forward instead of defining the future market as a reflection of what they see in their neighbor's driveway today. They rarely if ever see or recognize the larger design trends going on. To those of you in the trade you live that today is already old news and 3 years out is now. And the corporation is in fear that their vision of where it is all headed to in the 3-5 year horizon is not fundamentally flawed or that some absolutely unforseen occurrance will not blow apart all assumptions. Credit melt down, $4 gas, the prior gas crises, massive swing in currency valuations, etc.

For my aircraft I can define a singular client. It is a custom creation for them with all of their quirks. The car is a mass market issue (even for a Ferrari). As such they have to appeal to a more typical demographic for each niche. Like you say, get the basic story close enough then go create. I guess it makes the folks feel good that the designers can make charts and graphs and demographic profiles like the product planners and marketing departments. Lutz is right that the organization wants to believe in the MBA statistical analysis rather than good sense. Of course all this is what gets one to believing that an Aztec was a good solution when everyone's eyes were telling them different. [not tryoing to rehash the Aztec and I know how talented Tom Peters really is]

Jeff

 

A couple more from the Crown Prince of Thailand aircraft.

Jeff
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The following will be some various aircraft interior but not ones that I have done.

This one is a Boeing Business Jet that was originally for Boeing's own use and as their second demonstrator.
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This is one of mine. A Boeing 737-200 for Aerolineas Argentinas that has been used for VIP charter. At the time the then owner of Aerolineas was betting on one of the presidential candidates and figured he would endear himself to him by having this aircraft available for him to use for some of the non-government mission flights. Too bad that he pulled out of the race and left the presidential contest to Kirchner instead.
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This is a 767-200 that I had some limited involvement with. The design was by an outside group retained by the owner.
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Assorted including a 737 and 747
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747
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A Syd Mead rendering for the lead sled 727-200 and some photos of the final aircraft.
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Check out the renderings by Syd Mead. Got all 4 walls in the field of view.
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Gotta love those custom aircraft interiors. So over the top. Like you said,one off,custom everything. Extravagance knows no bounds!

 

More by Syd.
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Boy, you guys have gone crazy with the posts over the last few days, I was wondering when this thread would get resurrected.
I worked on the HondaJet but I can't show any images. certainly a lot different then working on cars.
I also did all the design and modeling of the interior and part of the exterior of a helicopter for the upcoming movie "Total Recall (2012)" It was a cool project as there was almost no restrictions on what I designed, as long as they liked it. The digital data is used in the special effects plus a full size model was built for the shots with the actors flying it.

 

cool,I'll look for it in the movie

 

great pics Jeff ...i like the Syd Mead stuff too, i remember having playing cards with his futurism illustrations, some blade-runner like