As you may notice by the content of my blog, I do a lot of work with Hyundai and Rhys Millen Racing. There is always something fun and exciting to produce from the ground up. Combine that with my affinity for cars and racing, and every job is better than the last. Its also fun to know that I have been involved from day one, producing the original proposal on the program, designing the renderings of the car, shooting the teaser video and soon, heading up to PIkes Peak to watch this new car in action.

The car I speak of is the RMR Hyundai PM580. This vehicle is a purpose-built racecar designed to head up Pikes Peak Mountain faster than anyone has ever done before. Here is a video I shot of Rhys and his father Rod talking about the family history at Pikes Peak:

As you can see, the family has a history with the mountain- which hopefully the PM580 will add to, breaking the elusive 10 minute barrier.

I have done some renderings in the past for Rhys, building on top of existing images to propose a new design, a new racecar livery etc. This vehicle was a chance for me to start from literally the ground up and bring to life the design that Rhys had in his head. Here is the final product- days of work, 247 layers in a photoshop document and lots of coffee went into producing this monster.

RMR Hyundai Genesis PM580

With the exception of the wheels, the rest of the car is 100% Photoshop and Illustrator. I shot a photo of the wheels at the proper angle and dropped it into the composite to add a level of reality to the car. So now that you have seen where I ended up, lets go back to where it started- at the body shop.

The start of the PM580

The start of the PM580

These are two photos I shot of the car in process- big hunks of foam, bondo and fiberglass being sanded, shaped and formed into what would be the plug for the mold. Once the shape of the car is finalized the build the mold around these pieces, a positive and negative for the final carbon fiber pieces to be produced from. I digress… These photos would be the foundation for me to create the rendering of the new vehicle. So where to begin? I started by pulling this into Illustrator and making a line drawing over the top of the car:

Vector Drawings of the PM580

At this point is was time to produce the livery for the race car. This can be tricky when working with so many sponsors, as they each have their own guidelines for how their logo can be used. Some can’t be tilted, some have to be on blue, ALL of them have to be bigger… I have some tricks that I used with layer blending modes, opacity and overlaying grayscale layers to make it look like the logos are actually on the car and interacting with the light. I would tell you how, but then I would have to kill you! Here is an animation showing the build up process:

And here is a 50% screenshot to show the level of detail in the rendering- from the vents over the fender to the way the Red Bull logo interacts with the shading of the car. Notice on the right side of the image a small section of the groups and layers of the photoshop file:

Screen capture of the PM580 detail

As if that was not enough work, this is only the front 3/4 angle. I had to do this process 2 more times for the front and the profile! All the hard work paid off, as Rhys and Hyundai were both happy with the rendering. It ended up getting blasted to all the major automotive sites like Road & Track, Jalopnik, Autoblog and even the Top Gear blog!

Looking forward to the next project with RMR and Hyundai…

So a couple of months ago my good friend Rhys Millen asked me to do a rendering of the new car that he was building for the 2009 SEMA Show. This car was going to be a mid-engine Genesis Coupe powered by the 4.6L Tau V8.  Rhys and Hyundai needed a rendering to service to the media to get the buzz going for the SEMA Show.  I have done a lot of work in the past for Hyundai Motor America and RMR, so they called me up to create an image that would do the car justice.

The main feature Rhys wanted to show was the new front bumper design.  It  was my task to take a cell phone image of the bumper he sent over and try and make it look like it was on the car.  Here is what I was sent:

New RMR Bumper

Next, I used a Genesis Press photo from photographer Morgan Segal and built upon that to create the rendering. Here was the original image:

© HMA / Morgan Segal

So from here, I had to clean up the lower valance so that I could recreate the entire front end of the car.  Here are the rest of the items I had to accomplish in the rendering:

• Lower the vehicle
• New HRE wheels/tires
• Create carbon fiber intake ducts behind the B-Pillar
• Add carbon a winglet
• Add carbon lip spoiler
• Fill in front radiator opening and smooth out
• Make paint look like new BASF 5 layer candy RMR custom color.

As you can see, I had my work cut out for me on this project.  :)

The first step was to clone out the entire front bumper so that I had a  clean slate to work with:

Rendering Process 1

From there I tinted the windows, designed the carbon inlet scoop and started painting in the inlet ducts on the front:

Rendering Process 2

From here I focused on the shading of the inlets as it would react to the lighting in the original photo- direct sun from the rear 3/4, casting a shadow to the front  left of the image. I started by creating a carbon winglet followed by putting the new HRE wheels on and then via a group of 24 layers, painted in shadows and highlights to make the front end look realistic.

Rendering Process 3

From there it was time to work on the carbon lip spoiler and fill in the area that was beneath the Hyundai Logo.  Lastly, I wanted to give the image a bit of a post-processing to add to the feel of the car.  Keep in mind, I skipped MANY MANY steps, but here is how it came out:

Rendering Process FINAL

Overall, the rendering was received very well and the car has been a success.  It was unveiled at the 2009 SEMA Show and was listed as “Must See Debut” by SEMA.

Here are some of the first photos off the show floor from Autoguide.com

Another fun project that turned out to be a success.    I love my job…