Hotrod Hayride

 I saw some very exciting photos from this event last year. A few months later I saw a poster for it on Eric's Historic Engine Company blog and the seed was sown - I just had to visit. I was a little nervous before I left - I know very little about the Hotrod world other than that I like the cars and the art scene which is such a big part of it but I needn't have worried - they were the nicest bunch of people you could ever meet. The atmosphere was terrific with visitors from France, Belgium, Holland, Finland and even Spain. People sat strumming guitars and singing rock and roll songs by their tents, there was a soap box race, wall of death, stalls, drag racing, live bands, good food and drink and a constant stream of awesome cars and bikes cruising past. I spent most of the time sketching and loads of people came up to chat so I left feeling that I'd really taken part in the event. So often when you're a photographer you never really get to interact with anybody and you come away from an event having viewed the whole thing through a viewfinder. Anyway, on to the sketches...

One of the first things I saw was this amazing creation with its huge truck wheels - towing a caravan! I got chatting to Mark the owner who told me he'd made a thumbnail sketch and then built it himself in three months out of the most unlikely collection of parts. He certainly nailed the proportions and stance and it all tied together perfectly. To be able to design and build your own car just blows my socks off...

Here's the first of a string of Model A Fords and perhaps my favourite car - a 34 Coupe with a huge Chrysler V8 in it. I found out that it's quite local to me so I'll be visiting to do some more sketches soon...

This flathead V8 was also in a great looking car - it looked like it would have been right at home at Bonneville. Below is a very smart looking Model A roadster in black with a tan roof...

 

This Chevrolet Cab-over was finished in bare metal and towered over everything else. It's a great bit of design and I'm not sure I've done it justice here...

 I loved the stance of this pickup and the simplicity of the roadster...

Interesting air filter arrangement...

What caught my eye here was the chopped top combined with the powerful looking engine...

These two are dirt track midget racers imported from the US. The top one originally had a V8 but when Niall bought it it came with a Fiat twin-cam. It looks just right and it made it a much more user friendly car - so much so that Niall was happy to drive the 230 miles from Yorkshire in it! The lower car is powered by a high revving 750cc Crossley...

Finally here a page of thumbnails - I think they work particularly well for Hotrods as the shapes and sizes are so varied and interesting...

And that's it. I took loads of photos too - still need to find time to sort through them before adding them to Flickr. Thanks to all the nice people I met for making it such a memorable weekend - and thanks also to the French people I met who gave me a round of applause after I showed them my sketches - never had that before :)

Fiat S76 - Bodywork 2

Popped in briefly today to se how the Fiat was getting on. Rather alarmed to see a pile of crumpled bodywork on the scrap pile but thankfully there was some on the car too. It looks superb - catches the light in all the right ways - matching the period photos.It's amazing to see the car in three dimensions after having looked at photos for so long. It took more than three goes to get it right and the wooden frame had to be altered too but it was worth it...

Goodwood Festival of Speed

Spent 3 days there this year. Friday I spent filming the Bloodhound team in action on their stand and also an F1 in schools tournament. The rest of the time I got to take some photos and do some sketching. As usual it took a while to get back into the flow of it - and the huge numbers of visitors combined with the busy goings on in the paddocks meant it was a much more challenging place to draw than sitting under some leafy tree at Prescott. Still, I was quite pleased with a few of the later ones.

First was this 1911 Fiat S74. This car has some similarities to the S76 I've been drawing but at 14 litres it has half the engine size....

I really don't know much about this 1935 car but it's striking aerodynamic shape caught my eye. I keep thinking I've drawn it stretched but it was pretty long. the aerodynamics suffer a bit when you see most of the top half of the driver sticking out the top...

It's always a treat to see Jim Hall's Chaparrals - there's really nothing else like them. The wing on this 1996 car could be tilted by the driver to give higher downforce on corners and less on the straights...

One of my favourite cars of all time. Unfortunately it wasn't running particularly well (you could find it by following the trail of oil). It was built by Ernest Eldridge in 1923, who used it to set a speed record of 146mph...

With so many people at Goodwood I had to try hard to find out of the way places to sketch. Quite pleased with how this one came out...

This magnificent 1930 car was once owned by Malcolm Campbell - he won his first race in it at Brooklands...

Another favourite of mine - it won the first ever Indy 500...

I was very taken with the pre-war Indy cars. This is the engine from a 1923 Mercedes...

Should have been red but I was quite pleased with the sketch and didn't want to ruin it...

Another of Jim Hall's brilliant ways of creating downforce - a pair of huge fans driven by a snowmobile engine to suck the car onto the road...

There was a wonderfl collection of boat-tailed cars on the lawn. I liked the proportions of this one...

There was a bit of a delay so I quickly sketched this terrific car waiting to go out. It's also a Land Speed Record holder - Rene Thomas took it to 143mph in 1923...

I've been wanting to sketch this for quite a while and finally got the chance at Goodwood. I was made very welcome By Ralph - who looks after this massive record setter. it was great to sit and study the interesting details for an hour or so. Particularly unusual was the way in which the bodywork had been 'sewn' together using short strips of screwed in metal - apparently to allow for the car to flex...

When you only have to turn in one direction you get some very unusual engineering innovations - this has to be the weirdest, with the driver sitting ina sort of side car alongside the engine...

These are becoming a bit of a tradition now. The cars are, Mercedes 710 SSK, Bugatti T35, Delage 2LCV, Bugatti T45, Fiat S74, Fiat Mephistopheles, Marmon Wasp, Miller Special, Miller Preston Tucker Special, Kurtis Kraft Novi Governor Special, Duesenberg Cummins Diesel and Peugeot L45...

Fiat S76 - Bodywork

Exciting times ahead as the bodywork is being shaped and fitted. Unfortunately I only had time to do this quick lunchtime sketch...

C Type Jaguar - iPad

Here's the more graphic treatment of the car I did the watercolour of. I used Adobe Ideas to sketch it then exported the layers into photoshop for some tweaking of the colours. Still can't decide which background colour is best. Probably blue, followed by red...

Cowboys

I watched Pale Rider again last night - what a great film. Here's Stockburn the baddy played by John Russell. I had to do it pretty much from memory as he got shot soon after I started. There's something that doesn't usually happen in life drawing. Done with sketchbook pro on the iPad.

Moe and Les

Here's a few character designs for a job which unfortunately never made it. The brief was to design two cheeky characters which would encourage people to do a little 'Moe' exercise and eat a little 'Les'. It was a lot of fun coming up with the designs and thinking of the various mischievous things they could do. Although it would have been CG I wanted to try out a kind of illustrative feel with lots of texture. Ah well. Here's the initial little thumbnails that I always start with...

... and a few with them in various costumes. I thought they'd be the sort of chaps who'd like to dress up a lot...

And here's some characters and environments worked up in Photoshop...

Life Drawings and others.

To balance out all the cars here's a few drawings of people. FIrst one is of Cathy. I did it on the iPad in Sketchbook Pro and then added some grunge with Photoforge...

This one of Finn was done the same way...

... and here's some done with real pencils and pens. I think the pencil ones were about 10 mins and the marker about 5...

Prescott - La Vie en Bleu

Just got back from a terrific weekend at the Prescott Hill Climb Circuit. I camped over for a few nights which meant I could get in two full days drawing - and a bit of photography too. The weather wasn't great during the day - a bit blustery and grey - but the rain held off most of the time. They'd really gone to a lot of effort with the French theme - Can Can dancers, mime artists, a wonderful accordionist, an angry onion seller - they'd even found French versions of all the signage that a racing circuit requires.

I got to see some excellent cars - some old favourites and some which I thought I'd never see - such as this Bedelia. I'd seen amazing period photos of these taken in Africa. The driver sits behind the passenger...


There were quite a few Coopers and other 500cc racers too. These are the sort of thing my Grandfather worked on during his time at Cooper...



This strange looking thing is a Triumph powered hill-climb car built by Tico Martini in 1962. He went on to build F3 and even F1 cars...


The campsite was full of interesting vehicles, among them this Citroen panel van (done on the iPad with the Adobe Ideas app) and rather handsome 1920's Renault...



As the day went on I managed to loosen up a bit. Quite pleased with this Sigma...


Managed to keep the loose work going the next day. Here's a Very large V8 engined Berliet...


... and one of my favourite cars, the JAP GN. Perfect proportions, exciting noise and the attention to detail in the build is staggering. I've taken a few photos which I'll be posting soon...


Here's a very pretty Vernon Derby - I only leaned about these recently. It has some lovely features such as wire wheels with integral drum brakes - a bit like the alloy versions on the Bugattis. There are a couple of photos of this on my flickr site too...


One last page of watercolour sketches. Two Austins and and Amilcar with a great wwoden boat-tailed body in the middle...


Lastly here's a page of quick thumbnails of interesting shapes which caught my eye over the weekend...


Hope you like them. I'll post the photos on Flickr soon. In the meantime - if you'd like to see some amazing period photos of cars like these I can't recommend The Old Motor blog highly enough - there's always something new and eye-popping to look at.

I don't just blog here you know...

I was lucky enough to be asked to be a guest blogger on the Adobe Ideas site. I talk a little about how I got into ipad art and also turning an Ideas drawing into a print...

Stefan Marjoram on Adobe Ideas