Like last year, Lexus’ booth was outside by the proving grounds, and the roar of the Bondurant Corvettes was audible over the tunes the DJ was playing. There was a definite attempt to give the space a club vibe, which was compromised slightly by the fact that the turntables didn’t have heads on them, and the cocktails were actually mocktails, but whatever. There was a grip of customized IS-Cs—including Brian Fox’s hyper-green example—on hand this year, but the red-hot LF-A was the star of the show. The matte black doesn’t photograph particularly well, but in person, it looked sick. The styling in the front is somewhat restrained, which makes the aggressive lines of its hind-quarters look even better. Hit the jump to see more shots of the new supercar, along with the pics of some fresh creations from Brian Fox, David Huang, Gordon Ting, Clark Ishihara and David Rahemi, and TRD.

Brian Fox, Lexus IS 350C
Fox Marketing

David Huang “IS 1000″
Lexus IS 300

IS C F-Sport
By TRD

Clark Ishihara and David Rahemi
Lexus IS 350C
By VIP Auto Salon & JTuned.com

GS 350 F-Sport
By TRD

As you might imagine, everyone who’s anyone in the automotive industry was at the annual SEMA Show in Las Vegas last week. While many pessimists have complained that this year’s show was smaller than any other SEMA in recent years, there were quite a few notable announcements, releases and debuts this year. (And those who did show up to the show were serious about doing business, not just a bunch of useless tire kickers.)

While there was much on the news front in terms of debuts, to be honest, there was nothing that excited me personally more than the new Lexus LF-A. I might be a bit jaded, as I am a Toyota man. My first car was a Toyota, and I’ve owned many many different types of Toyota and Lexus vehicles in my life; I’ve lost count of the actual number, but if you figure that I currently own 6 Toyota/Lexus vehicles, then I’m pretty sure the total number is somewhere around twenty. Yup, TWENTY! So maybe I do have a slight personal slant towards the Lexus brand, but regardless, I think the new LF-A that Lexus debuted at SEMA is nothing short of amazing.

Sure, there are skeptics out there who complain that the LF-A hasn’t yet beat an R35 Nissan GT-R’s record at the Nurburgring. There are also people out there who also say there are a lot of other cars they would rather buy for the LF-A’s hefty $375K price tag. Sure it’s pricey. And yes, maybe the R35 GTR can currently beat it around Nordschleife. However, in my mind, there’s just no denying how outstandingly bad ass the LF-A is. Continue reading and view more photos on MotorMavens!

LFingA is right…having just returned from SEMA and seeing a production version LF-A in the flesh I am impressed all over again. I’ve seen a couple of LF-As in the flesh leading up to this, there was a nice red concept version at Toyota Megaweb in Japan that I molested, and then there was the Nurburgring race car at Tokyo Auto Salon last year. Yet something was different about seeing this production LF-A at SEMA.

First off, it looks F-R-E-S-H in matte black. As much as I think everyone wants to say matte black has jumped the shark as a color, it still looks damn good and I don’t think its going away anytime soon.

I really have a personal dislike for discussing topics that I know every auto blogger in the world is jamming their keyboard over. So instead, I just want to share one detail of the LF-A that supremely impressed me. The top image is my favorite detail of the LF-A at the moment. They are just these perfectly sculpted and shaped rear winglets that mirror the tail lamps edge. The way that those extend outward and essentially make that parallel double canard shape that we’ve all grown so accustom to on the front bumpers of cars, it’s just so clean and yet massively aggressive to look at on a production car!

Here’s two more random snaps of the car I took:

I caught up with Brian over at the Lexus booth. Wow, that green BASF paint really pops in the sun. More pics and a short video of Brian talking about his Lexus IF C build after the jump!

I was in the Las Vegas Convention Center very early this morning wandering the halls to try and find undiscovered treasures hidden within the excesses of SEMA. Take a look at this one, a Lexus LX 570 competing in the SCORE Stock Full Class, piloted by Joe Bacal who is a Cancer Survivor sitting at the KC HiLiGHTS Booth. Read more after the jump!

This truck came in 2nd place at the 14th Annual SCORE Terrible’s Primm 300 this past September. During this run, the rear suspension was damaged in one of the more brutal courses in the SCORE competition, but Bacal persevered in getting the Lexus to finish, with the help from his crew. This truck has been repaired and is ready to tackle the infamous Baja 1000 that starts on November 19th. They are preparing for an outright win in the Stock Full Class.

Clambering over mounds of insane car nuts, I scampered for the doors to SEMA. Elbow clocking, crotch kicking, upper cut chucking. It was a nasty scene. BUT, I managed to get in with only a broken collar bone and a head gash. Only 4 inches long right through the left eye. But don’t worry. I’m ok.

And what did my good eye perceive? … Camaros. Ug. So, while everyone’s posting Camaros, I’ll post other stuff. Like this! My hotel.

Oh, and other things. Things like AWESOME DRAGTRACKS from my buddies at… well, Dragtracks. A super cool “green ride” from Local Motors, wild sculpted tranny covers from Zingology, an ECOMUSCLE Challenger from our friends at Popular Mechanics! Yes, an electric Challenger. THEN… a sick beast from some boys in Vancouver, Future Vehicle Technologies, who are gonna lay the smackdown for the X-Prize…eh, and great passionate people like Jack Lawford from HotRod HotLine.

What a frikkin’ cool day! PLUS… SEMA BABES. Not in this post, folks. But RIGHT AFTER. They get their own lil’ section, and since there aren’t many, soak it up.

Note to Car Domain: If you keep sending gorgeous girls like the one in your booth to shows, we’re all going to have to take more cold showers…. Onward!

Best New Product: Actually, this cool lil’ scanner scans the products you want info on. But it was cooler than all the products. Hm. Kinda says a lot about what was new… don’t it.

Here’s the wild Lexus IS C that Brian is bringing to SEMA this year. Be sure to check out his ride page for the specs and build pics, and of course we’ll have more on this car next week at the show!

Here’s some video of the LF-A in advance of the official unveil later today at the Tokyo Motor Show.

Falken Tire just built ride pages for all of their drift cars. How cool is that? My favorites are Vaughn Gittin Jr’s Mustang and Daijiro Yoshihara’s burly Lexus. Check out all five ride pages!

The BMW E92 M3 and the Lexus IS-F are both shining examples of sports-minded luxury cars. They both project an image of luxury and refinement, combined with engine response and handling suitable for the racetrack.

Not too long ago, I did a shoot with an E92 M3 and an IS-F that were both outfitted with a plethora of aftermarket parts from a luxury sports brand called Vorsteiner. When I was first introduced to the team over at Vorsteiner, it was to photograph their Porsche V-GT project for Modified Luxury and Exotics Magazine back in 2007. Continue reading and view more photos on MotorMavens