By Chris Borrelli

Chris Borrelli

In recent years, Adobe’s Photoshop has become quite popular and an essential part of the automotive industry. Photoshop is used in many areas of the automotive world, from a manufacturer making the vehicle of tomorrow to your average customizer previewing their ride before actually laying down the cash to go through with modifying it.  With a plethora of goodies for the technical artist Photoshop makes automotive design virtually limitless. Let us dig a bit deeper into this sometimes overlooked form of art after the jump!

 Image Credits: __nes__

Continue reading "Photoshop: Rendering the Automotive World" »

By Jen Dunnaway

Editor

I thought Nick’s clear-hood HEMI idea was pretty cool, and he’s got some other great gems on his ride page–his avatar, for one, is a Disney Cars version of his “Top Banana” Daytona R/T Charger. Other treats include the dragstrip pics on page 3 and the shifter-mod pics on page 2–nice yellow pool ball! Definitely check him out.

How do you like this photochop of the new Challenger with poverty caps? I think it looks pretty tough.

I really like this video set to Playhouses by TV on the Radio, which was shot at the Drop Zone Custom Truck Show in Salem, Oregon. It was put together by Crochface, who has a bunch of other cool mini truck videos on CarDomain (they are all short teasers for the DVDs he sells on his site, Surface-DVD). Besides shooting and editing video, Crochface is a talented artist. He worked as the art director for Mini Truckin’ for a while, and even won a photochop contest we had a while back.

As a Mopar guy I’m used to seeing real-life pictures like this involving Challengers and Road Runners (though usually the foliage in the background is weeds and not bamboo). So this GT-R photochop at The Real JDM really cracked me up.

Here’s one for the folks who believe that small is beautiful: full-sized rides reduced to microcar dimensions and cartoonish proportions. And yes, it’s all done through the magic of photoshop, though I have to admit, when I first ran across these images I could’ve sworn I was looking some bizarre club for grown-ups who like to drive around in their kids’ Power Wheels. Rob maintains that the shrunken-car photochop is a popular one that he’s seen before, possibly even on CarDomain members’ ride pages. Have any of you ever done this with your car?

CarDomain members never fail to crack me up. After we posted those Ronal teddy bear rims last week, Ernie couldn’t wait to try out a set of photoshopped 20′s on his tough Sierra pickup. Check out the manly result—I love it!

While it may not be as all-out wrathful as the fictional Chevy Tantrum, Andy’s photoshop certainly gives his El Camino a contemptuous scowl. On his page, Andy mentions his ambition to someday fab a one-off front clip, so the ‘Nio’s angrily furrowed brow may yet see the light of day.

When I stumbled across this allegedly tricked out Voyager, I was really excited—for about ten seconds. Completely ridiculous vehicles are some of my favorite things to blog about, and a 600 horsepower Voyager more than fits the bill. In my defense, it’s not like performance-oriented Mom-mobiles are completely out of the scope of reality. Remember the the ManVan? But of course, this is a total fake—just look at the horrendous PhotoShop work! Anyway, I still got a kick out of the page. I love how the computer has been "remapped, rewired and bypassed." Funny stuff, TJ.

We had twenty-five comments in our little Cars photochop contest last week but Neil was the only guy who managed to follow directions and a) do a Cars (the movie!) photochop and b) get it on his ride page. Luckily, his photochop of his 77 Lemans is pretty sweet. We’re sending him a CarDomain t-shirt. Nice work, Neil!