How do people come up with these liveries?!?!?

Just wanna say this thread has some awesome tips. Bookmarked it just in case I ever need them

t25torx wrote: I like printing off a bunch of side silhouettes of the car I'm trying to design for and then just break out the coloring pencils and try out different things. I'll search google for ideas and then adjust them to that car. A lot of times I end up going with a modified version of older designs from factory teams.

That is brilliant!

Vracer111 wrote: I'm partial to racing Miku livery (because huge fan of Vocaloid music)....would do something similar to this if I had a race car:

I've wanted to do an itasha paint scheme on my car, but I'm afraid people won't get it.

NickD wrote:

Vracer111 wrote: I'm partial to racing Miku livery (because huge fan of Vocaloid music)....would do something similar to this if I had a race car:

I've wanted to do an itasha paint scheme on my car, but I'm afraid people won't get it.

So? Your car, your rules. Go for it. Even if I don't know the reference, a good looking car is a good looking car.

I like the "print and doodle" method. I know what I'm doing this afternoon.

I bet tirerack.com would be great for this as they have that shot of the car in white at the top of the page.

At least for the sides.

In reply to Flight Service:

Sadly, they do not have images of my car...

Search Supra.
If you try "Supra line art" into Google, you'll find tons.

Or, find a white Supra and color in as needed.

Vracer111 wrote: I'm partial to racing Miku livery (because huge fan of Vocaloid music)....would do something similar to this if I had a race car:

To me, that's a good example of a poorly executed livery - if the goal is to promote a product. It's got pictures of blue-haired people on it. That tells me nothing and it's busy. It looks wild in a carefully posed shot, how will it look on track and at speed? At least the big magento and teal sections would make it distinctive on track, and if you had a strong enough brand you could get away with it.

I think the coloring book technique would help avoid this, as it encourages you to work in big blocks of color.

In reply to Keith Tanner:

It's Hatsune Miku who is a, well, hmmm... it's hard to describe. But pretty popular/well-known in Japan. So it makes more sense to them, than it does to most people on here.

NickD wrote: I've wanted to do an itasha paint scheme on my car, but I'm afraid people won't get it.

This guy is local to me:

This is the second version of his itasha livery. It originally looked like this:

In reply to Duke:

Hahaha, yessssssssssss. Last year at MatG there was a newer STi hatch with full Varis aero and an itasha livery that I somehow failed to get a picture of it. It was great.

Okay I typed in "Lotus 7 line art" into Google images and the very first thing that popped up is NOT something I want on my hard drive!!!

Flight Service wrote: Okay I typed in "Lotus 7 line art" into Google images and the very first thing that popped up is NOT something I want on my hard drive!!!

Interesting. I'll take your word for it.

Using "vector" in place of "line art" also works. To avoid alternate meanings of Lotus, maybe try Caterham...

NickD wrote: In reply to Keith Tanner: It's Hatsune Miku who is a, well, hmmm... it's hard to describe. But pretty popular/well-known in Japan. So it makes more sense to them, than it does to most people on here.

Fair enough, and it's certainly fun. My comments were from the view point of an effective racing livery.

Flight Service wrote: Okay I typed in "Lotus 7 line art" into Google images and the very first thing that popped up is NOT something I want on my hard drive!!!

Are you in China? My google only pops up lotus flowers. I'd rock that as a livery.