Designing my Livery
Design is such a huge aspect of motor racing. It covers so many areas, from mechanical to aesthetic. As a photographer, I have dipped my toe’s into the basics elements of graphic design. But would by no means consider myself a professional graphic designer. Which is why, when it came to the task of designing my own livery for my car I was immediately out of my comfort zone.
Since I started watching motor racing, one of the aspects that has really consumed me has been the design and liveries of the car. Arguably it is one of the first things you notice as a novice to the sport. Even for seasoned veterans, the first thing your eyes can distinguish when watching the sport are the general shapes and colours.
Arguably the most iconic team in all of motorsport, Ferrari. Has the most recognisable and iconic looks. That timeless, sharp, eye catching red (even if it has changed shades through the years).
This showed me how important the livery is to creating an identity in racing. You hope that people will be spending a hell of a lot of time looking at your car, and so I need to make sure it catches people’s attention and is instantly recognisable as my own.
After I found a blueprint online of the MX5 I decided to build the livery up in stages. First I would decide on a basic design, then Colours and finally incorporate the logos at the end. This was a really difficult final step, as I didn’t want to compromise the strong shapes of the livery, whilst at the same time the best liveries are those that can incorporate the sponsors into their design and don’t look like stickers just slapped on top.
The Basic Design
So starting off with the base design, I did some research into what liveries I’ve been drawn to in the past and the basic design philosophies that have stood out to me. Since about the age of 13, my favourite look of any car has been the Martini livery. Especially those old wide body Porsche’s and Lancia’s. However, I’d already used this approach in my helmet design and so wanted to try something a little different.
Looking at classic liveries the designs that I seemed drawn to were strong shapes, lines and colours. Many liveries today (I feel) get easily overcomplicated with loads of lines and small shapes that look great on their own, but after sponsor stickers are put over certain parts of the car, the synergy of the design gets lost and it looks confusing and cluttered. Some of the liveries I note as personal favourites where that of the Marlboro McLaren’’s, Gulf Porsche 917’s and Mazda 787B’s. All of which are famous for their iconic designs, but each look completely different and instantly recognisable.
(images in order from Ebeasts.com, RaceFans.net and Ultimatecarpage.com)
Photo from Jayson Fong - @jayson.fong
From here I then had a look at the series I’d be racing in. My Mazda was a factory Marine Blue and I intended to keep that colour as it is one that I have grown to love as I have owned this car. I looked to see which designs worked best with this car and what had already been done. I loved the blue and white combo featured on Will Blackwell Chamber’s car and the clean and clear steps seen on Jack Brewer’s car. My favourite liveries were all ones that incorporated the nose right down to the ground as I felt it pulled the whole design of the car together. Similar design aspects were used in another livery I love by Jayson Fong on a classic BMW E9. Although with toned down base colours, the stripes are clear, bold and eye catching. Having followed the creation of this livery on his instagram, it was a surprising source of insight and inspiration for my own design decisions.
From here I had my basic design sorted. A large stripe down the centre, bordered by two smaller stripes. And on the sides this stripe would be repeated from about a third up to the floor to help frame sponsors on the side and create a recognisable colour/design from any angle you looked at the car.
Choosing the Colours
Since I first fell in love with the martini stripes, I’ve always committed to my racing colours being a white base with red and blue stripes. However in owning this car I have slowly come round to really loving the charismatic blue that covers the car. And it is something I decided to keep as the base. After all it was still one of my racing colours so white and red should work for the stripe?
I then made some mockups, and I really liked the main stripe being white. I thought that it complemented the blue and it really caught my attention immediately when I looked at it. Having the bordering stripes as red however, it just didn’t work. It seemed to clash too much with the gentle (yet vibrant) colours white and blue and made it hard to look at.
Having studied no colour theory I wish I could describe a bit more why it didn’t work. But perhaps you can draw your own conclusions from looking at the initial edits.
With my girlfriends favourite colour being green, I sent her over a mockup with green stripes as a bit of a joke (sounds hilarious I know) but after seeing it on the car, I really thought it worked. I tried a few different shades, including British racing green, but finally decided on a lighter green that I felt matched the style of the light blue of the base. I also looked to the series and noticed that there wasn’t really any cars with a blue, green and white combination. And so I seemed settled, and really happy with my base design.
Incorporating Sponsors
The final task was the one I was most concerned about heading into this. And that was adding sponsorship stickers to the car. Even though I don’t have too many to add, there is a fine balance between making the sponsor logos clear and readable, whilst also not consuming the actual design of the car. Luckily I have two rectangular logos, these immediately fit purposefully onto the front stripe on the nose, and also on the rear.
The next was the side sponsors. With the livery design I was able to divide the doors into two segments. Which could neatly frame and fit two logos. I put my largest logo at the bottom as It looked much clearer on the white background. And I want to publicise myself as much as possible this year as (hopefully!) I won’t be able to in future years due to sponsorships just flooding my inboxes…
Above this I put the Forge Garage logo, it luckily fit neatly here and the green complemented the stripe very well.
The final logo to incorporate was the tile sponsor Hans Christmas Andersen which I new would be going large in the middle of the bonnet and boot. After messing about with sizes I was able to fit it in. With the red of the logo helping it to stand out whilst the greens and whites went together and matched my livery. I added a white border to the logo going on the car to help the shapes and text of the logo clear up. Having it previously cross different colours with a transparent background made it really difficult to read and distinguish on the car.
The Final Design
The final design is one that I am really proud of, especially coming from someone with no previous experience designing car liveries. It may look basic, but after reading this mammoth of a blog I made about it, I hope most people can see that a lot of thought and development went into this design. It is simple to read, pleasing to the eye and I feel stands out as a clean and professional looking car.
