savann wrote:I understand where you are coming from. Design plays a very little part in the modern Formula 1 car. They are well calculated machines and refined through (CFD, wind tune-testing and so on).
My project outcome will not go into the depths of Formula 1 in that regard mainly because of the tools and resources at my disposal. I am trying to illustrate what a speculative 2013-2018 formula 1 vehicle could be and what technology it will inherit.
I will try to be as truthful to the vehicle and racing series as possible but I am not going to be able to produce a product/outcome to the standard of Formula 1. It is very hard for me to think past the current Formula because I believe it is very close to perfection.
I don't think I wanted
to imply that (
visual, industrial) design plays a lesser part in Formula One than in any other pursuit. I only feel it is traditionally somewhat more intractable because the process is so convoluted. There's also a certain cultural expectation of "purity" i.e. going to an extreme in F1, something that is perhaps (
unnecessarily) regarded as beyond visual design's realm. The process of shaping the vehicle happens on so many layers in F1: Image, purpose, advertising, performance, emotion, rules, politics, driveability, relevance, ideas, you name it. Therefore I hold the visual approach as certainly no lesser than any other; IMO you're well within your rights to choose the aspects that are most pertinent to your approach and expand from there on as you see fit - like in your drawn studies of contemporary F1 cars.
I quite like the "LA Auto Show Design Challenge" for the outrageousness of it. One of their strengths is that the participants are commissioned an "impossible" challenge so they can design in a more liberal framework of responsibility and in a playful state of mind. In fact, I think I featured their robot car challenge somewhere around here. Sometimes artists go for controversy and outrageousness as an absolute value, something that removes the rationale of using these value based attributes from the subservience of the work itself. This seems somewhat cynical and usually turns my interest off - a more frequent occurrence than I'd like it to be. I think "LA Auto Show" is on more solid ground by
imposing a degree of "impossible" on the participants, therefore removing at least part of the pressure of considering or promoting issues secondary to the art of design itself from them.
As to Formula One being "close to perfection", well yes, the teams do a decent job on that front on their part. Within the rules and realities compelling them. The question for me therefore is: How close to "perfection" are "
image, purpose, advertising, performance, emotion, rules, politics, driveability, relevance, ideas, you name it" then? There should be ample room to illustrate options within a fraction of those. In my view you are as liberated by the resources you have as the resources you don't have. No single person makes F1, or any aspect of it, into being what it is anyway (
even though there are some who manage to emanate such confidence nonetheless).
Ciro raises an important point i.e. "what is a sustainable vehicle"? (
And answers quite correctly that none come close enough at present) Obviously, Formula One will struggle terribly for all the resources it requires to come even close to a zero sum game within its own materials' and energy cycles (
even though the sport does buy carbon offsets, it has to be remembered). Given that what is being physically done with a couple of dozen vehicles is going to have a minuscule effect on a Global scale anyway the question is, rationally, more about what Formula One can do to enhance the sustainability of the 600M+ passenger (
plus other) cars on the roads?
Fortunately the ecological aspect it is not solely your responsibility, nor mine. Some solutions we can come up with and just contend to being a part of a multitude of other brilliant improvements on the way. Rest assured, whatever you come up with, it will be " to the standard of F1" -
this is a human activity after all. Lofty goals can make one lose perspective. Now, if only I could be regularly reminded to hold on to this ethos myself at all times ...
