Andy Blackmore article… April 18, 2009
Posted by Seb Patrick in Other Sites.1 comment so far
Things are a bit quiet on the liveries front at the moment – those of us who’ve been hoping for a change to the Brawn livery have been sorely disappointed, although you’d hope that someone, somewhere back at the factory is working on something ready to roll out for the European races. We’ll see. Anyway, in the meantime, this was flagged up in comments to the previous post, but I thought it was worth linking to from the main page – over at Speed TV, noted livery designer Andy Blackmore has cast his eye over the various 2009 liveries in far more authoritative and technically-minded fashion than my own scribblings. Here’s part one of the article, and then part two. If you’re the sort of person who reads this site, then it’s highly recommended reading!
Reading the articles also led me to Andy’s own site, where you can read more about his work in the industry – and where he also publishes his excellent spotters guides to various sports, including a superbly-realised F1 2009 graphic. Again, well worth checking out.
More from me soon – the next published article on here (assuming there’s no new livery news in the interim) will either be a look at the 20 drivers’ helmet designs, or my look back at the history of the Jordan team’s liveries. Meanwhile, if you spot anything such as the above article that you think might be of interest to the site’s readers, either leave it in comments, or drop me a line.
Toro Rosso and Brawn – a late catchup April 4, 2009
Posted by Seb Patrick in Brawn, Launches, Toro Rosso.5 comments
Hi folks, sorry once again for the delay – I was busy around the time Toro Rosso launched, and figured it would be worth waiting for Brawn to unveil their new car in Australia before doing a post about both. Only… Brawn never did, did they? They raced with the same car as they tested with, only with a couple of Virgin logos stuck in surprisingly small and subtle places :
… and there’s not really a huge amount to say about it, is there? The fluorescent stuff is alright, and gives the team a distinct identity, but it looks like nothing other than a test car. The arrival of Virgin gave hope that there’d be some kind of rebranding exercise… but thanks to Button’s win, that car is the most famous thing in motorsport, and I honestly can’t imagine them changing it dramatically between now and the end of the season – I know they’ve only had a week since Australia, but if it was going to change, it would have been for Malaysia, and it hasn’t. If, as expected, Richard Branson ends up buying out the team and renaming it, then maybe then – but that can’t happen until the end of the season anyway. So it really does look like we’ll be stuck with a plain white car – with just a couple of sponsor decals and a bit of fluorescent yellow – heading the field this season. Nice helmet redesigns, though.
At least Toro Rosso have made some changes this year. The painted Bull remains, but it’s shifted solely to the engine cover, and there’s now a large Red Bull text logo on the sidepod. Unfortunately, coupled with the Red Bull Cola advert on the rear wing, it has the effect of making the STR look even more like the RBR than it did previously. That said, it’s arguably a slightly nicer looking car than its big brother – and the text against a darker blue background puts me in mind of a mid-90s Sauber, from before they took on the turquoise Petronas branding.
So that’s our full grid of cars. Winners for 2009? Williams, I reckon. It’s not that different to previous years, but it’s a very smart car, and I really like the curved and swooping lines as seen in the side-on view. Losers? It’s got to be Renault – the grid’s ugliest machine sits under its ugliest livery, and while it looks like far less of a patchwork than the 07/08 cars (in that all the colours on it look a bit more like they’re meant to go together) it’s still mildly vomit-inducing. And the nose is appalling.
