The car you always promised yourself...

Enjoy some pictures of '70s special saloons below!

- 1974 Brands Hatch Ford Sport Day - https://www.robertclayson.co.uk/p608734625
- 1974 Silverstone (notice the appearance of the SVA Camaro of Gardner, usually an ETCC runner that year and the Howes AMC Javelin too) - https://www.robertclayson.co.uk/p989729046

- PS this photo archive is also useful for the 1974 BSCC mod project as there are some pictures from a few meetings that year

Yeah, It's a good site that    I've been pouring over it for ages but there's not much stuff out there for the tin tops of that era and when you find it the pics are usually black and white or blurry
Any info is welcome though, there may be something I need to finish a skin...

Bit more progress to report...
I've painted Mick Hill's Boss 2 car (and corrected the wrongly positioned black rear panel on Boss 1 ) but I'm not 100% happy with the shadow around the front splitter yet;



I've also spent a lot of time sorting out a logo on Tony Strawson's Capri which got me thinking...

It should be straightforward skinning a car. You get a few pix together, download a few logos and then replicate it in your favourite art package  Easy enough with the latest racers but the problems really start when your thing is the 60's and 70's

This was a time when sponsorship became the norm but photos were still either black and white and/or low res. Add to that they're thin on the ground these days too and you can lose a huge chunk of your life trying to get the right one for a skin.

Case in point with Tony's car: there's a trianglular logo just behind the rear wheels that took some real detective work to find. I had to read loads of postings before I discovered the car was painted by a guy called Liam Churchill. Turns out he also painted Funny cars around the same time and after searching old dragster images I found 1 side on pic with the logo on it

It wasn't usable from the image but I could paint over it to recreate it as a layer. Even that took ages: finding a similar font that had to be stretched and manipulated and scaled all for this;



The point I'm making is that while most people will barely notice it I know it would drive me mad if it wasn't right. It might also help answer the question as to why mods and skins take so bloody long to do

So the Capris will be released eventually, it's just that these things take time

Just remember: don't hold your breath

Zee wrote:

Bit more progress to report...
..........................................................
The point I'm making is that while most people will barely notice it I know it would drive me mad if it wasn't right. It might also help answer the question as to why mods and skins take so bloody long to do

Precisionism is an art, and you, my dear friend Mel, are a Master in doing your job with high precisionism. Congrats! Keep going!

ney.dias wrote:

Zee wrote:

Bit more progress to report...
..........................................................
The point I'm making is that while most people will barely notice it I know it would drive me mad if it wasn't right. It might also help answer the question as to why mods and skins take so bloody long to do

Precisionism is an art, and you, my dear friend Mel, are a Master in doing your job with high precisionism. Congrats! Keep going!

Ditto

Great work

I seem to remember someone doing both the white and the dark brown livery for the Capri Perana mod, but I don't think the brown one had the Strawberries on it - what's the story on that? Some covert Beatles sponsorship maybe?

DarkSide wrote:

I seem to remember someone doing both the white and the dark brown livery for the Capri Perana mod, but I don't think the brown one had the Strawberries on it - what's the story on that? Some covert Beatles sponsorship maybe?

Yeah, that was me I also did the Boss 1 car and Mick Hill's blue Tricentrol livery but the Peranas weren't too accurate for Special Saloons.

I did put strawberries on the roof of the old version, in fact I reused a lot of the logos on the newer cars. The reason for it was that 'Strawberry' was Tony Strawson's nickname so he painted one on the roof every time he won a race!

I like your Beatles theory though...

Hm, indeed, I must have had that skin in my game for the better part of 5 years and I've used it in many custom grids and never noticed up until now!

I'm totaly with you about the time it takes to paint a skin of an old racer, so time consuming that you spend more time on research than actually doing the skin by a long way and very frustrating at times.

The reward to yourself is immense when completed, but as you say, who would know the amount of work it took.

Thank you for your dedication Mel m8, much appreciated from me at least.

There are many photos on here including a few of mine. https://tentenths.com/forum/showthread.php?t=25836&highlight=super+saloons

See post 11 on this thread. Might help. https://tentenths.com/forum/showthread.php?t=80167&highlight=strawson+capri

Nice find Andy!

Posted by Tony 'Strawberry' Strawson's daughter 'Strawberry Strawson':



Originally Posted by Alan Raine:
I have found a b/w photo of the strawberry roof.
Not very good pic. Black & White on a very dull, damp, misty, Silverstone morning in the 70's, but you can just about make out the Strawberries on the roof!

Tony 'Strawberry' Strawson's #17 Capri

How extrawbenarry!

fisheracing wrote:

Nice find Andy!

Posted by Tony 'Strawberry' Strawson's daughter 'Strawberry Strawson':



Originally Posted by Alan Raine:
I have found a b/w photo of the strawberry roof.
Not very good pic. Black & White on a very dull, damp, misty, Silverstone morning in the 70's, but you can just about make out the Strawberries on the roof!

Tony 'Strawberry' Strawson's #17 Capri

That's the pic i nicked his signature off!  The little cartoon just behind it i found in an old issue of Car and Car Conversions if i remember correctly

Here's a comparison of the old and new versions;









The new ones are a lot closer to the real thing with the narrower body and flared arches. I also found better pix of the front and rear so i could get the logos right this time too

I'm on with the Red Rovers car at the moment and it looks like something out of Mad Max...

Looking really good especially the strawberrys

I used to watch as much of these as possible when they were racing at Oulton Park.

@ Zee! Wow! Those wheels are a dream! How nice, very nice indeed. Speachless for the car, obvious, because it is magic. Congrats, Mel, dear friend!

Great great, great !!!

Just wonderful work going on here ! Thank you Mel.

I don't have Mick Hill's Capri but I have most of the Supersaloons from 1975 if you need any photos.

Andy Clegg wrote:

I don't have Mick Hill's Capri but I have most of the Supersaloons from 1975 if you need any photos.

Any photos of that era are welcome mate  Quite often you can spot something you need in the background so pit pix are welcome too

Strawberries car is looking mighty fresh there Mel m8... great stuff young man, proud of ya!!!

GeeDee wrote:

Strawberries car is looking mighty fresh there Mel m8... great stuff young man, proud of ya!!!

Do ya think making the Strawberry car counts towards my 'five a day'?

Zee wrote:

GeeDee wrote:

Strawberries car is looking mighty fresh there Mel m8... great stuff young man, proud of ya!!!

Do ya think making the Strawberry car counts towards my 'five a day'?

As the 'Geordies' (Tyneside gabble) would say "Whey I man"