One of the things they didn’t teach me in fancy pants design school is what it’s actually like working inside a real OEM studio. Covering all the fundamentals and necessary vocational skills, as well as giving you a broader understanding of creating your own designs at a macro level doesn’t leave a lot of time for the crushing reality of being a junior designer. I thought working life would involve rolling into the studio about 10am, sitting around sipping espressos, comparing black turtlenecks and cattily discussing what had hit the BMW Instagram overnight. Start work after a leisurely lunch, sketching into the evening before having an existential crisis about not drawing anything good that day. Imagine my horror when my manager told me I was expected to be in the studio around 8.30am, preferably not reeking of booze. There’s an 8.30 in the morning now?
The L663 Defender was already well on it’s way by the time I got my top-level security pass at Gaydon. The exterior and interior design was frozen and it was slowly making its way through the torturous realization phase of the design process towards production and public reveal. Although the long-lead-time tooling parts such as the body-in-white and lighting had been signed off, there was still a lot of detail crap to nail down and get right. The rear lights kept coming back from suppliers looking like cheap eBay led strips with bright hot spots rather a continuous ring of illumination. The alpine glass in the cant rail curled up at the edges because of its curvature. The darker paint finish on the X trim front and rear bumpers wasn’t adhering properly. Sitting in tedious meetings with supplier reps and engineers sorting this stuff out isn’t the watch wanker lifestyle I was sold.
One of the other things I was responsible for was maintaining an up-to-date set of ‘master’ images to be used in design reviews. Consisting of studio standard front three quarter, rear three quarter and side views; if anything changed in trim or finish specifications these had to be updated in Photoshop. They were a constantly moving target subject to the whims of the product and marketing teams, color, materials and finish (CMF) designers and the status of parts in development. If Gerry (McGovern) or Massimo (Frascella) wanted to see what the HSE trim level would look like with matte black door handles, it was my job to make sure the images reflected what they wanted to review. For expedience and convenience, you only alter what you need to. The same images are reused over and over again to ensure visual consistency – you don’t want to be reviewing a different render each week. I also used those images to work on proposals for (redacted) and (redacted) versions; chief designers only want to see what’s changed on something they are already familiar with.
Designers Have OPINIONS
A big part of trim levels is wheel options, and hoooo boy do designers have OPINIONS about those. Wheels are like a fashion accessory; pick the right one and the outcome is joy. Pick a duffer and you get misery. Wheels are a right pain to design. You set up actions in Photoshop to make sure you get the spoke angles correct and don’t accidentally draw a rotating portal to hell. All of us in the studio knew the new Defender looked its best on the 18” steel wheel (internally named ‘Steely Dan’) and people were going to lose their minds when they saw it. Marketing’s problem was the steelie was a no-cost option in the wheel lineup and not another expensive optional alloy. The steel wheel stayed in the product mix, but it’s only available on four-cylinder cars because the six-cylinder versions have bigger brakes so it doesn’t fit.
Launched at the Frankfurt show in 2019, the new Defender has been on sale for four years now, and I’ve personally known it for about eight, although staggeringly I’ve yet to drive one. Because I live in a company town I see them all over the place, but it doesn’t make me wistful like an old flame because that would mean out of a long line of ex-girlfriends, one of them had been cloned, which is mildly terrifying. No, it’s more a sense of regret because nearly every Defender I see is a high-end model in a subtle metallic on big alloy wheels, probably costing the thick end of seventy or eighty grand (except not because they’re on a company car scheme but still you get my drift). The steel wheels are a fun call back to the original L316 Defender, a vehicle designed with the express purpose of bashing the brains out of British squaddies bouncing across Salisbury Plain on training exercises. Gerry is not one for retro or heritage influences, so the new Defender being premium and flush and modern isn’t surprising. This is a criticism I have seen made about the whole of the Land Rover range in general, and the Defender could stand apart a bit by tying it visually closer to its beloved predecessor.
I’m Not Giving It Live Axles, So Bore Off With That
I’m not talking about redesigning the whole thing with a ladder frame, pig iron axles, the powerplant from an oiler and locking hubs or whatever other chunks of Victorian railway engineering those wrong-uns on the forums were bleating constituted a REAL DEFENDER. Those inbreds can take their three-fingered farm hands to the Ineos dealership and sign a big check for a Grenadier. I’m giving my Defender a small update to the glazing, making it look tougher and more down to earth. First of all, let’s look at some classic Defenders to get our eye in and give ourselves a reminder, as if one were needed, of one of the all-time iconic British automotive designs:
Let’s Make One For Me
I’m going to be basing my update on this, the Hard Top which in 90 and 110 forms is the cheapest and most basic Defender you can buy new, and as a bonus comes with the steel wheels:
On the doors it’s simply a matter of not painting the pillars black, giving a small cost saving. It emphasizes the fact doors are all one stamping and looks tougher. With the third side window, I’ve changed it from a flush, bonded piece of glass to a more traditional window held in place with a rubber seal. Think it looks a little plain? I agree. Let’s fancy it up a bit.
Much better. With a bigger vehicle like an SUV, introducing color breaks and graphics can work wonders in hiding the bulk. I don’t think retro for the sake of retro is always a good design choice, but used appropriately and sensitively it can be useful in giving your design more emotional appeal. I’ve stolen the graphics from the County package Land Rover appeared to offer last year that has now disappeared from the configurator. Perhaps they didn’t sell any (unlikely) or Gerry just hated it (much more likely).
You don’t want people seeing the dead bodies of your enemies you’re going to bury in the woods? Here at Autopian Design Studios we’re discretion fifth (after safety third and customer service fourth) so this is a 110 Hard Top with the new door glass arrangement.
A Defender For Adrian
When it came to the L316 Defender, not having any interest in off-roading I always preferred the 110 over the 90. Before I bought the Ferrari I was considering a late 110 in black with the Sawtooth alloys, until I realized they were climbing in value by the week and I’d have to install a rabid Alsatian in the passenger seat to bite anyone interested in shipping it to eastern Europe without my permission. With L663 a 90 is what I would have if Matt would stop sending my constant emails about a company car into his spam folder [Ed note: Until I’m allowed to take the Isuzu-powered Lotus Elan from the parking lot, no one gets anything – MH]. Below is what that would look like with the same updated glazing.
Not exactly me though is it?
Alright, that looks more suitable for the stylish goth-about-town, or perhaps a continent-crushing road trip to M’era Luna. These were all done over Land Rover press images, but in the studio those wouldn’t have been created until a few months before the launch. Instead, we used a configurator set up in Autodesk VRED set up by the visualization team from the latest production data. It allows you to select any of the current color, trim and wheel combinations on a car and render it up from a series of prescribed camera angles.
This is similar to the configurators you play with on an OEM website, but much more sophisticated and for internal use only, and unlike online versions it doesn’t send a load of data about potential customer choices to the marketing team. It’s a massive time saver for hard pressed junior designers who might have to quickly knock out a whole series of images so the expensive watch wearer-in-chief can decide on the final spec for their company car, which would inevitably end up with every optional extra and the biggest available alloy wheel anyway.
All images unless otherwise stated courtesy of Land Rover Media.
Those tiny taillights look so stupid.
I mentioned it elsewhere in the thread, but they’re a legal requirement for viewing angles because of the tailgate mounted spare.