Red Bull Ampol Racing will run a one-off Summer Edition livery on both the #88 and #888 Ford Mustangs at this weekend’s Boost Mobile Gold Coast 500, the opening round of the Repco Supercars Finals.
The livery promotes the Red Bull Summer Edition flavour with a lemon splash graphic over a dark blue base, all produced as a fully printed wrap.
I started on the project in late July with a lemon splash graphic supplied by Red Bull, created for the Summer Edition’s in-store promotional material such as posters. Because it was designed for print at poster scale rather than for a car, it needed a lot of work before it could be used. I extended the background, altered the glow effects and created separate splash angles for different areas of the car so the graphics would flow across the whole body. That reworked graphic was also used on the drivers’ race suits and as the basis for the initial concepts, developed with the team & Peter Hughes.
From there I worked with the commercial team to make the concept work for every partner and for the signage department. Some partner logos had to change colour to sit on the yellow splash areas, while others needed to stay on the blue base. I also gave feedback on which parts of the concept would and wouldn’t work for the print process.
I designed all of the print files and tested them on my 3D model of the Mustang before supplying them to Triple Eight’s in-house signwriter, Ben Schliebs, and we worked together on any adjustments needed during production. The rear bar was the hardest area, as the base wrap needed more stretch than my unwrap template allowed for. With the amount of fine detail I had to recreate to make the graphics flow over the whole car, this has been one of the hardest designs I’ve turned into a wrap.
The biggest challenge was carrying such a detailed graphic across multiple body panels. Each panel needs its own print file shaped to fit it, but the splashes and droplets still have to line up across every join so the car reads as one continuous design. With so much fine detail running from panel to panel, any misalignment shows, which made this one of the hardest designs I’ve turned into a wrap.
The renders shown here are my own, produced on a 3D model of the Mustang that hav been in the works for a few years. Before anything went to print, I applied the print files to the model as a test to make sure they would come out as planned so the final results match the renders.
With a short turnaround between Bathurst and the Gold Coast, the design was largely finalised shortly after The Bend 500 in September.
It’s always great working with Red Bull and Triple Eight. It takes a top team with real attention to presentation, and the organisation to match, to pull off a livery like this.
The Summer Edition Mustangs hit the track at Surfers Paradise from Friday 23 October.
