LA-Based CGI Artist Imagines a Future Where Humans Race Vehicles on Mars – autoevolution

Imagine for a moment that youre a settler on a growing Mars colony, and youre a bit bored. Since its Saturday, you and a few other members decided to have some fun racing. Remember, youre on Mars, so all that is bound to be a bit different.

One way your race day could unfurl is the way Daniel Trbovic reveals in the gallery and video below. Mr. Trbovic is a CGI artist and photographer living out of Los Angeles, California. Aside from creating renderings like these, he also travels the world photographing vehicles, everything from old-school Chevys to McLarens and everything in-between.

The visual project you see here is known as "Nomads on Mars," so lets call these vehicles Nomads, even though there isnt a clear mention of this. Actually, theres no mention of anything regarding the vehicles, just these images and the video.

However, the video alone is enough to give you an idea of what these vehicles are and how theyre supposed to perform. Starting from the ground up, the first thing youll notice is the wheel design. Unlike classic wheel design, Trbovic chose to include a hub-less wheel.

Looking at the Nomad's body, there isnt much to see. An odd teardrop shape seems to offer a degree of aerodynamics, while the minimal appearance of a frame means only one thing: speed. Because the vehicle includes only a few struts here and there and is mostly covered in glass, its probably quite light.

Since I mentioned aerodynamics earlier, I must ask if youve any idea what those lateral fans found at the rear could be used for. No? Me neither. However, if you think about where you may have seen this sort of system before (helicopters), you can kind of get an idea about what they may be used for.

One use for these fans could be to offer lateral stability at high speeds. If the Nomad is going too fast and starts to fishtail, the fans can kick in to correct the loss of traction. Their next use could be to intentionally create a loss of traction, like taking a very sharp turn where the rear end needs to be whipped around quickly.

There are a few flaws in this theory. If this were to be true, a mechanism such as this should be placed at the front of the vehicle to push air as far away from remaining surfaces as possible.

A final feature of the Nomad is that of autonomous operation. Sure, there are two seats inside, telling you that you can take these trinkets out for a spin, side-by-side style. On the other hand, the animation shows these puppies flying around without a single driver in sight. Theyre either autonomousor can be controlled remotely.

Personally, I'd love to see a design such as this flying around desert landscapes. But I also know that I probably wont be seeing anything like this in my lifetime. For now, let's just enjoy the (virtual)show.

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LA-Based CGI Artist Imagines a Future Where Humans Race Vehicles on Mars - autoevolution