Help me define "Proportion"....

I know the eye is the perfect tool for finding whats right. Thats why after you whack out 4" of metal, you can tell its just not "there" yet, so you slice out another 3/8" or 7/16", going a 1/16" or an 1/8" at a time. It is when you reach that final "BAM!! THATS IT!" -thats when you find out you just removed 4 9/16" of material.

Someone said it earlier: they like the "turret" to be 1/3 the height of the body and frame because thats where they feel the car has the best proportion.

Maybe what I was asking for wasnt numbers or even a subjective answer (to which there's no right or wrong response), but maybe a simple "show me a car that has perfect proportions". So here's an adendum to the thread: If you could, could you post a pic of a well proportioned car and highlight why you think it has "it"?

 

Art is the "stuff" Artists make.

"Artist" is a title a gallery owner pins on a person at the gallery opening of their stuff so the gallery can attempt to justify charging high prices for the "stuff".

"Proportion" is about as easy to define as "Quality"...

(For thoughts about Quality, read "Zen and the art of Motorcycle Maintenance"
I used to assign it as a text in beginning sculpture classes.)

 

Heimz .. I see your problem ..
As a rule : Beauty is in the eye of the beholder
Klaz
Take your pick :

 

True. I'm chopping a 34 coupe and had to put 1/2" back into the w/s posts. Just 1/2" too much wedge absolutely made it look like shit. 1/2" is a ton visually, even 1/4" is easily visible side by side.


.

 

There's some simple things to get a car to look the part it's being built for. The stance, or rake, can make or break a well proportioned build, right? So stealing from the Mopar idea of design from the 60s find a level line that's the most pleasing or dominant. If you "level" the rocker panels on those cars thay look bent. If you level the roofline they look "just right" from almost any aspect. It puts a very gentle rake to the overall car. You can really see this on lots of other cars just by taking a trip to a busy drag strip during a big bracket race. I was building a Vega wagon for brackets and when I set the body to the frame it just didn't feel right. It woulda worked alright but wouldn't look alright to my eye. Once I leveled the roof line (they tip upward from the rest of the car) it got really mean lookin. It had the perfect "stance" which had way less to do with performance than it did with looks.

This can be done with nearly anything. I've seen many a roadster and cabriolet end up way off even though the rest of the car was state-of-the-art be it restored big classics or hot rods. The main bow, that big one out back, sets the tone for the rest of the car. Too low, too high, all done. Just adding some other aspects of proportioning the overall look even after all the theories and figures are used. I haven't decided which surface to start from to get the right stance on the truck. I saved a pick of 427elky's black El Camino which I think has a great stance. The roof line is leveled and sets the tone for the rest of the car. On the chop for my 54 truck the back window will be less chop than the rest for reasons of proportion. Like what's been said above, I agree it's more than dimensions. 36-24-36?

 

Here's a commonly done example of wrong proportion. The first nose is what everyone runs but it reminds me of that moose post. The second is right.

 

I read Zen and the art of Motorcycle Maintenance about 25 years ago and every word rang true, great book anout "the vibe."
A bug-bear of mine is the chopped 33/4 coupe with a grille set at an angle that fights with the A pillar angle. To quote myself(!) from another post "the art of the art is making the art invisible." A few people "have it," most don't, and the smart ones who don't recognise this and copy* the good ones. As some of you have already said, I know right when I see it.

And square finished parts (eg "billet") never look good on roundy shaped cars, that being pretty well any car made in the 1930's.

*This need not be a bad word. My current project is a "Westergard style" custom. Everyone here knows what that means. I'm not cloning anything, but drawing on his aesthetic.

 

It's not seen, it's felt

 

felt.. like the perfectly proportioned fedora..

as said already it is viewer subjective,

what works in one environment may not work in another,
street, salt, lakes, strip, or autorama turn table.

generally speaking though,
balance and symmetry are what the mind looks for..
consciously or not...

the mathematical formulas above are the analytical brain's translations of what the artistic brain sees in the natural world.

unless you like to be shocked that is.
then there are no rules.

 

I missread the thread for a minute,, I thought it said "Help me define Traditional" I'm glad it was proportion though, I don't think I can handle another "traditional" thread....

 

=magazine guys?

 

i thnk its all semantics.

"beauty is in the eye of the beholder"

i agree with the theory that some relationship between shapes may be easier on the eyes due to some inherent natural instinct. even then, that instinct cant be built into everyone the smame way. im sure that for some people thats exactly what they try to avoid. if it looks "right" to them then they feel the need to change the object. or the proportions their instincts tell them are different from the first guys.

what the hell do i know anyway. semantics i tell you.

 

I thought fibonnaci was some kinda bread, some of that fancy stuff you get a Paneras.

I don't know anything about proportion but I can tell you that skinny chicks just don't look good to me, but skinny bikes do. I'm confused. I can tell when something looks good but I don't really know why.

I have no clue.

 

Thanks guys, youre all giving me some great insight as to what you look for.

Some of us aren't born with the ability to recognize proportion until its shown to them. Atleast now I have a decent understanding WHY certain cars just look better than others. If you have more examples, please post them.

 

I was talking to my pal, Francois, a few days ago and we decided that the 21st century definition of a traditional car is an out of proportion chopped mid fifties car. Early thirties car are a little more forgiving to the eye when done with a super radical chop.

I also believe that many people don't plan ahead when chopping a car. That would explain the cars with too much out of the roof or poorly laid in rear windows. I think it really helps to PhotoShop before using the fire wrench. Even cutting up and pasting a photo works well. Many cars seem to be sliced and diced before thinking of how to fit the glass, loft the rear window or any of the things that it takes to truly finish a car. And, yes, I really think cars can and should eventually get FINISHED.

There are many was to do a car too. Drip rails or not. Slab sided or added chrome strips. Slanted or straight B pillers. But when it looks right, it IS right.

 

I think people get the word proportion confused with the elements that make hot rods what they are.

In other words, you can build a hot rod with good proportions... and it can still be "wrong".

The element that factors heavily into the equation is "history".

When you build a car to go fast these days... it looks TOTALLY different than it did 50 or 60 years ago.

Someone with a historical perspective will argue a certain car has "good proportions" for different reasons than a street rodder would.

Flip open a Street Rodder magazine and you'll see more aesthetically pleasing designs than you will in a rat rod magazine.

But even if you go back in time... there are guys who got it "right" and so many that didn't...

The guys now who get it "right" borrow from those early designers and blend the elements into something with a historical perspective and an aesthetic that leans towards a street rodding influence.

It happens the moment you drop the front end of that otherwise period pre-war hot rod...

But why?

Shit, I dunno... because it looks good.

I do however think there are some "basics" to good proportions...

"Big tires in back, small in front"

"Rubber Rake" (i.e. not slammed)

And god forbid... "cowl higher than the grille shell"

But even then there are guys who will argue that their dead-level, grille-shell-higher-than-the-cowl rat rods have good proportions... to them.

Sam.

 

The posts by Sam and Phil make some pretty interesting points - and this post has been on my mind. Bear with me, but I have this art history/theory background that I am always referencing in life, cars too.

Sam's dialog, especially, speaks to a factor avoided in this discussion but important - aesthetic convention. This is a "traditional" board and with that comes some promotion of established visual concepts.

Emphasis in print media and "little books" has established an accepted visual convention to what a "traditional" car looks like.

Sam is a better purist than I am, in building things. He is very versed in the history and "rules" of making a car right. Others here are even more determined to recreate the correct period look.

I think the convention continues to skew, as the overall look of builds evolve - Barney Navarro probably liked some other guys grill shell, Kevin Lee liked Barney's the form of the grill shell was redetermined by Kevin and now his contributes to the accepted visual convention.

At the other end of the spectrum, there are guys like Roth. Ed referenced the conventions/standards that had been established, but went beyond them. Think Beatnik Bandit, for example, with it's stylized abstractions of a standard roadster. I see Roth the same way I see Jackson Pollock, in that his twisting of established visual rules created a new set of conventions. The Lunar Lander is evidence of that new set of rules.

None of this has anything to do with the question of proportion, does it? The conventions of what makes a car look right. Say we use Doane Spencer's car as the yardstick for "right" cars - well measuring the Lunar Lander against that wouldn't work. We would have to say that one of the cars is right out. Looking at the posts of modifieds from the early lakes points out a whole lot of cars, again using the Spencer yardstick, shows a bunch of misproportions.

I am not sure where I am going with this, ultimately. I have a great deal of appreciation for hot rod conventions. I don't always apply them as I am building, but I am very aware of them. A half inch, here or there, might as well be a mile...

 

It's hard to define, but when it's proper, I know it when I see it.

 

Dusty, you mentioned Roth and he definitely took "the look" to a new level. What really fascinates me is how he decided "a bathtub" could be beautiful. What went through that guys amazing mind???

I think the purpose of this post was to find insight into the judgement of these greats who customize cars. I still reference Cole Foster's metallic red Chevy Truck. He looked up at the inside of the roof and thought it was too tall... or maybe just thought it needed a change.. so he cut out another roof from a donor and welded it inside to bring the roof a whole new feel. It's something that most people will probably never see or notice.

Or the customizers who looked at a shoebox's bumper and thought it flowed better upside-down.

I am just trying to understand that artistic spark that predicates all these bitchin' tricks we see today... and of yesterday.

We all know it can be summed up as "you know it when you see it"... but the designers/builders didnt see it before they created it. They had to come up with it. They had to stand back 20 feet and spend an hour looking at the sweep of the glass or noticing a hood that peaked too much; maybe the deck lid needs to lengthened an inch or two.

Thank you everyone for chiming in here and giving your two cents because all of it is extremely helpful.

 

Dusting off a 5-year-old thread as I'm mocking (mucking?) up my tudor project for the umpteenth time.

I'm interested in hearing what a new crop of HAMBers thinks...

 

I think that a combination of Ryan and Alex' description come as close as one is going to get to a definition for proportion as it applies to a vehicle.

For me it has to do with leaning away from cartoon like dimensions. It is objective for the most part to be sure but if you slice and dice one to the point of looking like an Ed Roth cartoon you have destroyed the proportion. He purposely did that to get your attention.

It is a matter of cohesivness, everything has to work together with everything else. It takes a good builder/designer to actually pull it off. nearly everyone can build one to make themselves happy and a few others may even like it but one that is properly proportioned will appeal to the masses.

From experience I would have to say Cognac mostly.

 

While I agree what Ryan and Alex and some other's said, seems like these opinions are based on a car's (or truck's) side profile. As far as front or back view go, the most important thing about proportion is SYMMETRY. People tend to find symmetric cars, faces, buildings... most attractive when symmetrical.

 

While not everyone can pull off proper proportion, symmetry is easier for more people to achieve. Using a symmetrical design means you only need to get the proportion right on one side, then copy it for the other. It takes a true artist to pull off a properly proportional asymmetrical look that is attractive. Think of the Nissan Cube for a lesson on botching an asymmetrical design.

But I'm no artist.

 

It might be helpful to pick a particular car that is widely accepted as well proportioned, and compare it with the golden rectangle...

Take buildings for example - traditional architecture is often a repetition of the golden triangle, or its individual components.

This video may explain it better.

http://video.answers.com/understanding-proportion-in-architecture-255011241

See what they're doing with the rectangles - laying them onto the structure to illustrate the relationship? That's what I'd like to to with a few cars, to see how they compare.

I don't have pshop - is anyone interested in trying this?

 

That horrrible little thing looks like it belongs on the Cartoon Futurama!
And to think photographer Eric Geisert has TWO of them!

 

There is actually a formula that professional designers use. I am probably going to get it wrong so someone who has graduated design school will have to help me out but it is 2/3-1/3. The roof being 1/3 of the depth of the slab of the body.

I think that when it comes to asymmetrical Mr Roth was the king. That is not to say that I haven't seen other asymmetrical vehicles that I liked as well but he was consistent in a non consistent sort of a way.

I should ad that asymmetrical design usually only works in a show rod/custom sort of a venue, a performance based build seldom if ever looks correct as an asymmetrical build. I think that it is the idea of being balanced our mind just resists the idea of something asymmetrical being balanced. We logically can accept that the engine may want to be offset to balance out the weight difference of a driver but to offset one enough to really appear asymetrical would actually not balance one out unless you were a very large person.

 

Roth was definetly the King, and only 'cause it's a Roth ride would I tolerate that asymmetrical stuff he built.

 

36-24-36, but only if she is 5'2".

 

Nice flow..pleasing to the eye

Art,
squirrel said it right

We create, Art