How to become a car designer?

Passion! is the key to engage in any creative endeavour, and the same applies to become a car designer.

We know that a car designer designs a car, but in reality, it’s not simple. There are complex process and systems to bring out a car from concept to reality. You must have heard terms like Creative Designer, Clay Modeller, Digital Sculptor, Colour & Trim Designer, etc. These are people with different roles working in specific areas of car design.

A creative designer’s role is to generate ideas/concepts for the given brief. The fundamental tool in bringing ideas is through a Sketch, and the medium could be a paper or digital equipment such as Wacom Tablet or CINTIQ. Irrespective of the medium a creative designer exists to generate ideas/concepts, and there is a funnelling process to choose the best design work for further development.

In this article, let us focus on how to become a car designer. Below is the list of steps:

1. Clarity: Clarify why you want to be a car designer. Without purpose, you lack focus, without focus, you can’t deliver. Clarifying on the motivations or inspirations in becoming a car design would trigger the passion in you.
When you hit a plateau, and pursuing your goals seem difficult, making informed decision helps you understand why you started this journey. Also, enrolling in good design school requires substantial investment in time, money and effort. Check if you are ready to take the pledge.

2. Prepare: Preparation is the key to propel towards your goal. At first, you must work on your portfolio. A good design school would make an assessment based on your portfolio. A portfolio can have works related to Art, Design, Music, Photography, Sketching, Model Making or anything that’s considered creative. A good mix of creative ideas communicated through sketches and a bit of enhanced presentation through digital tools will make your portfolio stand out from the rest of the applicants.

Mantra academy can help you in imparting design skill-sets and prepare your portfolio through its “Design & Research program”. Click here for details.

3. Apply: Search and apply to the best design schools in the world. Look at their programs and shortlist the suitable ones after confirming the admission procedure, fee, duration and the university’s connect with the industry. Check the school website for important dates and application process. Few design schools provide scholarships, you may check with the students’ relation officer for details. Scholarship eligibility is based on your portfolio and achievement. Also, there may be a time-based studio test.

4. Toil: You can’t replace hard work. Be prepared to have sleepless nights in the design studio for being excited about the project at hand or for endless iterations trying to achieve perfection which usually doesn’t happen. Time management is crucial to handle projects within the stipulated period, else be prepared to get penalised on your grades for late submissions. Never get into the vicious cycle of delivering perfection, there is no such thing as a perfect idea, concept or product. Give the best version of what’s possible with your creative and design capabilities at that point of time. Try to be the best version of yourself.

5. Compete: You must have a competing mindset because transportation design is a highly competitive area. Never miss out an opportunity to participate in competitions and design events. Establish connections through networking and winning a competition means reducing the time gap in landing internships.

Please note, the above steps are simple steps in becoming a car designer. You may contact us for any help.