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Back in June 2008, MSN Autos threw down a challenge to its readers: Create the ultimate exterior for a Dodge Challenger and the automaker will build it for you. More than 330,000 entries later, a winner was chosen: graphic artist Jon Sibal. A 2009 Challenger R/T was painted to his specifications, and now Sibal and his car are turning heads all over his hometown of Aliso Viejo, Calif.
If you’re a fan of DC Comics, the eye-popping flame job shown here isn’t the first work you’ve seen from Sibal; he’s a freelance graphic artist who does ink work for DC’s popular “Superman” and “Supergirl” titles. MSN Autos caught up with him to talk about his hot paint scheme, SoCal car culture and the looks he gets while cruising around Orange County in his customized muscle car.
Q: How did you come up with the
concept?
A: Well, Dodge being Dodge — with their history of good old-fashioned muscle cars — I figured the main thing I needed was a high-impact, bold design. And that brought to mind the old hot-rod flames, that classic image … but I decided to modernize it, to use real flames, rather than a graphic representation. I like the idea, what it represents, that the engine is so hot the car is literally burning up. It’s very aggressive, and gives the car a lot of “movement,” even when it’s parked. For the hood, I wanted another classic image: a racing stripe. But I thought that maybe it was a bit boring for the challenge, so instead I chose a matte black finish for the body but a glossy black stripe from the hood all the way over the roof and down to the trunk, with the flames following the stripe the whole way.
Q: Did your work as a freelance arti
st give you a leg up?
A: It’s funny — I guess some people may think so, but, really, it was still a big challenge. All the comic work I do for “Superman” and “Supergirl” is manual — I’m talking old-school, big sheets of paper, ink, the works. Car rendering, which I’ve also started doing professionally, is all done digitally, and I tend to enter contests as a way to challenge myself. I enter to win, of course, but it’s mainly for a way for me to learn.
Find more pictures of Jon Sibal's artwork on Bing
Q: What kind of reactions do you get? The car doesn’t exactly blend in …
A: Oh man — it’s CRAZY! People talk to me about it all the time; even some neighbors I don’t know that well will come and talk to me when they see it. I remember one time, driving to Huntington Beach, this guy on a big Harley-Davidson pulled alongside me on the driver’s side, glanced over the car and then did a double-take. He then pulled behind the car to see it from the back and around again to see it from the passenger side. At the next red light, he asked me to roll down my window, but between the noise of his engine and the noise of the Challenger engine, we couldn’t hear each other. So he just ended up giving me thumbs up, and made some excited hand gestures and stuff over the noise.
Q: Any unexpected benefits from your prize?
A: I’m really a lot more into American car culture now. I mean, I’ve always been into cars, but my main project before this was my BMW. (Editor’s note: Sibal has put an impressive amount of customization work into his 1993 BMW 325 — so much so that it is no longer street-legal to drive in California.) I was big into the imports, the European cars. Sure, I had an appreciation for the American cars but wasn’t really in that world. Getting this car really changed all that — I’m now a project coordinator for a Challenger car club with chapters in Orange County and Los Angeles (SoCalChallenger.com). What’s awesome about the Challenger is that it really looks so retro, so much like an old-school muscle car, that people are really into that connection with the car’s history — and, of course, Dodge did a great job giving these really classic-looking cars all the modern amenities. It’s just an awesome car.
