Car Magazine - what's going on?

Car Magazine - what's going on?

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dandarez

13,244 posts

282 months

Friday 18th February 2022
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I remember 'Car' magazine - well before it became 'Car'. I still have lots of old copies stored away.

I saw my first copy of said mag - at this point (in reply to Derek's post above) it was called: 'Small Car and Mini Owner - incorporating Sporting Driver' - at the 63 Racing Car Show - taken to by my Dad who worked in the motor industry.

At that time I believed the addition of 'Sporting Driver' must have been relieved from another car mag title, but there was never such a thing.
It was no more than a byline added to let readers know that the mag catered also for 'sporting drivers' - and it did!

I confess at that point I had little interest in cars apart from their design and how they 'looked' - I was an 'arty-farty' type teen at that young point in my life and any decent school exam results I achieved, outside of English lessons, were only ever in Art. Even at that young age I had one ambition only, to work in an art environment or in commercial art - I ended up in print as an apprentice compositor! The lower case letters for the words 'small car' mag hit home now and made sense. I suppose I did achieve part of my goal in my mid 30s working under Tony Evora who came to Britain to teach, and was appointed Head of the Department of Art in an Oxford uni. Evora was the Cuban whose design for Guevara posters that adorned teenagers bedroom walls in the 60s on. Evora had worked on the Revolucion newspaper in 1960s Havana and it was he alone who created the bi-tonal graphic from Alberto Korda’s photograph of Che Guevara for publication, 'before' some other artist who today claims to have been the originator.
I digress. Back to cars and 'Car'.

My first visit to the Racing Car Show was in 61. I'd beem hooked by the sleek lines of the new Ginetta G4 on its launch, their stand had lots of visitors. Next to them was Rochdale Motor Panels who had an Olympic body unit pointing vertically, saving space, but to my eyes, it was artistic and clever - this also helped pull visitors to the two stands. Ginetta's stand had not been large enough to accommodate 2 cars so the Walklett brothers cannily mounted a body unit next to the actual car, at a 45 degree angle. Two specialist makers with artistic ideals. I was hooked! It seemed others were too, while some 'worried'... Lotus' stand had their Seven at a similar price to the G4 - Chapman wondered what the interest was all about, and was noted to have checked over the Stand - proving what a wily character he was, came his announcement halfway through the show of a price reduction of a £100 on all Seven orders. Some said he perceived the Ginetta as a threat, this was his way of dealing with it quick. Not sure it worked!

Back at home Dad was driving an Austin A40 (1963) 164 FFC and by this point in his life he'd just passed 23 yrs at Cowley (war yrs spent in RAF) - Pressed Steel Fisher, BMC etc - and he would constantly harp on at the dinner table to family about this proposed new Hillman Imp and forthcoming launch - because of the link between Linwood (Pressed Steel) and Cowley.
Small Car mag was now regular reading material for dad, and perusing by me. Price was two shillings (or as more commonly referred, two 'bob').

As Derek points out, 'Small Car' did criticise the new Imp (but to be fair that was not unusual, the mag was known to not hold back on criticism of other marques too, resulting in the mag often being slated by the then motor industry buffs.

As Doug Blain, editor from 64 to 71, once pointed out:
‘They complained all the time, they withdrew their ads, they stopped us getting hold of test cars. But I always figured that, if we were important enough, they’d come back. And they did!’
Blain was a very clever and astute motoring journo.

Although a true to heart Cowley man, dad let us (family) know one evening tea time that he was convinced the new Hillman Imp was the way to go, no Mini for him.
In 65 he decided on the 'best' model, and took delivery of a brand new Singer Chamois - EUD 647C. A couple years later I learned to drive in it, when dad decided the family needed a bigger car, so the 'Chammy' became my first car. Never looked back. 'Car' and many other car mags became regular buys, weekly and monthly ones.
Even now my garage is stocked with old car mags, from the 'specialist' stuff, to CCC, Hot Car, Motor Sport, Autocar, Motor, etc etc and of course, 'Car'.

Today, one has to wonder how some car mags still survive?
I no longer buy 'any' car mags.
That's a lie (after being given the heads-up on PHs classic car threads) I did subscribe, like quite a few on here during lockdown, to Classic & Sports Car (it used to be Classic & Sportscar - 1 word in its earlier years) - this was for 12 months - who wouldn't, for a measly 12 quid post free to your door?

Other than that, no, I'd much rather search out some of my 'old' car mags and read those instead.

Edited by dandarez on Friday 18th February 23:21

Yertis

18,015 posts

265 months

Monday 21st February 2022
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dandarez said:
I confess at that point I had little interest in cars apart from their design and how they 'looked' - I was an 'arty-farty' type teen at that young point in my life and any decent school exam results I achieved, outside of English lessons, were only ever in Art. Even at that young age I had one ambition only, to work in an art environment or in commercial art - I ended up in print as an apprentice compositor! The lower case letters for the words 'small car' mag hit home now and made sense. I suppose I did achieve part of my goal in my mid 30s working under Tony Evora who came to Britain to teach, and was appointed Head of the Department of Art in an Oxford uni. Evora was the Cuban whose design for Guevara posters that adorned teenagers bedroom walls in the 60s on. Evora had worked on the Revolucion newspaper in 1960s Havana and it was he alone who created the bi-tonal graphic from Alberto Korda’s photograph of Che Guevara for publication, 'before' some other artist who today claims to have been the originator.
I digress. Back to cars and 'Car'.
I'd never realised that about the lower case 'car' logo paperbag
How did the compositing career go? One of the many things I rue about the transition to 'desktop publishing' – a term I hate – is no longer working with typesetters into the night to meet some deadline of other. A whole ecosystem wiped out, and a lot of great characters vanished from daily life. Eg, the first typesetter who I worked with, who had crooked thumbs from whacking out Monotype, and previously been a Seafire pilot.

Derek Smith

45,512 posts

247 months

Tuesday 10th May 2022
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Yertis said:
dandarez said:
I confess at that point I had little interest in cars apart from their design and how they 'looked' - I was an 'arty-farty' type teen at that young point in my life and any decent school exam results I achieved, outside of English lessons, were only ever in Art. Even at that young age I had one ambition only, to work in an art environment or in commercial art - I ended up in print as an apprentice compositor! The lower case letters for the words 'small car' mag hit home now and made sense. I suppose I did achieve part of my goal in my mid 30s working under Tony Evora who came to Britain to teach, and was appointed Head of the Department of Art in an Oxford uni. Evora was the Cuban whose design for Guevara posters that adorned teenagers bedroom walls in the 60s on. Evora had worked on the Revolucion newspaper in 1960s Havana and it was he alone who created the bi-tonal graphic from Alberto Korda’s photograph of Che Guevara for publication, 'before' some other artist who today claims to have been the originator.
I digress. Back to cars and 'Car'.
I'd never realised that about the lower case 'car' logo paperbag
How did the compositing career go? One of the many things I rue about the transition to 'desktop publishing' – a term I hate – is no longer working with typesetters into the night to meet some deadline of other. A whole ecosystem wiped out, and a lot of great characters vanished from daily life. Eg, the first typesetter who I worked with, who had crooked thumbs from whacking out Monotype, and previously been a Seafire pilot.
A bit of a resurrection I suppose.

I went the opposite was to DanDare for a while. I started as a compositor, but tried to move towards graphic art. I started, with three friends, a company specialising in 'corporate redesign' as it would now be called. The others were the talent, I was sales. I'd get the jobs, tell them the sort of thing the customers wanted, and they'd ignore it all as they wanted to go all arty. We must have lost >50% of our sales through that, and the other half weren't that pleased. Profits were hit so, in order to make ends meet, I was voted out. Me, the only one bringing in work. The obvious happened within a few weeks.

They, or at least two of them, were very good at their job. If only they listened.

I went back into printing, training as a Monotype keyboard operator and, later, service engineer. I saw myself turning into one of the old boys I'd felt sorry for when I was an apprentice so jacked it all in and joined the police, this in 1975. The unions should have allowed desktop publishing to come in their remit. I now publish my own books online, so the training is still useful.

There was a museum which had an exhibition of the old-style printing methods and went along to reminisce. I was telling my youngest about the display when one of the organisers came up to me and asked me about the stuff. My sone was impressed by his dad that day. However, I really felt old.

My late dad was a printer and I still keep his quoin key in my car. Nice thing to touch.

I was there during the days of the Koenig/Krone Think Small VW ads. A great time in graphic art. Seeing a new one in the papers was a great thrill. They were a revolution, one that has lasted until today. We're due another revolution.

Whatever happened to Univers?

Yertis

18,015 posts

265 months

Wednesday 11th May 2022
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Alive and well near the bottom of the font menu:


Derek Smith

45,512 posts

247 months

Thursday 12th May 2022
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Yertis said:
Alive and well near the bottom of the font menu:

Thanks for that. It's a shame that no one, or at least hardly anyone, uses it nowadays. I remember arguments with customers trying to get them to opt for it instead of Gill. We studied it in graphic design one year and we had to design our own typeface using graph paper for a particular function. I went mad and did a whole range of fonts: bold, italic, bold italic, small caps with an italic option - didn't really work - and underlined, together with punctuation, which no one else thought of. I also had a title typeface that I used for a number of years, but no one copied. I might resurrect it for my website and YouTube channel.

I loved graphic design. The tragedy for the world is that in my group there was a number of talented guys, and also one who was something of a genius, and, as I had no talent, I was despondent so gave up, or rather, gave into the inevitable. Oddly, I gained a distinction at the end, but only because the genius spent 15 minutes totally redesigning my submission. I coughed to my tutor but he said he knew. That was a real slapping. It was the crumbs.

The girls though! And the short skirts. The music. The clubs. And the short skirts. Great days. I just wish I had had a bit of talent.

Yertis

18,015 posts

265 months

Wednesday 18th May 2022
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Derek Smith said:

Thanks for that. It's a shame that no one, or at least hardly anyone, uses it nowadays. I remember arguments with customers trying to get them to opt for it instead of Gill. We studied it in graphic design one year and we had to design our own typeface using graph paper for a particular function. I went mad and did a whole range of fonts: bold, italic, bold italic, small caps with an italic option - didn't really work - and underlined, together with punctuation, which no one else thought of. I also had a title typeface that I used for a number of years, but no one copied. I might resurrect it for my website and YouTube channel.

I loved graphic design. The tragedy for the world is that in my group there was a number of talented guys, and also one who was something of a genius, and, as I had no talent, I was despondent so gave up, or rather, gave into the inevitable. Oddly, I gained a distinction at the end, but only because the genius spent 15 minutes totally redesigning my submission. I coughed to my tutor but he said he knew. That was a real slapping. It was the crumbs.

The girls though! And the short skirts. The music. The clubs. And the short skirts. Great days. I just wish I had had a bit of talent.
The clubs, the girls, the short skirts, the spray mount, the smoking, drinking, all nighters to hit the deadline etc are all a thing of the past, sadly. The problem now is that anyone can buy a Mac and announce that they are a 'graphic designer'. A receptionist who worked for me did just that. I still make a living at it (that logo up there at the top is one of mine biggrin) but the competition is very intense and it's nowhere near as much fun as it used to be.

DSC OFF

189 posts

60 months

Saturday 4th February 2023
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Just browsed through a copy in Tesco. Looks to have shrunk in size - same height but much narrower. It looks odd to say the least, like distorted A4

Paper quality is dire too, not far off how Modern Classics was. Poor form

clive_candy

534 posts

164 months

Saturday 4th February 2023
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In the era of the EV mags like What Car which have tended to regard cars in a more utilitarian light will cater for those choosing their next means of getting from A to B while those that appeal to the driver like Car will go to the wall.

cerb4.5lee

30,170 posts

179 months

Saturday 4th February 2023
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clive_candy said:
In the era of the EV mags like What Car which have tended to regard cars in a more utilitarian light will cater for those choosing their next means of getting from A to B while those that appeal to the driver like Car will go to the wall.
I feel really sad about this as well. What Car was always generally a magazine for people who weren't into cars, whereas CAR magazine used to cater more for the car enthusiast in comparison. However because we're heading into a world of dullness with EVs...CAR magazine is also crap now sadly.

Yertis

18,015 posts

265 months

Monday 6th February 2023
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It's a shame it didn't go the route of 'Road Rat' etc


That said, I don't buy Road Rat either paperbag

5 In a Row

1,458 posts

226 months

Friday 12th May 2023
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Well, it looks like that might be it for me and CAR mag.
Latest magazine's long termers section is now stuffed full of EVs.

I know they're the future (due to legislation rather than them being the right option) but they hold absolutely zero interest for me frown

CoupeKid

747 posts

64 months

Saturday 20th May 2023
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When I read Car magazine in the late 80s and 90s it had a wide variety of articles.

There'd be a cheapish car giant test, an expensive car giant test, reviews, something on technology, something in motor sport, an interview with someone interesting in the auto industry, an piece on a classic car and something car culture related like a road trip or English guys watching a NASCAR race in the Deep South.

And it would be beautifully laid out.

Last time I looked it was composed almost all reviews, which is ok in itself but doesn't set the magazine apart from the other monthlies.

I suppose there's a more limited budget now but it also smacks of a lack of imagination.

Truckosaurus

11,183 posts

283 months

Tuesday 23rd May 2023
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Indeed. I recent bought a copy of the first issue of CAR I read as a youth, which kick started my motoring enthusiasm. It was an issue from 1990 and had a group test of Z1/MX5/TVR S2.

The big difference were there being articles that just had a small illustration to go with the words. Whereas these days magazines just seem to be more pictures than words.

Even the adverts were mostly words actually describing and selling the product.

I still think the death of car magazines began when cars all started getting sporty suspension and low profile tyres, so they look dull in the cornering photos.

coppice

8,561 posts

143 months

Tuesday 23rd May 2023
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I think the rot set in when the internet convinced everyone that they'd had enough of experts, reduced attention spans to seconds and made free content the norm . The average story is now 250- 500 words of cliched guff surrounded by endless equally cliched pictures.

Yertis

18,015 posts

265 months

Friday 26th May 2023
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Googling around I found a quite interesting article about the history of 'Car', by Gavin Green.

https://www.carmagazine.co.uk/features/opinion/gav...

carinaman

21,209 posts

171 months

Monday 28th August 2023
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Yertis said:
Googling around I found a quite interesting article about the history of 'Car', by Gavin Green.

https://www.carmagazine.co.uk/features/opinion/gav...
Second paragraph reminds me James May did an article for Engineer magazine in which he opined it was far more difficult to design and build a Supermini than a Supercar. I think May cited the Panda in that article.

Burny16v

130 posts

176 months

Monday 28th August 2023
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Just seen this thread and following all the talk of graphic design earlier I thought I'd chime in, especially after reading the second part of the article posted by Yertis as it mentioned Adam Stinson (who followed Wendy Harrop as art director). I studied graphic design at University (graduated 11 years ago now!) and Adam was my course leader, and I seem to remember having a flick through piles of older copies for inspiration once upon a time. For what it's worth, I've gone on to become a graphic designer in the automotive/motorsport world, so he clearly did a half decent job biggrin


Edited by Burny16v on Monday 28th August 14:57

theicemario

619 posts

74 months

Wednesday 6th September 2023
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Well I much enjoy James Dennison’s reviews on their Youtube channel. Picked up their September issue on a services the other day, will see what I make of that. I subscribe to evo but would love support other car mags as well