Sunday 28 August 2016

Roborace....?!?!

The guy (Daniel Simon) who designed this for the film Oblivion....



And this for the film Tron Legacy...


Has designed this...


for a new racing series that will support the various races held across the Formula E season. Looks great except this racing series is Roborace with all teams having the same car but with no human drivers allowed and only AI and algorithms creating the racing spectacle....  Now, unfortunately this is where my excitement (and most probably yours) .... stopped. So what is being proposed here is a battle of the nerds (no offense to those guys involved) to code their way to victory...

I am sorry but this will be about as exciting to watch as watching paint dry... Sure, it may be interesting to watch a race or two just to see how such a thing may be possible (self driving cars racing each other) but as soon as the initial novelty wears off, a Roborace event will be as stale as a 5 week old loaf of bread...

The whole essence of racing is the combination of man and machine... the only thing that makes F1 vaguely watchable these days are the drivers behind the helmets, because the mental / psychological aspect of the battle that takes place between driver and driver is what fans relate to and keeps people interested; How driver's deal with set backs and obstacles throughout a race and a season and their reactions to them is what creates the racing drama.

No drivers = no personalities battling it out to be champion. Sure the coders behind the scenes will be experiencing a few competitive urges whilst they code through the night to stop their car driving itself off the road but this will be mostly out of sight.

For me, the greatest thing about Roborace has been to discover the awesome visual and design work of Daniel Simon Design and realising he has been behind the design and creation of some of the vehicles I have dreamed of actually getting behind the wheel of, like the Light Runner from Tron Legacy and the dragonfly-like flying vehicle from Tom Cruise's film Oblivion. What an awesome job he has, working with the likes of Bugatti and Disney crossing the worlds of motor-sport and film to bring to life his ideas. Dream job anyone...?!

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