As we were with our cars Sony processed ours first and left the company demonstrators till later - each step is explained below.
1. Long Distance
I had to park my car in a marked box in quite a wide open space while 3 photographers took pictures from a distance, 1 photographer at '9 O'clock' was about 100 meters away, 1 at '11 O'clock' was about 50M away and 1 at '1 O'clock' was again about 50M away. After each photographer signaled to the marshal they had finished I had to turn my car around and put it back in the same box, at exactly the same angle - I know because he made me re-align my car by about 2 degrees, while they took some more pictures. I don't know how many they took but each time I had to leave my car for 3 or 4 minutes before they signaled they had finished. The other 2 TVRs had to repeat this with the roof up and with the roof down.
2. Detail
Next I had to park my car while this guy took numerous pictures with a small handheld digital camera. He took roughly a picture every 5 seconds from every angle of every detail on the car for about 10 - 12 minutes. I wouldn't be surprised if he took 150 pictures. He took pictures with the sunroof closed and open, through the sunroof of the seats, the pedals, interior and exterior door handles all exterior lights, badges, wheels, everything!
3. Colour Check
While the detail photos were being taken another chap came and checked the colour with a machine he held on the bodywork, he did this in 3 or 4 places on the car.
4. Mapping
This stage was strange, I must admit I didn't understand what was going on here. The car was parked in a white tent, they took pictures of the lights when illuminated - every light including reversing light, as this is dash switch operated I didn't really know if it would work as I don't use it but he seemed satisfied so it must have.
They then position 3 tripods around the car - 1 in front, 1 behind and 1 at the side while a guy went around with a large handheld device (it might have been a camera) taking what I think were 3D images. On each tripod was a SLR camera with the back removed, the shutter held open and a flashgun pointing through the aperture and lens of the camera, all 3 flashguns would fire each time he took an image.
5. Sound Recording
Next was the sound recording which was quite fun, this was a little way away from the other activities just along Millbrook’s 1 mile straight. One microphone was positioned 1 meter from the exhaust at 45% and another about a meter above the engine with the bonnet open, I had to give the sound engineer a few revs so he could set his recording levels and then switch the engine off. The car was then started and left to idle for 30 seconds then revved to 2,000rpm held for 10 seconds and back to idle, to 3,000rpm for 10 seconds and back to idle, repeated for 4,000 and 5,000rpm each time back to idle. They then recorded the horn with the bonnet open and closed.
6. Measurement Checking
A few measurements were taken with a good old tape measure and logged on a chart.
7. Final photo
The car was then parked on a mark along the 1-mile straight and a final photo taken by what looked like a high quality camera
A camera crew from Top Gear along with presenter Richard Hammond (small thin one) was filming during the morning and he was interviewing 2 Japanese gentlemen as I drove to the POD for some lunch. This was excellent, choice of Sushi, Lamb Cutlets or freshly cooked Wild Mushrooms and choice of salads followed by coffee trifle and exotic fruits.
Speaking with a guy from Sony UK he said that this road show was going to Lotus in Norfolk on the Thursday and then off to France next week. Approximately 700 cars will be included in the game - each one taking 1-man month to program into the game. All the people involved in the processes above were Japanese members of the Gran Turismo production team; very few of them spoke much English.
A very interesting and enjoyable day was had. Altogether I was in Millbrook for about 5 hours and was given a free tank of fuel by Sony on leaving (although I only had 10 litres as I don't like driving around in such an old car with more fuel than necessary).
I hope my car does justice to the Vixen model and to the TVR marque if it should appear in the game.
