It's very similar to Eckmann, but a bit heavier.

Here's a better image

I'm sure I've seen something of the right weight somewhere.

Taking the award for best club display was the Porsche Classic Club's ... Based on a 1971 crime caper, the film portrays Statham as a car dealer lured into a daring ...... including the '71 Le Mans winner and the 917/20 'Pink Pig'. ...... Pre-event favourite was Sam Mann's Bohman & Schwartz convertible coupe, ...

Second Hand Cars

Do I smell spam?

Thanks Richard, the style was revivied for a recent race...

http://www.24u.be/2006/en/fotopages/album/30/

And the team claims they had to redraw it...

http://www.paddocktalk.com/news/html/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&fi...

was really wondering if they wasted their time, and I'd also like to use the style on my car. :-)

I wonder if there is a closer match?

Si goes Seahawks in neon!

ChrisL

It's an old Letraset font called Pretorian.

(I can't believe the price they are charging for this--$160 for four fonts, and three of them are simple variants, two of which could be created with a single action in FontLab. And it's not even an original design. Plus you have to buy all four or nothing.)

Thanks Mark! It is a bit pricey.

>Si goes Seahawks in neon!

Well spotted Chris. I'm tempted to lay down the $400 for this...

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=300011306588

And here's why the Dallas Cowboys won't win the Superbowl this year...

http://www.microsoft.com/typography/links/news.aspx?NID=5646

Well spotted Mark, I knew I knew(??) it from somewhere.

Interesting claims on their site

"A revival of a classic Victorian design… Designed by Ron Carpenter and Malcolm Wooden in 1992."

Just to be pedantic, I think I'll have to find some period pictures of the car in 1971.

>Just to be pedantic, I think I’ll have to find some period pictures of the car in 1971.

Here you go...

http://962.com/registry/917/917-20-001/index.htm

It does look pretty similar doesn't Si?

I can't help thinking that the ProSpeed Competition rather missed the point though.

In 1971 Porsche commissioned SERA (a French aerospace consultancy) to refine the aerodynamics of Porsche 917k The people back at Porsche decided that it looked like a pig and lettered it with the names of the various cuts in German. The car was entered in the race by Porsche Austria whose sponspors Martini refused to allow any Martini branding on the car, which retired during the night, crashing because of brake failure.

That's too cute.

> crashing because of brake failure.

And I bet it wasn't just a schinken-bender.

hhp

>I can’t help thinking that the ProSpeed Competition rather missed the poin though.

I tend to agree, but there have been sillier publicity stunts in the history of motorsports... such as this recent example...

http://www.aarronpainter.com/media/blog/misc/star_wars_monaco.jpg

At least they didn't shape the top air intake like an R2 unit.

hhp

>At least they didn’t shape the top vent like an R2 unit.

That would have broken the FIA regs for sure :-)

As I recall both cars retired in the early stages of the race, so we didn't get to see the stormtroopers change the tires and refuel the cars more than once. Should've let the Wookie drive...

Mansell?
He actually had a rear passenger lately:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/motorsport/5236918.stm

hhp

"And here’s why the Dallas Cowboys won’t win the Superbowl this year…"
So my take on the font choice is that Dallas players are bums who can't be trained :-D

ChrisL

Regarding the font ...

Since DTP in no way owns the rights to Pretoria (the original name, I believe), I'll point you to Dieter Steffmann's version - which he calls Vivian.

>So my take on the font choice is that Dallas players are bums who can’t be trained :-D

I heard TO was going to jump a mail train but the box car was full of Parcells. :-)

> I’ll point you to Dieter Steffmann’s version

Thanks! My plan for TypeCon2006 is back on track. ;-)

"TO was going to jump a mail train but the box car was full of Parcells. :-)"

A thing of beauty my friend! Bravo!

ChrisL

" Dieter Steffmann’s version - which he calls Vivian"

Hmmm, I'm a little disappointed in Dieter. That was an old FontBank font by the same name.

- Mike Yanega

Thanks for the Fontbank connection, Mike. I'd wondered where he got the Vivian name, since he almost always uses the original name.

Philippe, from the MyFonts forum, and I are starting to think that Steffmann's fonts are, in fact, mostly made up of preexisting fonts that he made modifications to. By modifications, I mean converting to a Windows format, providing the alternates that were available in the original typeface, or, in many cases, simply filling out the character set. Some appear to be clones of the Solo/Dover fonts. I suspect, but don't know for sure, that some of the blackletter digitizations are from scratch, though.

Most of the originals for fonts he simply modified are no longer around (unless they're in the Opti dungeons of Castcraft). I wouldn't be surprised if his Vivian was released during the time that Fontbank was defunct and its fonts (which aren't entirely original in themselves) were gone from the scene - before Xara claimed to have obtained the rights to market them again.

Mike, what do you know of the geniune origins of Pretoria? The more I think about this paint scheme, the odder it seems.

Motor racing in general, and particularly the Porsche 917 in its various guises has long been a fascination of mine.

It undoubtedly was created in 1971, and the popular version of the story is that the pig "joints" and names were done as a bit of fun when the body came back from the aerodynamicists 5 inches wider (7ft 3in!) and generally much bulkier than its sleeker cousins.

There's a lot of letters on the car and it seems an odd font to choose in the days before computer plotters.

Unless perhaps it was in general use in butcher's shops around Stuttgart in the late 60s.

My (early 80s) Letraset catalogue doesn't offer anything helpful.

PS I can't believe I couldn't ID thisfirst time around :-{

Anyway, just for fun, here's another image, from Le Mans 1971 (with just a glimpse of one of it's Martini liveried siblings on the right)Picture credit unknown, copied from Porsche 917, The winning Formula by Peter Morgan