BMW E46 Drift Livery

A race car parked outdoors with racing decals and sponsorships, behind a metal fence with a construction vehicle in the background under a blue sky.

This project was a full custom livery design created for a BMW E46 drift car, designed entirely in Photoshop. The goal was to produce a bold, modern look that stood out on track while reflecting the identity of the team and its sponsors. It was a long but rewarding process, experimenting with colours, flow lines, and logo placement to achieve a design that worked both digitally and physically.

Seeing my concept move from a flat Photoshop canvas to a real car was an unreal experience - it’s one thing to design a livery on screen, but another to eventually see it tearing up the drift tracks in real life. This project pushed my creative and technical limits, from visualising the body lines to aligning every sponsor and graphic perfectly. It taught me a lot about balance, scale, and how design interacts with motion - something you only truly understand when your work is on a car built to slide.

What made this project even more special was seeing the collaboration come full circle - from early sketches and mock-ups to the final printed wrap, perfectly applied and drift-ready. It’s the kind of project that reminds me why I love what I do - turning creative vision into something that doesn’t just look good, but moves with purpose.

The Creative Process

A race car with various sponsor decals and graphics, featuring a white and purple color scheme, on a dark background.

Here’s a look inside the Photoshop workspace where the livery came to life. Everything you see here was built layer by layer - no templates, no shortcuts, just pure design from scratch.

The process began with carefully tracing the outline of the BMW E46 to create a base shape that matched the real body lines as closely as possible. This gave me a solid foundation to build the design on with precision. The traced mockup didn’t need to be perfect, but it allowed me to work accurately with proportions, placement, and visual flow - ensuring that what looked right on screen would also translate properly onto the car in real life.

In the first view, you can see the full right-side layout of the E46, where the structure started to take shape. From the sponsor placement and gradient flow to the bold purple and black contrasts, this stage was all about creating a design that moved with the car’s lines rather than fighting against them.

The next image zooms in on the fine details, like the angled grey streaks and the driver’s nameplate. These elements were refined with pixel-level accuracy to make sure everything aligned seamlessly once printed and applied. It’s the kind of precision that matters most when the car’s moving at high speed - every line needs to look intentional.

Finally, the bonnet layout showcases the SD Services feature piece, web link, and accent shapes, designed for visual impact when viewed from above or head-on. Every layer, from sponsor logos to flow lines, was carefully built and grouped for easy adjustment and experimentation.

What starts as a clean digital workspace soon evolves into a complex network of layers - each one serving a purpose. From tracing to final alignment, every step brought the concept closer to reality, proving that even a digital mock-up can carry real world precision when done right.

To help visualise the final look more realistically, I also outlined and recreated the original wheels and rims from the car, then brought them into the Photoshop canvas. This extra step helped me better visualise how the livery would interact with the car’s proportions, stance, and overall flow - giving a more accurate sense of what it would look like in the real world.

The driver name tag was created as part of the same project but designed on a separate Photoshop canvas. This allowed me to refine it individually - perfecting the flag, typography, and layout before bringing it into the main livery mock-up. It added that final layer of personality and professionalism, tying the design together as a complete package.

A digital illustration of a car with graphic overlays, including gray stripes, a purple segment, and a small British flag sticker on the side.
Design of a racing helmet with various logos and text, including "SD Services", "www.rkperformance.com", and "Lockstop", featuring purple and black accents.
A rectangular logo with the Union Jack flag on the left, the text 'KERAN DANY' in bold black letters in the center, and the number '25' in black on the right, all bordered by a purple outline.

The Final Outcome

The RKD Performance BMW E46 brought the digital design to life exactly as envisioned - bold, clean, and ready for the drift tracks. Seeing the livery fitted in real life was an incredible moment that tied the whole project together.

This project was more than just a livery, it was a full creative journey from concept to completion. Every stage, from sketching and refining the lines to seeing it fitted on the real car, pushed my design skills further. It’s projects like this that remind me why I love what I do: blending creativity, precision, and passion to turn imagination into something visual.

Scroll down to see the final photos of the car and how the design translates from screen to street.

A modified BMW race car with sponsor decals parked on a paved lot, with a tall metal fence and industrial buildings in the background under a clear sky.
Two BMW race cars parked on an asphalt lot, one purple with race decals and the other blue. A vehicle with tracked wheels is parked behind them, and a brick building and metal fence are in the background under a clear sky.
Two BMW cars parked side by side in an outdoor lot, behind a metal fence, with the sun shining brightly in the sky.
Two racing cars, a black and white one with sponsorship decals and a blue one, parked in a lot with a tall metal fence and a yellow construction machine in the background, under a partly cloudy sky.
A white race car with race decals and a black hood next to a blue sports car with absent front license plate, both parked on a paved lot in front of a metal fence, with buildings in the background and the sun high in the sky.
A white race car with racing decals and a black front grille parked next to a blue BMW with a custom front bumper. Both cars are parked in front of a tall, black metal fence with buildings visible behind it. The sky is partly cloudy with a few clouds
Interior of a race car with a racing seat, a race steering wheel, a gear shifter, and a metal footrest, with the dashboard showing gauges and a checklist on the windshield.
Two cars parked in an outdoor parking lot, a blue sedan and a purple coupe.
A white race car with sponsorship decals and a black front bumper, and a blue BMW M3 coupe with a black front grille and license plate 'K55 RXN', parked side by side on a lot enclosed by a tall metal fence under a partly cloudy sky.
Race car with sponsorship decals parked on a paved surface, with a fence and modern machinery visible behind it.
Three cars parked in a lot with a fencing background. The nearest car is a black and white BMW with performance decals, the middle car is a blue BMW, and the farthest is a black car. There is a large piece of construction machinery in the background.
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