here is how to get a straight line in PS with the brush tool.

Get your brush tool. Click once anywhere on screen. This will but a color dot on screen. move the mouse to a different locations. Hold down the "SHIFT" key and click once. This will draw a straight line from "POINT TO POINT". I use this trick more than any other I know.

Carter

LOL thats my favorite technique to use when doing grills etc...You're right thinking about it thats is the one I use most...

As far as wacom I stopped using mine and send it back it was useless to me just became to cumbersome and didnt does not simulate real world pen to paper at all.

Pen tool/stroke path/fill path are the main techniques I use for all my renderings.

Even after 7 pages I'd still like to read more. haha

I've drawn a lot of cars with pencil and paper, but they really are just illustrations, not designs. I've also done Photoshop work modifying photos to get a visual of what I have in my head. Attempted photo-realism is not very forgiving.

I also have a Wacom tablet and haven't found it to be very useful. I got the 6x8 and it is actually a little large. It seems my natural stroke is not very compatible with the size of the tablet and the screen window. It helps when I zoom out, but then I get a step in the line when zoomed back in.

A lot of what I do is either photo-based or graphic/logo-based. I have found it tough to really bring artistic style to a digital medium.

This is I think the best I've done so far, and as you can see it is somewhat of stretch to try and make it believable as real.

http://gearheaddezign.com/art/franken-z_orig.jpg

http://gearheaddezign.com/art/franken-z.jpg

looks pretty frickin solid to me, though the pics are small. good or bad, you certainly improved the car significantly as far as looks go.

Thanks guys. That was it. I just have to play around with it some more. So how does PS pick up pen pressure with the mouse? To improve the feel on the wacum tablet, my brother puts a real sheet of paper on top of the tablet since he has the same problem.
Thanks again,

Nah, you don't get to have pen pressure fun without a tablet. Sorry.

Here is a full-res:
http://gearheaddezign.com/art/franken-z_full.jpg

The wheels & tires are terrible when blown up because the biggest reference photo I could find was 1024x768 and the car was kinda small inside the framing. The mirrors are also pretty bad because I made them out of nothing. Tough to pull off with a photo-realistic feel. The fender vents could use some more work too.

Anything else you'd like to see differently from a style/presentation stand point??

The real tough part is getting my real car to look like that...

Here is another to take a look at. I didn't like the headline title but that's what he wanted.

http://gearheaddezign.com/art/haulins10.jpg

http://gearheaddezign.com/art/haulins10_full.jpg

There are pretty good though.When you brush mirrors or vents etc... try copying reflections from the car itself and put it on a new layer using overlay or softlight filter.It will give it a more real world feel.

If you need wheels In high res I have a resource where all the pics are 3000 res and above.

Just PM me and I will link you to it

yeah Z is pretty much the resident brush/chop master so he's your man. Just chopping seems like it would be pretty tough to me. I used to use it as a base for some of my stuff but no mas cause without quality ref material it's hard to get the results you're looking for.