Including TurboSquid.com’s 3D design models of the Pagani Huayra ‘Extreme’ last night opened a really stinky can of worms for your humble scribe — who tries to Do The Right Thing more than even Spike Lee.

On the one hand, these design models can and should be used for ethical and legal purposes. On the other hand: let’s imagine you own the intellectual property at play. Making the entire design available for just $100 or so to anyone online would be like Coca-Cola giving away the secret recipe after a customer takes their first sip of soda. Not in anyone’s interest — at least if they want Coca-Cola to still be around a few years later.

(Corporate Reality Check: Coca-Cola innovates rapidly ahead of most attempts to copy its taste and unique brand appeal.)

The perception by intellectual property owners, in this case, would likely be firm and swift removal of these designs — which all carry the names and likenesses of these well-known car brands. That much is clear to me.

A simple love for supercars and hypercars is our main attraction to the renderings — which in some cases are beyond photo-real. However, to say this is a grey area is a huge understatement. It is a dark, angry grey in the eyes of Ferrari, Pagani, Bugatti and all the rest — despite the hard work by many of the independent 3D modellers out there.

But must this always be the case? What about for cars so  rare that only a handful even exist in 4D — aka real life?

Probably still the same vat of molten legal quicksand for any participants, but… their draw to the eye and appeal to supercar fans cannot be disputed. Why?  These are better-than-life representations. Need a view from the top, but no crane or boom around? Just a few mouse movements away.

Here are three exceptionally-rare cars that frankly will not ever be seen in the flesh by 99.999997-percent of all humans for now, and for all future human history.

So rare that even BBC’s TopGear would grovel to get a brief test drive. (Sounds like SOP for any consumer or average guy when (attempting) to pry away the keys to a Toyota Yaris for a few hours!)

Summary Points:

— Ultimately, we are not quite as naive as this all seems to an outsider and, we suspect, the brand stewards who view these models as direct infringement. But is real life an option to find such stunning graphics of these, some of the world’s rarest and most-valuable classic cars? For car fans on the sidelines like us: the answer is no.

— Are we not just aiding this supposed infringement? No, not really: these screenshots are about 500×300 pixels wide, each. They preview the actual CAD-CAM design files that can be purchased.

— The inevitable third option (in any right/wrong scenario:)? All of the above is patently false and we are just ignorant outsiders.

 — Further information and all graphic originals credit to: http://www.turbosquid.com

JAGR. D-TYPE Longnose

MB SSK

MB SS Roadster