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Lexus LF-LC approved for production

On the sidelines of a press drive for the 2014 Lexus IS, the company's vice president of marketing in the US told Ward's Auto that the honchos in Japan have approved the Lexus LF-LC concept for production. He wouldn't offer any other details on how the luxury coupe might be transformed into a vehicle for the buying masses, and that has led to a bag full of speculation.
The show car was hybrid-powered and rear-wheel drive, a beautifully executed stab by Toyota designers in Newport Beach at redefining Lexus, but even with the concept, the point was to keep it "within reach for premium buyers." The report says the odds are on limited production and higher pricing than Lexus' "mainstream products," and other sites have speculated on what kind of powertrain it might end up in showrooms with.
GT Channel posits that the LF-LC will be the inspiration for a coupe in the Lexus LS price bracket with a choice of either the 4.2-liter V8 or the hybrid powertrain from the LS 600h, further speculating it will be called LC 550 and cost more than $100,000. It then says that there would be another coupe created beneath that one to replace the SC 430. Lexus Enthusiast, however, calls those "warmed-over rumors" and says that the marque probably won't deviate from its engine-capacity-naming scheme - labeling a car with a 4.2-liter V8 an LC 550. Nor does it think Lexus will use the letters LC after the company has trademarked "RC" in the US and Australia.

TMG Lexus LS Sports 650 destined for production after 2015?

There's little question that Lexus has succeeded in challenging its German rivals in the luxury marketplace. And with the LFA, it has proven that Japan can build a world-class supercar. What's left blank is the space in between.
Toyota Motorsport GmbH came up with a compelling answer in the form of the Sports 650 prototype, a Lexus LS with a 5.0-liter twin-turbo V8 producing 641 horsepower and other go-fast components to challenge the likes of the Mercedes-Benz S63 AMG and Audi S8. Toyota boss Akio Toyoda was reportedly so impressed with the project that he initially ordered TMG to build ten examples - one for him and each of his nine best friends. But since the model on which the project was based has since been replaced, questions remain over the project's fate.
Georg Kacher - European correspondent for Automobile and Car magazines - recently drove the prototype and reports that "the project will now likely be transferred to the new model out in 2015." That could come down purely to speculation, but Kacher tends to get the inside line on industry news, so this particular bowl of gossip soup might not requite the usual grain of salt we otherwise might add.

This Lexus hybrid will paint your self-portrait while you drive

To encourage better driving habits, some hybrids use leaves or tree graphics to portray how efficient or inefficiently a driver is, but Lexus has come up with a more unique method of relaying this information. For its Art Is Motion campaign, Lexus has equipped a Lexus IS300h with special software that enables the car to paint a portrait of the driver by combining the skills of generative artist Sergio Albiac with specific inputs from the driver.
A regular photograph is uploaded into the system, but the portrait will vary depending on how the car is driven. Using vehicle speed, engine speed and how often the hybrid system is used, the driver "paints" a self-portrait via the software that has cloned Albaic's creative process, which then shows up on the car's center display screen. If the driver is more cautious and maximizes electric driving, the image will be clear (as shown above), but if the driver accelerates heavily, the picture becomes more abstract. Similarly, slower speeds result in "colder" colors while higher speeds use "virulent" colors - perhaps signifying this type of driving isn't healthy for the environment.
For now, Lexus has only created one Art Is Motion IS300h, and it plans to auction off this car in the future. Lexus released three videos, which are all posted below, to show off this car, but there is no additional information yet about the auction.