Syd Mead, Turn A Gundam

Syd Mead interview, Turn A BD Box2

"The original request from Tomino-san to me was to feel the mood of the story, understand the story progression, and the story idea, and then to review the Gundam character before the story. And my job was to understand that transition, and to understand the history and tradition, and then carry that into the new character.

The difficulty was not to get scared by the level of responsibility. It's very similar to being asked to design a mechanical object -- and then the factory, the marketing managers, the technical people... they're the ones to decide what color to paint it, what materials to make it out of... My job is to provide the image and the design idea."