Tesla Truck On Mars? New Render Shows SpaceX-Inspired Pickup On Red Planet

Since June 2018, there’s been only one image of the Tesla Pickup -- now being called the Model P (for pickup) -- shared by Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

This one’s a not so impressive black and white artist’s concept depicting a black pickup on the back of a black Tesla Semi during the latter’s reveal in California. In August, Musk said the upcoming electric pickup was his “personal favorite” among Tesla’s upcoming vehicles.

In November of the same year, Musk shared more details about the Model P. Musk described his pickup as Blade Runner-like but the accompanying illustration depicts a truck that looks more like a brick than a many faceted mean machine.

Musk said he wants the Model P to be a “futuristic-like cyberpunk, Blade Runner pickup truck.” And, he said he doesn’t care if not many people want to buy it.

”I’m personally super-excited by this pickup truck. It’s something I’ve been wanting to make for a long time,” said Musk.

“And I’ve been iterating sort of designs with Franz (von Holzhausen, in charge of design at Tesla) ... It’s like I really wanted something that’s like super-futuristic cyberpunk. Which, if it doesn’t ... if I’m weirdly like ... if there’s only a small number of people that like that truck, I guess we’ll make a more conventional truck in the future. But it’s the thing that I am personally most fired up about. It’s gonna have a lot of titanium.”

That’s about all the info we’ve got on the Model P. But we’ve only got one illustration and that dates back to June 2018.

Now, renowned Turkish-Canadian professional automotive designer Emre Husmen, who is famed for his ultra-realistic automotive renderings, has released 22 concept drawings for the Model P. He even has one drawing showing a glossy brown Tesla Model P on the surface of Mars with the logo of SpaceX emblazoned on its right side.

These fantastic drawings are to be found at the website of Bēhance, an online platform owned by Adobe to showcase and discover creative work.

While these are just the artist's concept artwork and won't be the real world thing, they're still great to look at and fantasize about. The Martian Model P is really inspired.

Husmen’s creations really live-up to Musk’s description of the Model P as a “futuristic-like cyberpunk, Blade Runner pickup truck.”

Husmen said he was inspired from the Roadster concept's design language for this pickup truck. He said on this project, he thought about applying one-piece body design (without a separate back bed), because of the battery pack beneath.

“So it's much more rigid with independent suspensions... this allows it to have much better handling and performance,” he said.

“I imagined this could be the quickest and fastest truck ever when it comes out... since it's the most ultimate truck, I wanted to design its exterior sporty and dynamic... behind rear windows I placed "shark fins" to make it even more aerodynamic and energy-efficient... on the lower front, rear and side protectors there are hidden folding steps to assist users enter/exit the cabin and reach storage areas easily... these were my basic ideas while designing it..."