Is it time for wilder paint on street machines?
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Hot Rod magazine is bemoaning the lack of interesting paint colors and schemes on today's street machines, and who can blame them? It was just last week that we had the same conversation with some local gearheads. Sure, we love the subtle silver and grey of Joe Rogan's Sick Fish 'Cuda, but it seems as if the majority of custom vehicles have pulled back just a bit too far from the garish paint schemes of the 1980s Pro Street movement, and have left us with a limited palate of monotone boredom.
The question then becomes a matter of where to go from here. The psychedelic schemes in Hot Rod's gallery come mostly from the hippie aesthetic of the 1960s, and so it would seem that any new trend would need to be equally rooted in contemporary times instead of simply borrowing from the past. With that in mind, what makes sense? Joshua Davis has produced prints for BMW that were computer-generated from a variety of character lines and the available colors for the roadster. Perhaps a similar technique could be applied towards coding a program that would design the appropriate paint scheme when given a variety of inputs. Considering how computers are taking over every other aspect of the automobile, it's only appropriate that they assume a larger role in the appearance as well.
[Sources: Hot Rod; Wired]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jason 12:35PM (9/11/2006)
The sample picture provided shows exactly why people don't do that anymore. Ugh.
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Son of Dat 12:41PM (9/11/2006)
I commend people for being original
When it comes to hot rods and muscle cars, there are waaay too many flamers out there. I understand the tradition....but put the flames out
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Carlton 12:55PM (9/11/2006)
Most of them look like something my dog threw up. Keep it original. The cheesy graphics make it look cheep.
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Carlos 1:11PM (9/11/2006)
I'd love to see more interesting colors out there, but it won't work.
People nowadays think anything but plain shades of gray are offensive. Hell, they find everything else offensive too.
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Mark 1:10PM (9/11/2006)
Hard to beat the classic racing stripes.
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Sue Esponte 1:22PM (9/11/2006)
I'm all for more interesting paint colors/schemes being made available. The only reason my currently daily driver is grey (along with seemingly 1/2 the other cars on the road) is because my choices were so limited. I don't consider beige, tan, brown, burgundy, orange-red or teal green metallic to be options. Why can't reds be red and other colors be more interesting? I applauded Infiniti for making Liquid Copper an option on the FX when it first came out. Other manufacturers need to do the same with other more exciting colors!
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Adam 1:38PM (9/11/2006)
To me, it lloks like current street machine styling is actually following the current trends in automotive deisgn. LOok at the Sick Fish for example. Huge rims, smother out lines. It looks like any of the retro concepts that are showing up at autoshows.
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Richard Warren 1:26PM (9/11/2006)
The color choices on most new vehicles is limited and as the article says, monotone is the color of the day. When you don't have a lot of choices you take what you can get. I'm for more color.
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Pinkerton 1:50PM (9/11/2006)
As these cars get older, people become more and more fond of the original appearance. There's also the collector factor. How many people would want a 'Cuda that looks like it came straight out of disco era East L.A.?
IMHO, the worst thing to happen to street machines are BIG rims.
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jjd 3:35PM (9/11/2006)
The paint color choices offered by today's manufacturers is ridiculous.
I was recently at a Porsche dealer and they had about a dozen Porsches out front for sale. What colors were they?
Silver, silver, other silver, white, black, grey, dark grey, greyish silver.
It was absolutely ridiculous. Hello??? Could we have some color please? These are not your father's Oldsmobiles, these are Porsches. Please give us some exciting colors.
And that goes double for BMW, Mercedes, Audi.
You can get the Audi S4 (if you have that kind of dough) in two interesting colors: Imola Yellow and Sprint Blue Pearl Effect.
The rest of the colors? Black, white, dark-blue-almost-black, grey, silver, dark-green-almost-black. OK, and a nice bright red.
But that's it. Let's say you don't have the green for an S4 and can only afford an A4 instead. You can't have the yellow, or the excellent Sprint Blue. In their place you can have another-dark-blue-almost-black, beige, and light-blue-almost-silver.
Come on Audi, give us some interesting colors. Like the late lamented Nogaro Blue. Now there was a color.
Think back to the mid-70s when Porsche offered Orange, Lime Green, etc. That's what I'm talking about.
Sigh.
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Karl 9:13AM (9/12/2006)
#9 is dead on.
Sure, 16 inch rims may be a performance enhancement, but 22"? They look rediculous. And you paid how many thousand for them? The only thing stupider than how huge rims look is the guy who paid to put them on his "ride".
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apple_box 3:09PM (9/11/2006)
One word: Resale value. What do you think of buying some kids aero kitted and rimmed out Civic. It all looks great at a show or maybe down the highway but everyone wants an empty pallet.
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apple_box 3:09PM (9/11/2006)
Sorry that's two words.
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Sid 7:20PM (9/11/2006)
I agree. When the Mazda3 came out back in 2004, there was a yellow and a orange offered alongwith the usual colors. Both were cancelled. When I went to buy my car (2006 model), I asked why Mazda did that. The dealer shrugged and said 'no one asked for those colors'.
I'm glad I got Indigo Blue. It's a dark blue which has a purple tint in bright sunlight. Beautiful. It stands out from the crowd.
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John 9:35PM (9/11/2006)
dodge always has cool colors on the there street racing technology cars, the super bee editions have a great color scheme for the charger. a new red, different than inferno red, they have yellow and orange.
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Ford Mustang 11:25PM (9/12/2006)
I like wild paint schemes, but those are all hideously ugly. Most of them look like they were painted with a paint brush and masking tape.
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Sue Esponte 11:10AM (9/12/2006)
Low profile do tires do have a proper place on sports cars up to a certain size after which they just become punishing and ill-equipped to protect the rims from pothole damage and also of little value in terms of providing additional grip (compared to slightly higher profile counterparts).
On SUVs their downright pointless and in most cases, in my opinion at least, just look silly unless the SUV is lowered since the low profile rims leave these huge gaping holes between the body and tires. The Escalades and other offending SUVs wind up looking like their riding on bicycle tires rather than looking 'cool'.
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