At the 14th AIC Congress 2021 held in Milan, Italy, Gyunpyo Lee delivered an oral presentation entitled “Is Blue Still a representative for Future Vehicles?”. The study shows how the marketing norm for eco-consciousness represents color for future vehicles, encompassing both battery electric vehicles and hydrogen-powered electric vehicles. Furthermore, the study revealed that heritage brands of the industry lead the representative color shift from red, an industry norm for expressing sports driving, toward blue by examining automotive interior design photos dataset composed of both internal combustion engine vehicles and electric vehicles through identifying the representative color of those vehicles utilizing color palettes.

Abstract

Studies in alternative fuel vehicles identified blue as a representational color even though it is used scarcely in vehicle design. They also identified that blue usage in the vehicle’s interior is minimal compared with the exterior. The study analyzes the press-released car interior photos of electric vehicles (EV) and internal combustion engine (ICE) vehicles of global automakers in identifying blue dominance by incorporating a k-means clustering algorithm with weighted color filters. The analysis resulted that blue and green are used more in EVs to represent eco-friendliness and electrification. Ford, Kia, and Mercedes Benz have statistically significant evidence with 99.5% confidence in the independent t-test for blue. Audi and Nissan have significant evidence with 99.5% confidence in green. Consequently, the study confirms that blue is the representational color for three prominent global OEMs.