Soul Red

My friend KK is a color photographer. He's also a color maven. Loves colors. He gardens, and for him gardening is basically color management—a continuous creation of ever-changing color combinations. I used to not get some of his photographs, until I realized they're often about some precise color somewhere in the shot. Sometimes even just a little bit of color in the shot.

If you're a color photographer too, and you love colors, you owe it to yourself to go see a new Mazda painted in the latest version of "Soul Red." Soul Red Crystal Metallic Tricoat, to be more exact. Just gorgeous. There was video (I couldn't find it—I think it's been replaced by the new video) showing the original craftsman who hand-paints Mazda's concept cars. When the company decided to try to provide the show-car finish on production cars, they actually used the motions of this master painter to program robots that replicated his arm movements! So cool.

I saw a CX-3 in this latest new iteration of the color the other day. Stopped me in my tracks. The color changes with the light, too. If I get that Miata I want before I go shuffling off to Buffalo (hopes are fading), it'll be Soul Red.

Really worth seeing. Because let's remember, the joy of seeing precedes the joy of photographing.

Mike

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(To see all the comments, click on the "Comments" link below.)
Featured Comments from:

SF Murph: "We got a CX-5 in the Soul Red. Cost $500 more, but so worth it. Such a great color to have in our lives every day."

Steve Rosenblum: "I have a Soul Red 2014 Mazda 6 and people still walk up to me after I park the car to tell me how amazing it looks."

Herman Krieger: "In the early 1950s I worked as a chemist for a industrial paint company in California that made auto paints for new cars as well as for repainting of autos and trucks. My speciality was auto finishes in lacquers and air-dry enamels. At that time the cars came in all sorts of colors, that make the present day cars look rather drab."

Mike replies: Why is that? These days you can go on the computer and "build" a customized car out of the options and colors available, which I sometimes do for fun. I've been struck recently at cars where the only colors available seem to be some form of drab. Some cars seem to have two kinds of black, three kinds of gray, a white and an off-white, and silver. It makes me wonder.

Marvin G. van Drunen: "Re 'Some cars seem to have two kinds of black, three kinds of gray, a white and an off-white, and silver. It really makes me wonder.' I own an automobile dealership. My lot is full of three kinds of gray, two shades of black and white and silver cars and trucks. We have other colors available, but when I stock them they just sit and sit without selling. I'm not sure why, but I've got to go with what the buyers want to buy. The favorite car I recall from my youth was my father's 1956 Ford Crown Victoria painted white and FLAMINGO! Flamingo was a wonderful, rich dark coral. I loved it."

Hugh Crawford: "So if you went to the Porsche dealer in 1973, this is what they offered.

Alaska Blue Poly
Amber/Signal Orange
Aubergine
Bahia Red
Beige Gray
Chartreuse
Dalmatian Blue
Delphy Green Poly
Earth Olive
Gemini Blue Poly
Glacier Blue
Gold Poly
Gold Poly
Green Poly
Gulf Blue
Gulf Orange
Indian Red
Irish Green
Kelly Green
Leaf Green
Light Green
Light Ivory
Light Yellow
Lilac
Marathon Blue Poly
Olympic Blue
Phoenix Red
Raspberry
Ravenna Green
Saturn Yellow
Sepia Brown
Signal Yellow
Silver Poly
Sunflower Yellow
Tangerine
Zambesi Green

"...and if that's unsatisfactory there is always this:

Hugh with the Huemobile

Mike Plews: "The Miata is a car I always admired more than lusted after. I have a couple of Triumphs, TR3 and 6, in my past so I appreciate the Miata as a roadster that does not drip parts as it goes down the road. That admiration turned to lust with the latest iteration of the Miata. It looks like a baby Ferrari and Soul Red is flat out gorgeous. Thank god they don't make this in BRG or I would be cashing in my 401K."

Mike replies: My Miata of sainted memory was BRG...

...And it even had a wooden Nardi steering wheel.

Comments

[John Camp]

Color is like music. Some people, like me, revel in it, which is why I have a large flower garden surrounding my workshop. My latest color triumph came when my brand new winter jacket from Arc'teryx, which are expensive down jackets, with nylon covers as sturdy as Kleenex, got ripped on a pine tree branch. The problem was that the down could *not* be stuffed back inside. I sewed up the jacket, but there was this white line of down on it that I could not get rid of to save my life. Then it occurred to me -- I'm a hobby painter, and I have a wide range of paints. I matched the coat color perfectly with a combination of Pthalo Green (blue shade) and neutral grey, and my coat looks like new.

[Daniel]

Just be sure to havc a few dollars saved for the fines you will get. Red cars get stopped more than any other color.
Red sports cars top the list.

[Peter Meeus]

Hi Mike,

This may well be the video you are referring to:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-iaG-EdDyw

Kind regards,

Peter

[Hi Peter, That's the current video, that I linked to in the post. There was an earlier one that showed the craftsman painting, and talked about how they mapped his movements to create the painting machines. I wasn't able to find that one.... --Mike]

[RubyT]

My relationship with cars is almost entirely utilitarian, and I'm more of a blue-green person, but now I want a Mazda so I can have this shade of red. Wow!

[beuler]

Where I live all cars are black, dark grey or light grey (because of the resale value). Those wanting to stand out buy white cars. Except for Mazdas. 80% of new Mazdas are soul Red.
A while back I commented that all new Mazda models share the same design language. I guess that Soul Red is part of the vocabulary.

[Kaemu]

For leased car, keeping the colors generic (unlikely to displease many people) probably makes it easier to sell them after they are return at the end of contract.

This consideration also applies to people who intend to sell their car after a few years before buying another. One could also posit that as owners keep their cars longer, a safe color may protect them if their taste changes over the long run.

Just some ideas, don’t know really

[Robert Roaldi]

Soul Red. There should be a Devil Blue. A friend had a Subaru Legacy in Cranberry Mousse. I had a 1996 Escort GT in Cayman Green.

[N. Collins]

I have a 2017 Mazda MX-5 RF in the $500 option Soul Red color Club Edition stick shift. It was the best car money expenditure I have ever made. I get numerous compliments practically every day I drive it besides really enjoying it myself. The car is a joy to drive as well. It's my third Miata but my first brand new one.

[Brian Stewart]

Mike said: "Some cars seem to have two kinds of black, three kinds of gray, a white and an off-white, and silver. It really makes me wonder." Because they're aimed at B&W mavens, like me? The brand of car we drive is pretty much like this - we have two dark grey cars in the garage with subtly different shades of grey. Pretty as a (B&W) picture. My complaint is that we need more shades of automotive grey, not less!

[MarkB]

Nice red, but for me it's the Nissan Maxima in Deep Blue Pearl. Got that by chance on a weekly rental around Chicago (my old home town), and it was the first car I've driven that I was actually *happy* to see that the hood intruded on the front windshield visibility. Got to watch that blue change in the light while I drove in the summer on Lake Shore Drive.

[Max Cottrell]

IMO, GM has an even better shade of metallic red. Check out a recent Cadillac.

[TC]

One of the visual delights of Havana is the rich plethora of auto colors there, as they have to maintain the vehicle's original color according to the registration even if they switch everything else out to keep those old 50's cars running.

[Henning Wulff]

Bit of indecision with the Huemobile? :-)

I've seen a lot of Mazdas in that colour recently, which delights me as I love red cars, and while not my favourite red it is very nice. Every car I've bought new where I had choice of colour was red. Different reds, but red. Some I've had to paint before I took possession, but it was red when I started driving it.

This summer I sold my perfectly nice dark blue older Porsche Boxster and hunted down a used one in Guards Red. Last of the non-turbos and manual. Yes, I have gotten a ticket, but I'll live with that. My more powerful, faster car is white, also bought used; somewhat rare and a bargain so I had no choice.

I'm quite sure that Guards Red was also offered in 1973. I know someone who had one, and I believe it was the original colour.

My wife likes silver and more especially, blue. I refuse to buy a silver, white or black car ever again, but sometimes I don't get to choose.

[Chuck Albertson]

I'm still partial to Candy Apple Grey (Bob Mould's formulation).

[Doug C]

I am glad that Mazda is paying more attention to color now. I recall the first Miatas came only in red, white and blue. The red looked like they had chosen the paint on the basis of cost rather than appearance and the blue didn't look any better to me.

I was tempted by Miatas but ended up buying another Lotus Elan, and that one was a truly brilliant red. So red, in fact, that I found it hard on my eyes when I was washing and waxing it.

[Peter Croft]

In the past couple of years I've been thinking of buying a used Mercedes, CL or CLK, (but I've come to my senses after reading too many tales of woe about reliability and parts cost - I'll stick to Japanese).

Anyway, I came to realise that trying to get any colour other than black (~60%) or silver (~35%) in Australia is almost hopeless. You see an occasional white one, but almost nothing else. Black with black leather seats in our scorching summers? How well do you like to be cooked?

However, in the past few days I've been gobsmacked by an Audi in a beautiful dark, dark sea green and a local GM car in a similar dark forest green. Almost made me follow them.

[Bear.]

My long lamented MX-5 (as the Miata is known in Oz) bought brand new in 1990 was in an absolutely lovely "Mazda blue". But I saw an "RF" in the Soul Red you refer to just last week and it was just stunning.

[NeilClasperPics]

'There should be more orange cars' is a thought that struck me a while ago, then I noticed that I'd started photographing orange cars in the neighbourhood. And once you realise you've started doing something like this, you end up noticing more (of whatever it is). One of the best things about photography, I think. Here's the collection so far: http://neilclasperphoto.com/albums/30RAqb/orange-cars-and-bicycles-of-south-east-london