That is commonly done on cars.

Toyota had grey and white primer surfacers to go under different colors. They would use the white primer under solid red and solid white cars. They used white instead of grey because of hiding issues with the solid red. Red pigments don't hide well, so having white instead of grey helped make the coating look more uniform.

The most common is when you have a pearlescent color. Take Toyota color code 051 for example. The white base was actually the white primer surfacer mentioned above. The base coat was then a clear with effect micas on it. The normal clear coat was sprayed above that. By changing the color of the primer, you would get radically different affects.

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2010 Toyota matrix

'93 500 SEL
A bad addiction. Takes all of my cash.

'12 Volvo S80 T6
Needed something that wasn't as hard to deal with as my bad addiction

'18 Mazda Miata
No more boring cars for everyday transport!