APRIL2001 287

Modifying an Existing Numerical Shade Sorting System

Through Cluster Analysis
Y. S. W. Lr, C. W. M. YUEN,K. W. YEUNG,AND K. M. SIN
Institute of Textiles arid Clothing, The Hoiig Kong Polytechnic Uiiiversity, Hioig H O I I ~KOW~OOI~,
, Hoiig Korig

ABSTRACT
Our previous study compared the effectiveness of Clemson color clustering (ccc)shade
sorting, originating at Clemson University, with a shade sorting process called K-means,
originating at the Indian Institute of Technology. We proved that these two methods were
suitable for shade sorting since their performance was very much alike. These results have
led to a study of modifications of the ccc shade sorting process by combining hierarchical
and nonhierarchical algorithms into a single process in order to improve the effectiveness
of shade sorting.

Cluster analysis is a tool that can reveal associations as
well as data structures [13]. Clustering results can con-
tribute to the development of a classification scheme that
can be used to develop a general model to describe the
distribution of other samples separating from the parent
population, provide definitions of size, and measure the
change in previous notional categories.
The Clemson color clustering (ccc) shade sorting pro-
cess was the first algorithm to adopt the statistical com-
putation technique called hierarchical clustering, which
is a branch of cluster analysis for numerical shade sorting
[8]. The method provides an extremely effective way to
fulfill the basic requirement of shade sorting by forming
a minimum number of sorted groups without any notice-
able shade differences [3-12, 20, 26, 28, 32-33, 351.
The inventors of the ccc shade sorting process
claimed that it would make no sense to select a shade
sorting arithmetic, which was less effective than their
method [12]. We have studied the effectiveness of the
ccc and the parallel thresholds K-means shade sorting
process, and our results show that both perform in out-
standing but different ways [23]. Our previous study
proved that the performance of ccc shade sorting arith-
metic is very effective, resulting in a good utilization of
fabric. However, other workers also proved that parallel
threshold K-means shade sorting could do the same job
with higher compactness of the sorted groups [34]. It is
rather difficult to distinguish which, the ccc or parallel
thresholds K-means process, is more suitable for shade
sorting. All these contradictory results initiated our in-
terest in studying modifications of ccc shade sorting by
combining hierarchical and nonhierarchical algorithms
into a single process.
Our research is based on this idea of combining the
two shade sorting methods. ccc shade sorting is accom-
plished using a commercially available statistical soft-
ware package called Minitab 10.5 Xtra. According to the
results obtained from ccc shade sorting, cluster seeds can
be located for nonhierarchical clustering. Subsequently,
another nonhierarchical clustering method, called se-
quential K-means sorting, is used to modify the out-
comes obtained from the ccc shade sorting method. We
believe that this newly developed process will improve
the effectiveness of the original process to a certain
extent.
In addition, we investigate the performance of the two
shade sorting processes-original ccc and modified ccc
shade sorting-using the five measures mentioned in the
previous study in order to identify the most suitable
algorithm for shade sorting [23].
Based on our earlier studies, we have adopted the chic
microspace, which is the best one for allocating the color
population, for both original ccc and modified ccc shade
sorting in this study [24-253. Furthermore, we have also
chosen the optimum permissible color difference toler-
ances obtained in the same study for the shade sorting
process, as shown in Table I [24-251.
Experimental
We selected 40’s cotton plain knitted fabric that had
been subjected to the same scouring and bleaching pro-
cess for coloration. The fabrics were cut into approxi-
mate dimensions of 25 X 10 cm to give an exact weight
of 5 g ? 0.05 g before processing.
COLORATION
FABRIC
Twenty sets of colors, including eight main shade
groups, i.e., red, orange, yellow, green, blue, violet,

Te.rrile Res. 1.71(4), 287-294 (2001)

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288 TEXTILE
RESEARCH
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I. 50% rejection level obtained from linear regression using CMC color difference equation.
TABLE

Color Constant Linear model expressed

set no. Color term Coefficient u in simple algebra A E when %R = 50%

1 grey 0.2163 0.3373 %R = 0.2163 + 0.3373 A E 0.841 1

2 grey 0.097 1 0.5463 %R = 0.0971 + 0.5463 A E 0.7375
3 black 0.2345 0.3062 %R = 0.2345 + 0.3062 A E 0.8671
4 blue 0.0939 0.4174 8R = 0.0949 + 0.4174 A E 0.9705
5 blue 0.1909 0.4196 %R = 0.1909 + 0.4196 A € 0.7367
6 blue 0.2560 0.3910 %R = 0.2560 + 0.3910 A E 0.6240
7 brown 0.0737 0.4819 %R = 0.0737 + 0.4819 A E 0.8846
8 brown 011239 0.3971 8R = 0.1239 + 0.3971 A E 0.937 1
9 brown 0.1407 0.3903 %R = 0.1407 + 0.3903 A E 0.9206
10 green 0.1391 0.5 I53 %R = 0.1391 + 0.5153 A E 0.7001
II green 0.2350 0.3073 %R = 0.2350 + 0.3073 A € 0.8623
12 orange 0.1006 0.3334 %R = 0.1006 + 0.3334 A E 1.1980
13' orange 0.0816 0.4560 %R = 0.0816 + 0.4560 AE 0.9175
14 red 0.0795 0.4382 %R = 0.0795 + 0.4382 AE 0.9596
15 red 0.0013 0.5619 %R = 0.0043 + 0.5619 AE 0.8822
16 red 0.1703 0.4192 %R = 0.1703 + 0.4192 AE 0.7865
17 violet 0.1741 0.3462 %R = 0.1741 + 0.3462 AE 0.9314
18 violet. 0.07 1 1 0.4849 %R = 0.0711 + 0.4849 AE 0.8845
19 yellow 0.0524 0.4009 %R = 0.0524 + 0.4009 AE 1.1165
20 yellow 0.1453 0.3587 %R = 0.1453 + 0.3587 A€ 0.9888
Whole all 0.1404 0.4091 %R = 0.1404 + 0.4091 AE 0.8790

brown, and black, were produced by dyeing the pre- For each color set, one piece of fabric was dyed to the
treated materials with different reactive dyes. Each shade common shade standard, while the other fabrics were
group contained two to three sets of colors with various dyed to match this standard. In total, seventy-four pieces
shade depths. We chose these twenty colors with refer- of dyed fabrics in each color set were obtained and
ence to those colors originating from specifications pro- labeled. Each piece of dyed fabric was folded into an
vided by Smith, as shown in Table I1 [30].We picked the eight ply sample for color measurements with the reflec-
recipes used for dyeing the knitted fabrics in order to tance spectrophotometer..
obtain particular lightness values ranging from 15 to 90,
as shown in Table 111. In order to get the same color and
minimize the effect of metamerism, all samples in each
TABLE
111. Recipes of the 20 sets of colored samples.
color set were produced using the same prescribed com-
bination and amount of dyestuff. Color Dye
set no. Color Lightness Dye used percentage

11. Color specification for apparel: block sizes for 555 shade
TABLE 1 grey 80.21 Remazol Black B gran 133 0.025%
sorting in Cartesian (L*u*b*) coordinate. 2 'grey 66.57 Rernazol Black B gran 133 0.1%
3 black 17.00 Remazol Black B gran 133 5%
Lightness AL* Aa* Ab* Remazol Brill. Orange 3R 1%
Color range allowance allowance allowance 4 blue 71.04 Procion Navy H-ER 150 0.1%
5 blue 40.13 Procion Navy H-ER 150 1%
Grey 70-90 0.8 0.4 0.6 6 blue 19.39 Procion Navy H-ER 150 7%
Greyhlack 20-70 0.8 0.5 0.6 7 brown 79.53 Procion Brown H 4 R D 0.1%
Black 0-20 0.8 0.5 0.6 8 brown 50.26 Procion Brown H-4RD 1%
Blue 50 or above 0.6 0.2 0.5 9 brown 31.30 Procion Brown H 4 R D 6%
Blue 20-50 0.6 0.2 0.5 Procion Yellow H-WR 1%
Navy 10-20 0.6 ' 0.3 0.6 10 green 75.01 Procion Green H - D B D 0.1%
Brown 70-90 0.8 0.4 0.6 11 green 32.04 Procion Green H-WBD 3%
Brown 40-70 0.8 0.5 0.6 12 orange 79.61 Remazol Brill. Orange 3R 0.1%
Brown 10-40 0.8 0.5 0.6 13 orange 46.11 Remazol Brill. Orange 3R 6%
Green 40 or above 1.0 0.4 0.5 14 red 76.61 Procion Red H-EXL 0.1%
Orange 60 or above 0.4 0.35 0.6 15 red 50.64 Procion Red H-EXL 1%
Orange 30-60 0.5 0.4 0.6 16 red 22.08 Procion Red H-EXL 5%
Red 60 or above 0.35 0.35 0.35 Procion Navy ER 150 1%
Red 30-60 0.5 0.5 0.5 Procion Yellow H - D R 1%
Red 10-30 0.8 0.5 0.5 17 violet 77.19 Rernazol Brill. Violet 5R 0.1%
Violet 10-80 0.7 0.5 1.2 18 violet 39.33 Remazol Brill. Violet 5R 3%
Yellow 80 or above 0.5 0.4 1.2 19 yellow 89.01 Procion Yellow H-E4R 0.1%
Yellow 10-80 0.7 0.5 1.2 20 yellow 70.08 Procion Yellow H-EAR 3%

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APRIL2001 289

Color Measurentents + 0.0131C0*) + 0.638, S H = S,[(T)(f) + 1 - fl,

The spectral reflectance value of each colored sample f = [C0*4/(C0*J + 1900)]"2, and T = 0.36
was determined by a set of instruments developed by + abs[0.4 cos (It,* + 35)] unless 11 is between 164" to
DataColor International, including Oriris 2.3 color +
345", when T = 0.56 abs[0.2 cos (ho* 168)]. AL*, + +
analysis software installed in an IBM computer that AC*, and AH* are differences in lightness, metric
interfaced with the Elrepho 2000 reflectance spectropho- chroma, and metric hue, respectively, between the stan-
tometer. The spectral source and the observer-viewing dard and the sample. Lo*, Co*,and H,* are the lightness,
angle for computing the color difference were D,, and metric chroma, and metric hue of the standard, respec-
1O", respectively. tively. 1 = 2 and c = 1 for the chic (2:l) equation, i.e.,
We selected the operational mode of the reflectance acceptability criteria.
spectrophotometer to include the specular component. All the colorimetric data were expressed in three por-
For each colored specimen, four individual color mea- tions consisting of lightness (AL/2S,), chroma (AC/
surepents were recorded in different directions by rotat- Sc), and hue (AH/SH). W e obtained the values of the
ing the specimen 90" between each measurement. We three individual portions from the direct output of the
then averaged the four spectral reflectance values to Datamaster color analysis software. The three portions
generate a mean spectral reflectance value used for sub- expressed as DL, DC, and DH, were input into the data
sequent data analysis. We repeated these procedures for window of statistical software Minitab for Windows
all twenty color sets [l, 17-18, 22, 291. (Release 10.5 Xtra, 32 bit), then chosen and loaded into
the processor for analysis, and the output was displayed
in the session window of the software. Either hierarchical
Data Treatment or nonhierarchical cluster analysis could be chosen for
All the data collected from the reflectance spectropho- execution by the operator.
tometer were output from its secondary storage and then Both the hierarchical and sequential K-means cluster
input into another IBM computer interfaced with Data- analysis can be accessed from the Minitab software. The
master color analysis software developed by DataColor operator can select the criteria, including the linkage
International. The colorimetric data of each colored sam- method, distance measure, number of clusters formed,
ple were then computed using the chic (2:l) color dif- and standardization methods of data, etc., from the hier-
ference equation as shown in Equation 1 [2, 14-16, 19, archical clustering method (cluster observation process
21, 27, 311: in the software) for processing. Output formats such as
AEcqc = [(AUISL)2+ (AC/CSC)~ + (AH/SH)2]"2, distance matrix, dendrogram, and storage of cluster
membership, etc., can be obtained after the analysis
(1) process is completed. For the ccc shade sorting process,
where S, = 0.040975L0*/(1 + 0.01765L0*) unless software settings are recommended according to Table
Lo < 16 when SL = 0.511, S , = 0.0638C0*/(l IV.

IV. Different dialogue setting in Minitab 10.5 Xtra software for performing ccc shade sorting.
TABLE

Dialogue Criterion Option Set as

~ ~ ~~

General variable any variables in data window DL. DC, & DH

linkage method 7 linkage methods complete linkage
distance measure 5 interobject distance measures Euclidean distance
standardize variables yes or no no
specify final partition by number of cluster or similarity level number of cluster
number of cluster any numerical integer depending on number of sorted
groups formed
show dendrogram yes or no Yes
customize dendrogram yes or no yes
storage yes or no Yes
Storage cluster membership column any column number depending on preference of end user
distance between observations yes or no Yes
and cluster centroid
distance matrix yes or no no
Customize title any text depending on preference of end user
label Y axis with similarity or distance distance
show dendrogram in one window or separate window one window
for each cluster

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After ccc sorting, the DL, DC, and DH data allocated
in the data window were rearranged for the sequential
K-means analysis (cluster K-means process in the soft-
ware). The selected seed points were placed on the top of
the sheet in the data window. The operator could choose
the criteria, including the number of clusters formed and
standardize variables for processing the sequential K-
means analysis. The default distance measure of this
program is set as a Euclidean distance. The output for-
mat, such as the distance from the cluster center and
cluster membership, etc., can be obtained after the anal-
ysis is completed. To complete sequential K-means
shqde sorting, the software should be set as outlined in
Table V.
Interpretation
The optimum clustering algorithm for an industrial
shade sorting application should be determined after the
clustering processes have been completed. The perfor-
mance of these processes can be assessed in terms of five
different measures, as discussed in detail in the previous
study [23]:
1. Formation of sorted groups: Simply known as
“number of sorted groups formed,” which reflects the
circumstance of fabric utilization and distribution in the
shade sorting process when using the same quantity of
fabric. Consequently, minimizing the number of sorted
groups formed is an elementary requirement to be ful-
filled by assessing performance.
2. Variation in color within sorted groups: Simply
known as “the maximum color difference within sorted
groups,” which indicates the association within the clus-
ter. The smaller the value of color difference, the higher
the association of the sorted group. This can be consid-
ered a more satisfactory sorting process.
3. Utilization of the fabrics: Two factors are consid-
ered when assessing the effectiveness of fabric utiliza-
tion, i.e., the “number of groups containing only one
fabric” indicates whether the outlying colored samples
TABLE
V. Different dialogue settings in hlinitab 10.5 Xtra software for performing sequential K-means shade sorting.
Dialogue Criterion
General variable
specify partition by
number of cluster
standardize variables
storage
Storage cluster membership column
distance between observations
and cluster centroid
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TEXTILE
RESEARCH
JOURNAL
can be grouped and sewn together with other fabrics or
not, and the “percentage of groups in low utilization”
indicates the portion of low fabric utilization, defined as
follows:
Percentage of groups in low utilization
number of sorted group containing less than four fabrics
total number of sorted groups
4. Distribution of the population: A cumulative fre-
quency polygon is plotted where the y-axis is the per-
centage of a sample consumed and the x-axis is the
percentage of a sorted group formed. The percentage of
a sorted group formed relating to the 25th, 50th, and 75th
percentiles of the consumed sample can be recorded
from the cumulative frequency polygon. The three-re-
corded “percentage of groups formed” reflects the uni-
formity of the colored samples distributed in the whole
population. If the percentage of groups formed is small,
the colored samples will be concentrated in the largest
sorted groups. On the other hand, the colored samples
will be dispersed evenly in the sorted groups if the
percentage of groups formed is large.
5 . Compactness of individuals in sorted groups: Two
factors are used to study the compactness of the sorted
group, i.e., the average sum of squares within a cluster
and the average distance toward the centroid of the
group. The sum of squares within a cluster reflects the
variation of the individuals within the sorted group. The
larger the value of the average sum of squares within a
cluster, the larger the variation among individuals within
a sorted group, and so the association of this sorted group
is low. In addition, an average distance toward the cen-
troid indicates the distance of an individual sample to-
ward the center of its own group. As the individuals are
far from their center, they are dispersed away from one
another within the same group and so can be deduced as
having a low level of association.
Option Set as
any variables in data window DL, DC, & DH
number of cluster or initial number of cluster
partition column
any numerical integer same as number of groups formed’by
CCC sorting method
yes or no no
yes or no yes
any column number depending on the preference of end user
yes or no Yes
APRIL2001 29 1

In conclusion, when there are (a) fewer numbers of
sorted groups, (b) less color difference within a sorted
group, (c) better fabric utilization, i.e., fewer “sorted
groups containing only one sample” and a lower “per-
centage of sorted groups in low utilization,” and (d)
higher compactness within a sorted group, i.e., a low
“maximum average sum of squares within a cluster” and
low “maximum average distance towards the centroid,”
the utilization of acceptable colors in a fabric population
will be maximized. Thus, we can conclude that this
shade sorting process is the best one in application.
Results and Discussion
Original ccc shade sorting according to these proce-
dures continued until the color variation within the sorted
groups exceeded the maximum permissible color differ-
ence tolerance, as shown in Table I. Sequential K-means
shade sorting then occurred after rearrangement of the
data in the data windows under the same circumstances.
This refined shade sorting method is called the “modified
ccc shade sorting process.” We analyzed the differences
between the original ccc and modified ccc after com-
pleting these two sorting processes.
Prior to the analysis, we found that these two pro-
cesses exhibited entirely different sorting outcomes in
the twenty color sets except for set 13, i e . , a dark orange
color. The sorting outcomes were identical for color set
13 using either the original or modified ccc sorting. In
view of this, our comparison of the two sorting methods
with respect to this color set should be ignored because
an identical performance is obviously meaningless.
Since the number of seeds chosen for sequential K-
means analysis was governed by the number of sorted
groups formed by ccc shade sorting, the number of
groups formed by modified ccc sorting was exactly the
same as that formed by the original ccc sorting. The
results are illustrated in Table VIA.
The maximum color variation within sorted groups is
shown in Table VIB. The two clustering algorithms
exhibited similar results. Both methods produced nine
sets of color in which the numerical value of the “max-
imum color difference” was identical after excluding
color set 13. The original ccc produced a lower “maxi-
mum color difference” value in five color sets, while the
modified ccc produced a lower “maximum color differ-
ence” value in another five color sets. It was hard to
distinguish which shade sorting method was better in
terms of this aspect.
Meanwhile, it was also possible to investigate the
“number of sorted groups containing only one sample”

TABLEVI. Comparison of the shade sorting performance in different color sets produced by original
and modified CCC shade sorting methods.=

(B) maximum (F) maximum

color (C) number of (D) (E) maximum average
difference sorted groups percentage average sum distance
(A) number of within sorted .containing only of low of squares toward
groups formed groups one sample utilization within cluster centroid

Color Color set BY BY BY BY BY BY BY BY BY BY

’ BY BY
set no. name Color OCSS hlCSS OCSS hlCSS OCSS hlCSS OCSS hlCSS OCSS hlCSS OCSS hlCSS

1 black01 grey 8 8 0.810 0.810 0 0 25.0 25.0 0.154 0.154 0.389 0.389
2 black02 grey 11 11 0.731 0.733 1 1 27.3 36.4 0.088 0.088 0.279 0.279
3 black03 black 6 6 0.792 0.723 1 1 33.3 16.7 0.073 0.071 0.253 0.252
4 blue01 blue 9 9 0.935 0.935 0 0 0.0 0.0 0.108 0.136 0.318 0.351
5 blue02 blue 12 12 0.6.57 0.666 0 0 8.3 8.3 0.086 0.086 0.279 0.279
6 blue03 blue 16 16 0.608 0.608 1 0 37.5 43.8 0.066 0.1 10 0.243 0.243
7 brown01 brown 6 6 0.830 0.841 0 0 16.7 16.7 0.103 0.114 0.302 0.309
8 broanO2 brown 7 7 0.944 0.887 1 1 14.3 14.3 0.159 0.096 0.389 0.261
9 brown03 brown 14 14 0.909 0.909 2 2 35.7 28.6 0.132 0.125 0.356 0.318
10 green01 green 8 8 0.605 0.569 0 0 0.0 0.0 0.069 0.043 0.255 0.184
11 green02 green 7 7 0.806 0.806 1 0 28.6 14.3 0.078 0.076 0.256 0.252
12 orange01 orange 5 5 0.832 0.832 0 0 40.0 ’ 40.0 0.085 0.085 0.264 0.264
13 orange02 orange 12 12 0.802 0.802 4 4 58.3 58.3 0.088 0.088 0.287 0.287
14 red0 1 red 5 5 0.906 0.919 0 0 0.0 0.0 0.130 0.128 0.339 0.330
15 red02 red 6 6 0.750 0.783 0 0 0.0 0.0 0.081 0.081 0.269 0.269
16 red03 red 21 21 0.769 0.729 2 2 61.9 61.9 0.133 0.133 0.365 0.365
17 violet01 violet 4 4 0.932 0.921 0 0 0.0 0.0 0.081 0.078 0.250 0.258 .
18 violet02 violet 9 9 0.772 0.772 0 0 11.1 11.1 0.102 0.101 0.310 0.311
19 yellow01 yellow I1 11 1.053 1.053 0 0 9.1 9.1 0.165 0.165 0.380 0.380
20 velIou.02 vellow 10 10 0.968 0.968 1 1 20.0 20.0 0.188 0.188 0.430 0.430

a OCSS = original CCC shade sorting process, hICSS = modified CCC shade sorting process.

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292 TEXTILE
RESEARCH
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using the same set of treated data as illustrated in Table
VIC. After the clustering process was completed, the
original ccc method produced eight color sets consisting
of the “sorted group containing only one sample” after
eliminating color set 13. The additional sequential K-
means process reduced these eight sets to six sets. In
addition, the original ccc algorithm formed fourteen
“sorted groups containing only one sample” in these
eight color sets but the modified ccc algorithm formed
twelve such groups in these six color sets. Actually, the
modified method reduced the two color sets from one to
no “sorted group containing only one sample.”
A comparison of the “percentage of low utilization”
between original ccc and modified ccc methods is illus-
trated in Table VID. In that table, the “percentage of low
utilization” of fabric obtained from both original ccc and
modified ccc methods ranged from 0 to 61.9% in these
twenty color sets. The original was identical to the rnod-
ified in fourteen color sets after excluding color set 13.
with additional sequential K-means treatment gave a
better performance in three color sets. However, the one
with no sequential K-means process treatment gave a
better performance in two color sets only.
Figure 1 summarizes the “percentage of groups
formed” among the twenty color sets at the three percen-
tiles using the original and modified ccc shade sorting
methods. The readings of “percentage of groups formed”
at the 25th, 50th, and 75th percentiles of the consumed
samples are plotted against different color sets produced
by the two shade sorting methods. When comparing
original with modified ccc clustering, we see that the
former yielded a larger reading of “percentage of groups
formed” in fourteen cases, while the latter yielded a
larger reading of that category in thirty cases. In addition
to this, both methods produced identical numerical read-
ings in the remaining thirteen cases after eliminating the
same reading of “percentage of groups formed” obtained
from color set 13, i.e., the dark orange color, for its three

;
For the remaining five color sets, the ccc sorting process percentiles. Obviously, the results show that the colored

PILL
... 7. 3

COLOR SET

FIGURE1. A plot of the percentage of groups formed at 25th,50th, and 75th percentiles of samples in different
color sets produced by the two sorting methods.

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APRIL2001
samples obtained from original ccc sorting seemed to be
enclosed together to form large sorted groups. The same
data set tended to disperse evenly in various sorted
groups after further processing by sequential K-means
sorting analysis. Some colorists prefer to have the sorted
colored sample enclosed in a few groups. Others prefer
to have the sorted samples distributed evenly, i.e., each
sorted group containing approximately the same number
of samples. The results provide ways to select a process
depending on the preference of the end user.
Table VIE shows the “maximum average sum of
squares within a cluster’’ of the twenty color sets using
the two clustering algorithms. A comparison of the orig-
inal-ccc with the one subjected to sequential K-means
clustering shows that eight color sets gave identical read-
ings of the “maximum average sum of squares within a
cluster” after excluding color set 13. Original ccc shade
sorting produced a smaller numerical result for this cat-
egory in three color sets. Modified ccc shade sorting
provided a smaller numerical result for this category in
another eight color sets. An additional sequential K-
means process seemed to offer an improvement in this
aspect for shade sorting while it formed a more closely
packed sorted group.
Table VIF summarizes the “maximum average dis-
tance towards the centroid“ of the twenty color sets
based on the two different approaches. Again, it was hard
to differentiate the performance of the original and mod-
ified ccc shade sorting methods. Nine color sets gave the
same numerical reading in the “maximum average dis-
tance toward the centroid,” except for color set 13. The
original ccc produced a smaller number for this category
in five color sets, while the modified ccc produced a
smaller number in another five color sets.
Conclusions
When comparing the performance of the original ccc
and the modified ccc with sequential K-means shade
sorting in terms of formation of sorted groups, variation
of color within sorted groups, utilization of colored fab-
ric, distribution of the population, and compactness of
individuals in a sorted group, we have found that the
modified ccc method originating from ccc sorting and
subjected to additional sequential K-means clustering
shows better overall performance in assessing five mea-
sures. The performance of the modified ccc is similar to
the original ccc in terms of the first two criteria, and a
definite improvement has been achieved in terms of the
next two criteria. In conclusion, the modified algorithm
is more suitable for shade sorting in the coloration in-
dustry. An industrial-scale trial of the modified shade
sorting process is highly recommended in order to affirm
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293
the process’s suitability for fulfilling the basic require-
ments of shade sorting.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
We express our thanks for the financial and facilities
support provided by the Research Committee of The
Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
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