I thought I knew, then I realized that I wasn’t sure, but soon I again thought I understood, and now find myself doubting, Help if you can while I am still in a stable state of confusion. I saw Fockemonns post “King Tiger, Ardenns Offensive” I see that he is using Tamiyas colors (or so it seems). That seems to be the current accepted correct colors if properly mixed and applied. Ok by me they are pretty. Lately builds in AFV Modler magaziene are using a brighter color selection. The red brown is well shall we say a bit redder. The yellow is a lot less green and the green is brighter. Those guys do a lot of research also. Being that I am a bit anal concerning paint color which is more correct and why. I know about paint fade, crappy paint, improper paint mixing etc… I am not defending AFV, I tend to think their Hunting Tiger was overweathered for the length of time it was in service. Thanks Greg.
personally, I mix my Tamiya Red Brown with Hull red to acheive that reddish brown. The green and yellow I leave alone
gjek,
This is what I’ve read. The camouflage colors were often applied in the field, They came in tubes of concentrated paste. Depending on what was used as thinner and how much thinner was used determined the various shades.
More thinner, lighter colors. Less thinner, darker colors.
Personally, I use Floquil railroad colors. For the base I use mud, then follow up with any of a number of shades of greens and browns ( red/browns ).
Depending on the primer coat and application of the base coat and camouflage colors you can get a variety of results. This coupled with the weathering and there are countless numbers of finishes you can come up with.
Not saying anyone is wrong, but I wouldn’t get too “hung up” on correct colors.
Joe
I once had a chance to talk with a couple of gentlemen about the color schemes on German armor and have always kind of taken what they told me as the truth. (they were both there at the time the paints were being used). According to them, the new vehicles came in the yellow from the factory and you could find variences in the colors from different factories/paint batches, not much but noticable on new vehicles). The browns and greens were a different story. They were issued as a paste in tins and were supposed to be thinned with gasoline for application. In the tin, both were very dark (the green was almost black). If thinned and applied as directed, you would get a medium green and a medium brown (applied with a paint gun). However in reality, they were thinned with almost anything liquid (gas, diesel, used oil, water etc) or even directly out of the tin and applied with anything handy (paint brushes, mopps, rags,bare hands etc). So depending how it was thinned and applied, the results could be from a very light brown (almost pink) to a very deep chocolate brown or a very light pea green to a very dark black green. It kinda results in a case of pick what you want and go with it.
Gotta go with the consensus here…there really are no blanket “correct” colors and variations (within limits) are the norm rather than the exception.
You might as well stop wringing your hands over it. Just make a choice and go with it …and build the model already. There is no right answer when it comes to this question.
finally the big question is clear . and i have said this on other postings also, tank crews did and used what they had available to them to paint their vehicles , this is like some big revelation to some people i geuss. now if we can get away from the pretty airbrushed camo schemes that alot of people are hung up on and hand paint like most crews did in the field .our models ( yes some vehicles came out of the factories with pretty sprayed on camo)but alot of you guys are hitting the nail on the head with camo applied by hand in field conditions. this is like a breath of fresh air to me . cause i 100% handpaint my models ( german armour and afv) by hand .i thick coat the dark yellow on and overlap stroke it wet then it drys evenly ( “my factory spryed base coat”) .then its dark green and red brown put on in various camo schemes and patterns .
i will post photos of these models hopefully around the end of may . cause they are currently on display in seoul korea after winning the 2nd infantry division model contest and winning the 8th army model contest . now im waiting on them to be forwarded to the army wide contest sometime in the late summer
I think a lot of the color debates are somewhat pointless. I can nitpick esoteric details with the best of them, but when it comes to colors my attitude is whatever seems right is probably good enough. My reason for this laidback attitude above and beyond the actual paint variation and weathering effects, and suck light is the effect of the lighting conditions on the viewer’s perception of color. A Tiger II from the Ardennes Offensive, would different in bright sunlight vs. overcast vs twilight vs. any other lighting condition. A model of the Tiger II, even if painted with the exact color of the full scale original, would look correct only a specific real lighting condition, (unless you have a very complicated lighting system for you display case). I think the effect is a whole lot more involved than the usually quoted nd overly simplistic “scale effect”. The upshot, is that I think if you come up with colors that seem right and seem to have the correct contrast, it is difficult to legitimately challenge the result.
Andy
I have found this article to be quite useful.
I just paint everything Pink (for base coat) and Bright Orange and Green for camo…everyone is so shocked when they see my models, they don’t even care to comment. [}:)][:D][;)][:P]
Greg, what I’ve picked up on the brown and green gels with what’s been written here. One of the big German armor experts, a German guy who has spent his life studying this and talking to ex-Panzer men, says that the yellow was pretty much standard. According to some, there were two dark yellows, one called Dunkelgelb Nach Muster and the other just called Dunkelgelb. Some say that the two colors were the same, and Dunkelgelb was a simple renaming of DNM, others disagree, and claim they were two slightly different colors.
He claims that the yellow did not fade in the sunlight, for some chemical reason I did not fully comprehend, as opposed to a color like Olive Drab, which faded like crazy.
He also apparently asserts that Dunkelgelb is a honey brown color, and that the Tamiya shade is too light and greenish. Then again, he studied the Tiger in Bovington, and maybe he’s mixing the whole thing up with the DAK mustard!
The yellow used by lots of guys, particularly those beautiful kits made by the expert Spanish modelers, is probably too sunny and light. They admit it themselves when you talk to them on Missing Lynx about it – they say they do it for effect. Their kits also show what is probably an excessive amount of paint wear. That in no way detracts from the beautiful artistry of their builds.
The color mixes for German paints have been standard for a long time. They are set by the RAL German Institute for Quality Assurance and Certification. It’s still widely used today. Example:
http://www.kern-gmbh.de/index_ral.html?http://www.kern-gmbh.de/kunststoff/service/lackierung/ral.htm
Dunkelgelb was assigned code RAL 7028. Unfortunately, the original color swatches have never been found, maybe incinerated by bombing or maybe just discarded. The reason that’s unfortunate is that 7028 is no longer in the registry – it was a Nazi addition that was expunged from the registry after WWII.
Here’s just one of many sites that look at the color and try to understand what it looked like:
http://www.ww2modelmaker.com/articlepub/SApaintpt1.htm
(This one talks about the color fading, though, so you can see there’s no consensus on this.)
Here’s another:
http://www.panzerworld.net/colours.html
Don’t fret your investigation of the true color – if it’s part of the fun of modeling for you, go for it! Truth is, I suspect, that it’s a Holy Grail of sorts. If it is more of a worry than a concern, then really, don’t worry. Just use the Tamiya color.
Thanks! My point is I just want to be reasonably close. I fade and weather my paints but I do want to have an accurate start point and I think most of us want that.
Keep in mind that the industrial bombing greatly depleted paint supplies. On 8-19-44, tanks leaving the factory, such as panthers, jagpanthers, tigers, jagpanzers, and some stug IV, had dk. yellow base coat w/ dk. green @ red brown patches w/ the “ambush” pattern. In mid Sept. 44, all tanks had red primer w/ limited dk. yellow, dk. green @ or red brown camo. On 10-13-44 the order was given to use dk. yellow, dk. green @ red brown over the red primer in limited amounts and that dark grey could be used as a substitute fo dark yellow. But there is no evidence of this, however in the squadron signal publication on the panther, there is a panther in the color plate section that has a late panther w/ a dark grey base w/ dk. green camo. on 12-20-44, dark green was now the base coat and a hard edged camo of dk. yellow w/ or w/o red brown, was applied. Also german units in the field would use whatever was available, such as captured stocks, even the local hardware store.