Hi guys!
Inspired by the other Jagdpanther thread on the forum currently, I was curious and wanted to as if ayone really knows what color is this Jagdpanther in this well-known photo?
Is it a panzer gray vehicle with possible DY patches, or is it overall Panzer Green?
Anybody know for sure? The mantlet coor seems to argue for Panzer Gray?
!http://th209.photobucket.com/albums/bb311/MegSparrow/Emoticons/th_EMOTICON___NOTICE_ME___by_flaccidou.gif
From what I can see and judging by the surrounding landscape, the dirt /dust on the tracks and the impression that it’s been there awhile… looks like green with a lot of dust. But then again there does’t appear to be any dust on top of the mantlet. Second vote is green & DY.
DISASTERMASTER
Looks green & yellow to me…
I’m skeptical about the reports of Germans painting armor Panzer Grey in the last months/weeks/days of the war…based on that, and the pic, and the tendency for color pics of that period to be as confusing in tones as B&W pics, I vote for dark yellow base w/ heavy green overspary…I can even detect a little red-brown splotching along the very top of the superstructure…
When you increase the contrast, the body has strong green splotches like the uniform of the man on top, while the gun area goes towards dark grays without any color to it.
So I’d say the gun was grey and the tank itself was green.
…one thing for sure, I don’t see any chipping or rust on it…
Bertman’s comment seems to be right on. The mantel and “saukopf” do seem to be more grey than the color on the hull.
You might also note the color compared to the GI’s presumably olive drab helmet. The tones are very similar, to my eyes.
This photo demonstrates a lot of the problems with trying to judge “accurate” colors from WW2 color photographs. Tonal shifts from the film/developing process, lighting, dust, etc. are all in play in this one.
It has all the characteristics of a late Jagdpanther in relation to the mantlet and barrel, which means it would’ve most likely been finished in a basecoat of Olivegrun and the dark yellow added over that along with the possibility of additional red-brown.
FWIW, there haven’t been any documented cases of actual vehicles leaving the factory in '45 with the panzergray applied. The order in place for a short period allowed for the use of panzer gray “IF” they had it still on hand “AND” they didn’t have sufficient stocks of Olivegrun and/or dark yellow.
I’m in agreement with Manstein’s revenge. The mantlet looks like a red brown color to me.
which prooves it has been photoshopped!
I dropped this in Picture It and did an auto adjust. The top of the saukopf leans very much to green. I’d vote for dunkelgrun over dunkelgelb.
Im with Manny on this. Theres deffo some red brown around the top.
…Guy
well, I increased the contrast and saved it for others to see–doing so just makes any color stand out more and if it is gray it’ll just get darker.
the green on the tank and uniform is for sure.
When my wife looked at it, she said it looked colorized, and that that was very common back then (lots of photos of her parents are that way).
assuming that you are actually using Photo Shop or Paint Shop Pro, have a look at the histogram (I think you can also bring it up with an imported picture as well). It will tell you everything about every hue that’s there.
gary
That process was called “hand-tinting” and it was very expensive – not as expensive as the color films then available (and remember – Gone With the Wind came out five years before this photo was taken, shot in Technocolor), but expensive to the point that you’d have it done for portraits almost exclusively.
Color photographs existed then, and fade just like this pic shows.
you need to keep in mind some photos of WWII were not originally in color, they were colored later after the war same with movies. my wifes grandfather was a german soldier in WWII after the war he joined the US army and was a Photo/ video recon officer and did alot of coloring to WWII reels/ pictures so some may not have been 100% accurate with the true color.
Hmmm…so is no chipping and no rust the new “accurate” weathering? [:-,]
Honestly, I don’t know if I’ve ever seen the paint simply chipping off of a tank. But I still think it looks cool on a model if it’s done right.
I took the photo and enhanced it eveery way I know how. You can definately see the 3 tone redbrown, Green and Dark yellow. That would be the safe bet. The gray on the manlet could well be a side effect from that big shell hole through the center road wheel. That’s my idea and I’m stickin with it. (maybe) The green on the Gravel road makes me think it was color enhanced as does the heavy amount of green on the vehicle.
