All of the references I have found are pretty much in agreement on the FS colors and patterns for the AF planes during the Vietnam war but I’m puzzled about the assignment of the two greens that were used. FS34079 Dark Green and FS34102 Medium Green look correct, but based on my memories and the color slides I took they seem to be applied in reverse of all the painting guides I’ve seen.
I tried to post below an Ektachrome slide I took back then which I have scanned and color corrected for the Ekatachrome bias. Now certainly the shades will be different from the FS color chips due to weathering, lighting and color film inaccuracies but the differences in darkness are unmistakable and seem to be consistent with reversing the suggested applications of 34079 and 34102. When I painted the F4 I’m working on using the reversed greens it looks like the photos
I’ve never embedded an image before so I hope this comes through:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/87241479@N06/7986972247/sizes/l/in/photostream/
Color me baffled here.
Have you tried to Google search images for SEA schemes for the aircraft you’re trying to build? That may help with some of the confusion, or confirm what you know.
Glenn
Yes, all the images I have found agree with my photos as far as where the dark green and medium green are applied but the reference drawings typically all have them as shown here:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/87241479@N06/7989372699/in/photostream
The official Tech Order for painting USAF aircraft that is posted on the F-4 Phantom Society website is a later version and shows the patterns for the later F-4 scheme.
I’m going with what matches all the images, so I swapped the two colors but I was just curious about why the discrepancy.
I’m not quite sure. The colors look to be in the right places to me, but where the demarcations between the colors look different from most Phantoms I’ve seen, especially the left front. You should be good to go with what you have, and I hope you’ll post your work when it’s finished!
Glenn
Thank you, I’ll be sure to post it. I’m doing a particular tail number so I will copy that planes pattern, but the patterns did vary between planes, units and exact time. The TO says that there is leeway allowed in the precise boundaries, as long as the balance of the areas covered by the three colors is about the same as the official diagram. I also noticed that the underside gray of the planes I worked on was pretty much the same white as the wheel-wells, so I’m not sure if maybe the overhaul base people just used white to eliminate one more color to paint. You can sort of see from the other photos on my Flickr account that the undersides look more white than light gray.