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 Post subject: USN 5-L question
PostPosted: Wed May 03, 2017 3:01 pm 
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Hello friends,

With my '44 San Francisco model primed and ready for paint, I now am having some doubts about the 5-L light grey. There aren't any color photos of SF I can find, but contrast between the 5-L light grey and 5-O ocean grey is not too bright, as seen in the picture below:

Image

I looked up present day pictures of USS Slater and USS North Carolina, both wearing a MS32 camouflage scheme with basically with the same colors as San Francisco in MS33 outfit, only with the addition of dark blue in the former:

Image

The point is that the 5-L in this picture look almost white to me. I get the same experience when looking at North Carolina's pictures. I intend to use Sovereign Hobbies Colourcoats 5-L and 5-O, of which I thought this was spot on (I read this somewhere). But as it comes out of the bottle the 5-L can sure be seen as light grey, but compared to the pictures above it still looks too dark to me. On a small scale model I'm afraid the model will turn out too dark.

This picture is not perfect, but these are 5-O and 5-L underneath each other on a black background color:
Image

I'm not sure it is very visible in my photo, but actually the same goes for the 5-O. Again, when compared to Slater and North Carolina, it strikes me that this color is too dark as well. Of course I can tune both paints down by mixing some white, but now I'm not sure whether to do this or not.

Any advice or tips for me?

- Bas :smallsmile:

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 Post subject: Re: USN 5-L question
PostPosted: Wed May 03, 2017 3:07 pm 
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You're assuming the paint on today's museum ships are accurately matched to the tone and hue of the original WWII paints.

The 5-L I've used (Polly Scale) is indeed a very light grey, and I often use it instead of white on my 350th and 700th scale ships to help tone down the intensity (not to mention easier painting).

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 Post subject: Re: USN 5-L question
PostPosted: Wed May 03, 2017 8:00 pm 
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I know it's not 100% accurate but look up some footage of the Cleveland class cruiser USS Astoria on YouTube. There's a bunch of original color footage and black and white stills on her website from the negatives of the ship's photographer. She wore the same two colors so it should give you some more insight into the colors. Again it's all subjective but should help.

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 Post subject: Re: USN 5-L question
PostPosted: Wed May 03, 2017 11:30 pm 
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According to Lee Johnson's Dazzle Camo website ... http://www.usndazzle.com/ship.php?id=46 ... USS SAN FRANCISCO was painted in Ms 33/13D, not Ms 32, so the colors wouldn't be the same as for ships painted in Ms 32.

"Design 13D was then drawn as well as for the New Orleans class heavy cruisers as above on February 3, 1944, and was used by the heavy cruisers USS Tuscaloosa (CA-37) using 5-N and 5-L and by USS San Francisco (CA-38) using 5-O and 5-L or possibly pale gray (5-P)."

If she was painted with Pale Gray (5-P) rather than Light Gray (5-L), that would explain why her paint would look even lighter.

Plus, remember that the photographic films used in WWII era, were of two different types, orthochromatic and panchromatic, which had different spectral responses than each other and way different than current digital cameras. Some colors look lighter in one film type than with the other and a color digital camera image isn't likely to match.

Plus, as Timmy says, what paint the museum ships used may or may not be good matches to true WWII era paints.

How a color looks inside in typical lighting compared to being applied to a large ship outside in bright sun with sea and sky backgrounds will alter the visual effect to the human eye. To compensate for that many modelers will "lighten" the paints they use to match the effect seen outdoors in 1:1 scale.

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 Post subject: Re: USN 5-L question
PostPosted: Thu May 04, 2017 3:25 pm 
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Thanks guys for your replies. :thumbs_up_1:

Rick, why would the colors not be the same? I am aware that San Francisco wore MS33/13D, however 5-L and 5-O are used in MS32 and MS33 as well. MS32 also uses black or dark blue, but I didn't look at the latter color.
The usndazzle.com website is a very welcome addition by the way, wasn't aware of its existence... It also has some more SF photos, so thanks for the tip!

Cliffy, I saw the videos. My impression that the 5-L of Souvereign Hobbies is too dark just became stronger. I also found this picture of USS Concord wearing MS23 in 1943, all 5-L light grey and also very light. By the way, you refer to USS Astoria being a Cleveland class cruiser, however she was a New Orleans class, as well as the USS San Francisco was :eyebrows:

Image

My conclusion: mix the 5-L I have here with white.

Thanks for the suggestions,

- Bas :smallsmile:

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 Post subject: Re: USN 5-L question
PostPosted: Thu May 04, 2017 7:12 pm 
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Bas,

I missed your two lines between the USS SAN FRANCISCO and USS SLATER images. Sorry. I was confused from the rest of the discussion that you didn't realize that SAN FRANCISCO was painted to MS 33 standards.

As for the same colors used, I have found that being sure to verify the colors applied for a given dazzle scheme on a ship is important. There were substitutes of paints done on individual ships. An example is Lee's note that SAN FRANCISCO "may" have used 5-P in place of 5-L.

Actually USS CONCORD is painted in Ms 22, note the 5-N band parallel to the waterline at the main deck (aft). It is likely her upper works are actually 5-H. Depending on many factors, including camera settings. sun aspect, and age of the paint, Haze Gray can appear very light. Attached is a scanned image from the original transparency of USS EDISON (DD-439) painted in Ms 22 alongside several FLETCHER class destroyers painted in Ms 21. You can see where strong sun causes the appearance of a lighter shade than is the actual paint.

After USS ASTORIA (CA-34) was sunk, a new CLEVELAND class cruiser was named USS ASTORIA (CL-90).

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 Post subject: Re: USN 5-L question
PostPosted: Sat May 06, 2017 5:10 am 
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Hi Rick,

:doh_1: Of course, I totally missed the new Astoria CL-90. I was looking at pre-war color footage of a New Orleans class cruiser, in an overall light grey coat. The 'new' Astoria footage is very helpful (I posted the video below). The main conclusion I can draw was actually that it is very light dependant, you are very right about that. The youtube video I think was made at dawn or dusk, when the plane is switching from the sunny starboard side to the shadow port side, the colors look very different indeed.

Well, I painted USS San Francisco's base coat 5-L yesterday. In the end I decided to use unmixed 5-L (so no whites), and it turned out very okay :thumbs_up_1:



Thanks for all the replies,

- Bas :smallsmile:

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