HMS Prince of Wales

[EJFoeth]

Fortunately we have a lot of photographs of HMS Prince of Wales and between images you can see the contrast change, even though there is no reason to assume a different color was applied... tone C is a nice example because it is much darker on some shots than on others, so combining the two types of shots makes the identification as C (and C only) relatively easy. And then, for HMS Queen Elizabeth I have a noticed a few areas that were locally changed so you have to be careful. And then there is the influence of weather and surface inclination; every time I look at the fwd turrets I think: has to be E... So, if you do not have enough photographs you may identify a color poorly, and if you do have enough, you may erroneously conclude a color was painted out or the entire pattern was reapplied. Both are not applicable to Prince of Wales IMO. I'd never try to guess colors from one or two pics only without other source material. I think our current estimate is pretty good but I'd be surprised if no one spots a new error. The actual color is something else entirely. With what I've read on the forum I'm not sure sure the blue-grey AP507B I applied to my Hood model is accurate... too late now.

[elcejay]

Hello EJ - there are perhaps too many photos of PoW! (I say that tongue in cheek.)

I would be interested in your thoughts on this theory...

With paints C and D, I wonder if we are seeing B6 and MS4. They are approximately the same reflectance (B6 is slightly darker), but a different shade, of course. In true greyscale, they will be almost indistinguishable but, as you know, the B&W photos are not true greyscale, they are either orthochromatic or panchromatic conversions of colour to B&W.

With fresh B6 being quite blue, it will appear lighter than it is in panchromatic images, but darker than it is in orthochromatic images. MS4 will not be so affected as it is closer to a true grey, and is not bluish - both panchromatic and orthochromatic film will 'convert' MS4 similarly and show it as near-true to its greyscale.

Most of the B&W images of PoW would be panchromatic, so depending on how old the coat of B6 is (i.e. how faded its blue value has become) and subject to the lighting conditions (and how well the image was taken, developed, reproduced, etc), it may at times appear in the image as lighter (when fresh) or darker (when the blue has faded) than the MS4.

This could explain why at times it looks like there are two paints under the aft-most arch of paint A on the port side, and at other times there appears to only be one. Those paints may be B6 and MS4.

(That hypothesis has been presented a little clumsily, but I think you will know what I mean).

Regards,
Lindsay

[SovereignHobbies]

That sounds like a reasonable test Lindsay. It should be repeatable and does not require any other assumptions to be true to prove itself true or false, so long as the photographs are known to be of the same colour scheme in the first place

[EJFoeth]

That sounds like a reasonable test Lindsay. It should be repeatable and does not require any other assumptions to be true to prove itself true or false, so long as the photographs are known to be of the same colour scheme in the first place

I'm fairly certain they are. I think most of the variations in the schemes people have included are caused by different types of films leading to misinterpretation with contrast changes. For instance, it is claimed that one colour of HMS PoW was painted out, but on some shots the two colours are simply very similar.

If you compare the pattern we made here with this photograph, you can still find the pattern outlines on the stern if you look really closely. (You would barely be able to use the photograph to find the patch outlines.)





(don't mind the actual colors in the above chart...)

[SovereignHobbies]

I agree Evert-Jan,

I think this subject is interesting but is full of red herrings and divergences to colours that were not on the Admiralty colour palette at the time and are highly unlikely to have been used. As per our PMs, I soon hope to consolidate some new thoughts on B5 and B6 and I believe that HMS Prince of Wales was probably in a fairly typical colour scheme after all.

[EJFoeth]

Indeed; it's simply a matter of tying all the Admiralty Disruptive scheme's together

[elcejay]

Hello EJ, I am afraid that I can't see the chart of colours - are you able to post it in a different format?

Hello James, I agree - I don't see any out-of-the ordinary paints being on PoW, and I don't see any changes to the scheme on the hull once applied (the funnel band is the only obvious change). The reported scheme changes are due only to photo quality and reproduction (there are a lot of poor-quality reproductions on line) and paint wear, in my opinion.

Hello all, back in 1973, Peter Hodges, in his Royal Navy Warship Camouflage 1939-1945 described the problems with relying on WW2 colour and B&W images to determine paint shade and tone far more eloquently than I have. Had I held a copy of that a few months ago, I would have avoided many of my posts here.

We can get some indication of relative tone of the paints from the levels of grey-scale in the B&W images, but it can't be used definitively to determine shades ('colour') of paints of equivalent, or near equivalent tone ('brightness') if one of those shades is a bluish grey. B5/B15 and MS3/G20 will be very difficult to tell apart even if they were adjacent to each other, and impossible to tell apart with certainty if they are separated by another paint. The same is true for B6/B30 in comparison to MS4/G30, and is quite possibly the case with 507C and MS4A.

In my roundabout way, what I am hoping to do with this post is to advise those who come here in the hope of a definitive answer on the PoW scheme (as I did), that there is likely never going to be such an answer. As I now know, the capital ship schemes of this period of the war are not covered in any fleet orders - they are one-off designs for individual ships, but no known record of those designs has been kept, and the log books (at least in the case of PoW) do not record the paints used. All we are ever likely to have is a range of likely options for the scheme, nothing more.

One thing that I do hope, though, is that an awareness of the shortfalls in the photo record (e.g. blues look lighter than they are in panchromatic images) may help to whittle down the options, as well as to prevent people from falling into the trap that I did in believing that comparisons of contrast in the photo record could give us the specific tones, and therefore the likely shades, of the paints.

Regards,
Lindsay

[EJFoeth]

Should work now. Also reuploaded this one:

[SovereignHobbies]

Excellent posts both.

I snapped a report on camouflage trials in summer/autumn 1941 in which Prince of Wales took part. The report writer mentioned that POW was in "intermediate Admiralty disruptive" scheme which broadly agrees with our thoughts here that POW was painted in a standard colour palette, and that narrows it down to 507A, 507C, MS1, MS2, MS3, MS4, B5, B6 and possibly MS4A.

I've got some colour data to share with you and the others Lindsay which I will send tonight.

[Sutho]

I am also particularly keen to see any information of Prince of Wales.

[EJFoeth]

Camo statistics show that MS2 was not applied with AP507A/B, MS4 was not applied with AP507C and also no B6 with MS3/4 but on occasion with MS2. This proves nothing, of course, and B6 on PoW may have been simply rare.

[SovereignHobbies]

Camo statistics show that MS2 was not applied with AP507A/B, MS4 was not applied with AP507C and also no B6 with MS3/4 but on occasion with MS2. This proves nothing, of course, and B6 on PoW may have been simply rare.

The samples of those shades in ADM212/124 that we examined on Saturday make your analysis intuitively sensible.

MS2 is fairly similar in appearance to Home Fleet Grey, so having both shades in one disruptive pattern would serve no purpose.
MS4 is fairly similar in shade to 507C Light Grey/ Mediterranean Grey, so having both shades in one disruptive pattern would serve no purpose.
B6 whilst a different hue is a very pale unsaturated blue-grey of a similar impression to MS3 and MS4, so again having both shades in one disruptive pattern would serve no purpose.

[Sutho]

Any updates or photos of your visit to the archives please?

I am very keen to see some news of what to expect with colours in the future.

[dick]

The report writer mentioned that POW was in "intermediate Admiralty disruptive" scheme ....

What was the file reference for this terminology please? If we are looking at the same report, the key to "(A)" was "Admiralty Schemes (Original Medium Schemes)".

[dick]

B6 whilst a different hue is a very pale unsaturated blue-grey of a similar impression to MS3 and MS4, so again having both shades in one disruptive pattern would serve no purpose.

Two comments:

1. The sample of B6 you saw may have lost some of its vigour. We have yet to agree what B6 actually looked like.
2. Part of their thinking was to try to blend bits of a disruptive pattern with bits of possible background, so colour did matter in that line of thought. Only later did they realise that colour mattered less and tone more.

[SovereignHobbies]

I need to get a whole load of stuff compiled and sent to you Richard, as well as the others. I'll try to do it tomorrow if possible. There hasn't really been an opportunity when I've been at home with everything in front of me to do it since we got back. Losing Saturday to the trip itself has been a set back in terms of keeping various plates spinning, so to speak ...

[Sutho]

Noting earlier that we are came to some conclusion that the CC paint ranges of B5 and AP507B were the same, and in addition given your findings that AP507B was a mismatch, is it at all possible that the AP507B and B5 samples that WEM originally had to produce the colour coat paints were in fact B5 only in 1941?

I agree with the decision to keep the early AP507 colours in stock as well as the later G colours as it does make perfect sense to me when I read your justification for that.

[Sutho]

Has anyone seen this - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EfOFCjIdLRQ - 59 minutes of colour video footage of the Royal Navy in WWII taken by sailors and confiscated by the censors. It has colour footage of HMS Ark Royal, HMS Eskimo in WA Blue, footage in Scapa Flow in 1941 showing HMS Queen Elizabeth. By their own admission in the commentary the video has faded over the years.

[508medway]

That is from the Roland Smith Royal Navy at War series of DVDs & Videos. These are some more.


https://www.amazon.co.uk/Royal-Navy-War ... land+smith

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Royal-Navy-War ... YEKFJX1CZ1

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Royal-Navy-At- ... YEKFJX1CZ1

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Royal-Navy-War ... YEKFJX1CZ1

[Sutho]

Excellent posts both.

I snapped a report on camouflage trials in summer/autumn 1941 in which Prince of Wales took part. The report writer mentioned that POW was in "intermediate Admiralty disruptive" scheme which broadly agrees with our thoughts here that POW was painted in a standard colour palette, and that narrows it down to 507A, 507C, MS1, MS2, MS3, MS4, B5, B6 and possibly MS4A.

I've got some colour data to share with you and the others Lindsay which I will send tonight.

Can I please have some of that colour data sent to me too please.

I am in Australia and am very interested in this subject. I have recently sent of an email to the Australian War Memorial in Canberra inquiring if they may have any RAN paint chips or descriptions in their archives as the RAN used the same paint as the RN. If I get a positive response I am a four hour drive from Canberra and will be more than happy to go there on a weekend to examine what information they may have.