What is the sense to camouflage the sides and not the top? The purpose of camouflage is to hide. If you only camouflaged the sides and not the sides you would stick out like a sour thumb. The reason there are no pictures of tops, the person taking only took side pictures. And mostly only one side. They weren’t worried about latter use buy modelers.

By 45 the Germans started using Red Oxide as a base color.

According to Thomas Jentz, red primer as a base coat only appeared from September, 1944 until it was superseded by a new camouflage directive in December, 1944, calling for all parts to be base coated in Olivgrun prior to delivery to the assembly plants, where the disruptive camouflage was applied (some modern enthusiasts insist that the red primer was always overcoated with the three camouflage colors during this period, and that the directive simply meant that it was not necessary to cover the entire vehicle with a single Dunkelgelb color coat first). And, based on photographic evidence, at least one Panther armor plant produced parts coated with gray zinc phosphate primer rather than red oxide. As for camouflage on the upper decks, it would seem logical to paint disruptive patterns there as well, given the threat of Allied air attack.
The Axis discussion group on Missing-Lynx has numerous threads on this topic, if you search.

Automatic grit blasting and zinc dust paint spraying equipment are widely used in steel workshops and shipyards to protect steel plates during storage before fabrication and until application of the final coating system.

I've been trying to post a link to the photos but so far have been unsuccessful.
does it work now?


http://www.panther1944.de/community/viewtopic.php?f=45&t=1514&start=10

Van,

Excellent job on your panther.

How did you mask the paint job?

Can you please post some more photos?

Thanks.

Matt