Couple questions about the recognition stripes seen on Soviet tanks during the fighting in Berlin:

1) What guidelines were issued to the tank crews and how strictly were they enforced? I've seen pictures of tanks with stripes just around the turret sides, stripes on the sides and top, and a single long stripe running the entire length of the vehicle. Were these differences merely due to lax guidelines and unit differences?
2) Is there any evidence that tanks carried Soviet flags in addition to (or instead of) the recognition stripes? I haven't seen any pictures of this, but I'm wondering whether this is because flags weren't readily available and/or there was a risk the flags would be confused with the German flag.

Thanks for any help.

My guess is just that the regulations were so lax...Soviet factories couldn't even synchronize their paint colors, resulting in many different colors of tanks, and even some tanks that were rushed out of the factory without a paint job at all! I don't think you'll get any flak (no pun intended) for the recognition stripes, however you decide to implement them. And as for the flags, I also don't know about that. Perhaps a few tankers brought along flags to wave proudly as they took the city, but my better guess is that they simply had no use for the flags. Every weapon in Berlin was trained on them...why bother attracting even more attention to themselves?

from what i have seen from pics of them they have the ring around the turret in white with a cross on top.with a strip corresponding to the one on the turret (with the turret pointed forward.)continued over the top of the engine deck.
others have the cross running from the top of the turret over the side of the turret and on to the hull.along with the strip running down and over the engine deck.
from what i gather it was an after thought and might have been field applied.rumor had it it was so IL2 sturmoviks would not strafe them. there was a bit of an issue with that i gather
i only saw one pic of a tank that had the cross on top, strip down the back and a second strip run across the hull over the forward external fuel tanks.
there was one particular regiment or battalion im not sure which. their ID mark was a white arrow strip along the side of the turret. they add the the white cross to the top of the turret. and stripe down the back.
i used israeli gray as dirty white, it turns out pretty good because of the green in teh paint make it look like the russian green is bleeding through.hope this helped.

heres a reference website for paint schemes n stuff, here the page with white cross on they 1944 model
http://www.o5m6.de/T-34_85_1944_Flattened.html
hope this helps

The Soviet use of white markings especially near the end of WWII is a study in confusion...literally. The Germans were VERY harassed by the Soviet Air Force and the Soviet armor was usually adorned with SOME for of ID so their own aircraft would not attack them. The Germans were quick to try and copy these ID markings and the Soviets were quick to change them. So you could get some VERY confusing markings. I believe that the build up to the Invasion of Berlin allowed for markings to be cleaned/consolidated, so they may look much better than other period photo's/markings.

Your best bet is to model a vehicle in a picture.

So far as I have ever seen, flag were only used in staged shots for propaganda.