All,

I am interested in what people might suggest for accurate colors for the following: German WWII Panzer IV Ausf. E Interior, and German WWII Red Oxide Primer colors. I know there are several premixed colors available, but I'd rather just do some mixing of my Tamiya colors.

For red oxide I have Tamiya Hull Red and Tamiya Red Brown, and for the interior, White, and Buff, as starter colors. Anyone have any thoughts about what to mix into these colors to create a reasonable (not necessarily perfect) red oxide and interior color, respectively? I have many other Tamiya colors that I could use to add to mixes to create decent colors. All I need is something close, since the colors will only be seen through open hatches, and won't be easily seen.

I could always fake it, and come up with something I think might be okay, but I'd rather get a little closer to reality than just some wild guess. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.

Curt

When I did my Panzer IV I used Vallejo Red Brown Primer and Tamiya White, with a very light over spray of Tamiya Buff.



I am not totally sure of the light, as the actual color is more a cream, but to me it looks accurate.

Kevin

Cool, Kevin, thanks. I'm thinking that what I might do, lacking any further guidance, is to mix 50:50 Buff and White, and for the oxide, use Red Brown with a little pure Red mixed in, to get colors similar to what you've shown in your picture. I don't know how accurate that may be, but as I'd written before, not much of it will be seen (save for the inside of the hatches that will be open).

I presume that the turret hatch interiors were that ivory color as well? I've seen lot of models that show the hatch insides as white/ivory, thus I can only presume that this reflects reality, but can anyone say for sure that this is true? Further, to pick out details on the hatch interiors, should I use a contrasting color, such as black or grey. or would I be best off in just doing a silver dry brush sort of thing?

FWIW, Curt, I think that once you adjust the colors for scale effect and add some weathering, trying for a precise match is largely wasted effort.

I'm in the close enough is good enough school where color matching is concerned since the end results have to take in to consideration what you're going to put on top of the basic colors. So much depends on your individual painting style and techniques, especially with the interior ivory which can easily be made too dark (IMO) after weathering.

The Hull Red over the Red Brown using a pre-shading technique is probably good. I might use a combination of raw umber and Payne's gray washes over that for post-shading and to start the weathering.

For the interior, the original Elfbein (ivory) should be easily mixed from the Buff and White. You could even try a pre-shading method here with a very slightly darkened white (add just a touch of the Buff) over the Buff.

From what I've seen, the prototype interior ivory is much
closer to white than buff but it clearly not pure white. Having said that, though, I've even used almost straight white (with just a touch of the buff) with a burnt umber wash to post-shade which creates an overall ivory shade.

Since you're painting for the colors to be seen through open hatches, you might consider some starkly (or at least strongly) shading with lighter/brighter highlights for the work to be seen. This would then vary the actual shades of the colors used even more from the direct prototype match. Of course, this also depends on just how larget the hatch openings are.

For areas that are just barely visible through an open hatch, I generally start with pure flat black and paint the entire interior to avoid any possibility of exposed plastic ever showing. (I also do this inside engine compartment areas that have open louvers or grills or grates for the same reason.) The the actual interior colors are "blended" from this total shadow to their final shades just inside the hatch area, sort of an "ultimate" pre-shading.

Just my .02...

Although you can find exceptions to every rule, the interior color of the hatches should be the same as the "original" factory exterior color of the tank (dark gray or dark yellow). A very lot of model builders get this wrong, but if you check your prototype references, you'll see that with very few exceptions (presumably all crew or workshop changes), the hatches are the exterior colors. (Even occasionally camouflaged, but very, very rarely ivory.)

Shade these the same as you would the exterior base colors, to include the effects of "mechanical" weathering (wear and tear).

BTW: This "rule" also applies to most other nationalities, like US, Soviet, and Commonwealth armor. It's not universal (the Hungarian Toldi hatches appear in the interior color, for example), but is the norm. The idea is that the open hatch should not compromise the overall camouflage effect. (I'd also guess that if the hatch is closed, from the inside, the contrasting colors would make finding the way out in an emergency bailout easier.)

HTH,

I use Krylon ruddy brown and Colorplace white as a base for my Pz.IV.

Thanks, guys. Mike, I understand completely what you're talking about. Your thoughts make me feel like 'close enough' is, indeed, close enough. I'll take your ideas into consideration. I'm close enough to have to start painting the interiors, so I'll make a decision soon, maybe even today.

Tamiya Hull Brown will work over a dark base coat. And my local choo choo store has red oxide primer for rail cars that does nicely, too.