1:48 P-51D by Tamiya 44-13410 LOU IV

[Robert Porter]

Yup did that and as you can see lots of disparity. Modern pictures of the restoration I don't think are necessarily reliable. And the colorized period photos I know are not, so that leaves the black and white shots and a lot of debate. But thats always the case so we go for close enough.

 

[fubar57]

There's an article in IPMS Stockholm where the experts were all over the place between blue and green but since then I've read an article saying definitely OD. Of course I never bookmarked it

 

[Airframes]

The 'debate' started in earnest around 35 years ago, with discussion and argument over the well-known colour photos of 'The Bottisham Four', as they became known. At the time, I was even involved, albeit on the fringes, as a certain magazine asked if we could advise on the actual colours seen in the photos, and establish if it was blue, or, as had only just been mooted, a shade of OD or other green.
This was because many reproductions, in magazines and elsewhere, were less than perfect, more so if the reproduction was a copy of a copy of a reproduced original transparency, where the upper colours did exhibit a blue cast, of various densities, depending on the printing at the time, and this varied, in the many different reproductions, between a hint of blue in what looked like a dark greenish shade, through shades of blue, to almost redish purple !
Of course, as a certain author had mentioned, many years previously, that the 361st used a distinct shade of blue, for which there was little, if any, evidence, there was certainly a case of the eye seeing what it wanted to see, and this 'colour scheme' grew from a passing remark, to being 'true', to the extent that every profile of the Group's aircraft showed this scheme, and every model was painted in the 'Railway Blue', with some kits including this scheme on the instructions, and even at least one airworthy Mustang (in the USA) finished in the same scheme !
I get down to the great Bottisham Airfield Museum when I can, and I've had long talks with the Museum's historian (who has an absolutely fantastic Bottisham and 361st FG photo collection, consisting of a lot of large, very heavy albums), and he confirms what we deduced from the 'Bottisham Four' photos all those years ago, both by info in his collection, and from first-hand accounts from the men who actually re-painted the aircraft at the time - the upper surfaces were (new) OD, darker of course than the weathered, older paint on the anti-glare panels, but where the AEAF stripes were painted out was very possibly locally acquired RAF Dark Green, but might have been even newer OD. Regardless of what was used to cover the stripes, it is darker then the rest of the OD, even if only slightly.
(Note that some units in the 8th and 9th Air Forces sometimes used British Army paints, if or when US OD was in short supply or unobtainable at short notice.)
The reason for the OD upper surfaces was that the 361st were supposed to deploy to the Continent as soon as possible after 'D-Day', and was intended as camouflage when on the ground at one of the rudimentary ALG's behind the beach head, with the same upper surface 'colour scheme' being scheduled for all of those FG's who would also deploy to Normandy, or have reason to be on a ALG during daylight - for example, if still based in the UK, but operating form a ALG during the day, and returning to the 'home' base in the evening.
As this was intended as ground camouflage, then it makes absolutely no sense to paint the aircraft blue !
From little rumours great news stories grow - I saw it in 'The Daily Mirror', so it must be true !

 

[Wurger]

 

[fubar57]

From "Aircraft of the 8th AAF 1942-1945".

​

Not saying right or wrong, just throwing it on the fire

 

[Airframes]

That's basically correct, and the photo is a B&W print of the original colour pics series of what became known as 'The Bottisham Four'.
Since the advent of digital photography 'for the masses', and the possibility of 'colourisation' without having to employ a specialized company, this series of colour images has sometimes been referred to as being 'colourised' from B&W photos, an assumption presumably based on lack of actual background information regarding the set of pics, and the variation in hues depicted, depending on the quality of the image in question.
This is not the case - the originals were taken with colour transparency film which, from memory, and without checking the details, was 'Kodachrome'. It's possible that it might have been the then relatively new Ektachrome, another Kodak transparency emulsion, although this wasn't as widely available, or quite as popular, at the time, and, after so many years since being involved in assessing the images for the 'real' colour balance, I can't remember which film it was.
I remember seeing at least one suggestion, that the perceived 'blue' tone was a result of reflection of UV light from the intensity of the sky, but this is not the case - the sometimes visible, and extremely varied 'depth' of any blue tone to the 'green' painted areas was purely as a result of the colour balance of the reproduction(s), where the image exhibited a blue cast due to either incorrect processing or final printing results.
I've actually seen a couple of versions of the photo above, where it would appear that the lab, or studio concerned, attempted to correct and print the image, in all good faith, to show blue, rather than 'green', believing, at the time, that this is how it should look, presumably based on the 'error which became fact' mentioned previously. In these instances, the nearest machine, 'E2-S', appeared to have upper surfaces in a 'muddy' shade of blue, with a hint of green in the highlights, no doubt leading to even more 'evidence' of the blue colour scheme, many years later, when any accompanying captions or text had long been separated from the 'blue' images !

 

[Wayne Little]

Good info!

 

[Crimea_River]

A new and very interesting article on this topic by Dana Bell appears over at Hyperscale.

"Out of six surviving color images of the 361st's Mustangs in flight, only three images are original Kodachromes, and only one of those shows the much-disputed Bottisham Four. That image, when lightened, shows the green on the tail of Lou IV, but also clearly shows the blue camouflage on that aircraft and two others. Today's new argument must be that the only clear original image of the four aircraft clearly shows blue paint on three of the aircraft, green on the fourth, and additional patches of green on the first blue aircraft."

 

[Airframes]

Very interesting article by Dana, much of which I agree with.
I'm still rather dubious about the blue though. Those tonal differences still have a green cast, whether in an original or duplicate transparency, or in an internegative reproduction, and differ in tone and depth to the blue seen on the wing tips, fin tip and rudder trim tab of "Tikka IV", which most certainly is blue.
It was about 1980 when was I was involved in the colour analysis of the good quality duplicate transparencies when I was with 'The Big Yellow Box', and, although I don't remember all of the details of the study and outcome after so many years, I do remember the results of discussion about the effects of colour couplers and emulsion layers on final colour cast, depending on reproduction and processing controls, and these concluded that the bias was more towards green than blue, and that green, any green, can create anomalous reflections giving a perceived blue cast, just as black, and sometimes red can also.
I still believe that these particular aircraft were painted in varying shades of green - O.D. and at least one shade of dark green, whether US, British Army or RAF - and I don't feel that the perceived blue matches the blue shade that very possibly was used at some point, as seen on the small areas of "Tikka IV", and described, from boyhood memory, by a well-known British author back in the late 1970's.
It should also be noted that in all of the colour reproductions (and the original 4x5 trannies) there is a fairly high level of UV, evident in the tones of the clouds, and this would certainly have an effect on color reflection.

 

[Crimea_River]

Sounds very similar to the discussions around the apparent blue version of RLM 83.