Tiger II Camouflage Patterns

[Earl of Grey]

The following are color profiles I've been collecting for years. They were taken from various sources and have either been found on the internet, donated by friends or scanned by myself which explains the variying quality.

Some notes beforehand:
- The most obvious mistake a lot of artists apparently make is mistaking dusty road wheels to be painted in RAL7028 Dunkelgelb. Actual color of those road wheels depends primarily on time of manufacture.
- I'll sort the profiles after units and have one post each for all respective vehicles. That way, I can always add new profiles should I find some.
- These patterns are historically accurate to a big degree (else they wouldn't be posted here). They can thus be used for modelling or wargaming purposes without second thoughts. (For interpretation of colors see below.)
- I tried to get unit, place and time correct for every profile, but that isn't always possible. Please don't regard the captions as 100% accurate, rather as a 'very likely'.
- The colors shown in these profiles are not the historical colors of the respective vehicles but only an aproximation/impression of the respective artist. The general color placement of the three colors is usually correct (as far as it can be determined), hue/saturation etc. are not.

If you have any further questions (because I might have forgotten something), feel free to ask!

[Earl of Grey]

sPzAbt424
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt111.gif
- Poland, September 1944

[Earl of Grey]

sPzAbt501

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt312.gif
- Poland, August 1944

[Earl of Grey]

sPzAbt503
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt301.jpg
- Normandy, July 1944



http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/ktbrown.jpg
- Normandy, August 1944



http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt334.jpg
- Normandy, August 1944

[Earl of Grey]

sPzAbt506
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt3d.jpg
- Arnhem, September 1944


http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt211.jpg
- Germany 1945

[Earl of Grey]

sPzAbt507

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt-right.jpg
- Germany 1945

[Earl of Grey]

sPzAbt "Feldherrnhalle"

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt324.jpg
- Hungary, January 1945

[Earl of Grey]

sSS-PzAbt501

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt105.jpg
- Belgium, Spetember 1944



http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt334-1.gif
- Ardennes, December 1944



http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt213.jpg
- Ardennes, December 1944

[mTk]

They're hard to see. :panda:

[Bootie]

Damn camouflage. :) Great pics though.

[Aragorn2010]

PzAbt. 503 Normandy July 1944 is my favorite, but they all look superb.

[Earl of Grey]

Thanks to Spike for reworking the colors to a (probably) more accurate rendition. Sadly the turret numbers have deteriorated somewhat in the process, so if you would like the know the actual colors of those for a certain tank, ask me.

[PoorOldSpike]

The original pictures by an unknown 'artist' were bad, far too small, bright and garish, they looked like they were gaymobiles out of a mickey mouse cartoon, look-
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt111-yuk.gif




So (with Earl of Grey's permission) I enlarged them and toned down the colours like this-
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/kt111.gif


Let's have a vote- who wants me to delete my improved large pictures and replace them with the old mickey mouse small ones?

[Earl of Grey]

Oh, I actually resized them so the individual posts wouldn't be so big with a couple of those included. But yes, some of the original ones were very bright.

[PoorOldSpike]

On 1943-02-18, it was ordered that all vehicles were to be painted in a base coat Dunkelgelb nach Muster (DARK YELLOW).
Over this, a camouflage pattern of Olivgrün (OLIVE GREEN), Rotbraun RAL 8017 (RED-BROWN) and Dunkelgelb nach Muster consisting of stripes was to be applied by the maintenance sections, according to the terrain. For this purpose, the paint was delivered as a paste, which could then be thinned with most liquids, and applied. Dunkelgelb nach Muster was later re-named Dunkelgelb RAL 7028, and Olivgrün was re-named Olivgrün RAL 6003.

On 1944-08-19, it was ordered that the tanks should be painted at the factories, in order to achieve more standardized patterns. The pattern used, called Hinterhalt-Tarnung, consisted of a base of Dunkelgelb RAL 7028, with Olivgrün RAL 6003 and Rotbraun RAL 8017 stripes. On top of this pattern were added small dots of all three paints.

In mid-September 1944, the tanks were were left in the red primer as the base coat, with only limited camouflage applied by the factories. On 1944-10-31, this order was expanded to include that both Dunkelgelb RAL 7028, Olivgrün RAL 6003 and Rotbraun RAL 8017 should be applied in limited amounts over the red primer, and that Dunkelgrau RAL 7021 could be used in stead of Dunkelgelb RAL 7028 if no Dunkelgelb RAL 7028 was available. There is no evidence that Dunkelgrau RAL 7021 was ever used, though.

On 1944-12-20, it was ordered that the base coat should be Dunkelgrün RAL 6003, with a hard-edged pattern of Rotbraun RAL 8017 and Dunkelgelb RAL 7028.

http://www.panzerworld.net/colours

A good example of Dark yellow/ Olive green/ Red-brown camo on a Jagdpanther in the Munster Panzer Museum-

http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g64/PoorOldSpike/sub4/jpan-colors.gif

[Aragorn2010]

How I would love to have one of those in my backyard....

[Earl of Grey]

Don't forget those colors are only aproximations of the real colors used! There were in fact, FOUR DIFFERENT SHADES of dark yellow (RAL7028) alone and there is much discussion if there were different greens and browns in use.

[PoorOldSpike]

Yes, plus of course colours changed over time like Bootie said under a hot sun, dust, rain, frost etc..