US Navy camouflage measures of WW2, from pre war 1930's to post war 1946

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@bullettube9863 Ай бұрын

Camouflage was meant to fool fire control directors making it hard to focus and thus get a true bearing. It worked best for submarines as they had only a periscope rather then the binocular directors used on surface ships. Painting the decks a darker color made it harder for dive bombers to achieve hits, and painting the lower hull a dark color made it harder for torpedo bombers to judge the distance to the ship they were attacking. Haze grey allows a ship to blend in with the haze over water from a distance. Other "decorative" trims were used to avoid friendly fire and on carriers it made it easy for pilots to find their home when multiple carriers were present.

@navybowie Ай бұрын

@bullettube9863 yes indeed, very well put, thank you for your insight

@bullettube9863 Ай бұрын

@@navybowie Now you can do a video on aircraft camouflage and why America stopped painting their bombers in 1944!

@navybowie Ай бұрын

@bullettube9863 your right I sure can in fact I'm planning on making one in the near future covering both army and navy planes

@ronandanne1 2 ай бұрын

The paint manufacturers must have loved the Navy in ww2 😅

@JeffreyWilliams-dr7qe 2 ай бұрын

Otherwise all else bare metal?

@stephenn1056 Ай бұрын

Exceptionally well made video my friend. And beautifully made models as well.

@navybowie Ай бұрын

@stephenn1056 thank you so much, so glad you enjoyed the video and my models, really appreciate the compliment

@FastFatman 2 ай бұрын

Exceptionally well researched and presented. A must have guide for hobby modelers of these WW2 ships. Thank you sir!

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@FastFatman thank you so very much, so glad you enjoyed it

@tonyInPA 2 ай бұрын

Great video, you actually hit the nail in the head towards the end with the depiction of the Iowa class battleships listed, including Iowa and Missouri. I’m not familiar with the documentation they have, but New Jersey does have some documentation of measure 21 being used first, and then measure 22 in 1945.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@tonyInPA thank you so much, my previous video didn't include any battleships, I actually had to build them just for the video cause I knew they were desperately needed

@Plaprad 2 ай бұрын

Excellent work. It's amazing how much paint alone it takes to run a fleet. And the Alabama looks great in #12.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@Plaprad thank you do much, yes it's definitely amazing I agree the alabama does indeed look great in ms 12 mod.

@theTopCat-1 2 ай бұрын

Rather than constantly discussing armor thickness perhaps we should be discussing paint thickness. Especially on the older ships! LOL. Great video, thank you.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@timothycarroll5846 very good point lol Thank you so very much, glad you enjoyed it

@ut000bs 2 ай бұрын

You did an awesome job. Measure 21 was always my favorite wartime camouflage but I was always sort of gothic, I suppose. My father had a really good color picture of his destroyer in a floating drydock right after it had been repainted in 21. I have no idea what happened to that photograph. It would have been a great picture to share online today. Thank you for taking the time for this in-depth and well presented video. Again, it is an awesome job. I have been a hobbyist World War II historian and all-around information gatherer for over 50 years and work such as this is needed and hugely appreciated.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@ut000bs wow thank you so very much,so glad you liked it and thank you so much for the kind words

@ut000bs 2 ай бұрын

@@navybowie I'll make a few pointers to this video to a few people. I hope it gets you a some views and perhaps a couple more subscribers. Thanks again.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@ut000bs thank you, I would certainly appreciate that so much

@akosgergely6447 2 ай бұрын

Amazing job with the models, well done! Also nicely compiled.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@akosgergely6447 thank you so much, I definitely appreciate the compliments

@rafaelj.benero4880 2 ай бұрын

Thank you for all your work preparing this video!...

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@rafaelj.benero4880 your very welcome, thank you for watching it

@iamrichrocker Ай бұрын

hey Bowie..nice content, esp about painting the stripes on the carriers...e.g..the Y on Yorktown..never knew that and surely made sense..that earned a sub..GL with the channel and keep up the great content..

@navybowie Ай бұрын

@iamrichrocker thank you so much, so glad you were able to learn something new from my channel and so glad you appreciate the content, really means alot

@johnberke8206 Ай бұрын

very well done. Thank you for you effort!

@navybowie Ай бұрын

@johnberke8206 thank you so much, so glad you liked it

@davidlavigne207 2 ай бұрын

Remarkable. It explains the many variations to camouflage measures in the many photos I see of WW2 ships. Bewildering array. I wonder did it fool the enemy at any time?

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@davidlavigne207 thank you so much, that's exactly what I was trying to achieve. Not sure about that but if I had to guess ms 22 was probably the most effective because it made a ship blend in with the horizon making it appear further away than it really was if I remember correctly

@davidlavigne207 2 ай бұрын

@@navybowie Thanks for the kind reply. I noticed in my research into the Patrol Craft of WW2, that in 1942 and 1943 that they tended to use the Navy Blue and Light Gray alternating patterns. Later in 1944 they used the Dark Grey below and lighter Grey above. I can't remember which Measure they were, but it answered my question. What other type of history videos do you present?

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

Your very welcome, that's great to hear I've covered navigation lights, Enterprise cv 6 bridge tour,the first nine fleet carriers and carrier flight deck lights to name a few

@tsuaririndoku 2 ай бұрын

NGL you’re my hero. I was doing a color scheme in Naval Art to make a right colors for each ships. You’re nailed all of them :D

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@tsuaririndoku thank you so much, so glad I could help

@minerran 2 ай бұрын

These paint schemes were actually misnamed. Never were they intended to camouflage (i.e. hide from view) a ship. Instead, in the days before radar, ships gunners used optical rangefinders to determine range, course and speed of a target. These patterns were intended to make the job of an enemy gunner a little more difficult. Seconds matter in a naval gunfight. He who gets the range first, usually wins. Sometimes, a false bow-wave was even painted on to make the ship look like it was moving faster than it was since runners used that observation as well to judge speed. By the end of 1942, this definitely no longer mattered as shown when USS Washington sank the battlecruiser/battleship Kirishima at night using radar. Optical rangefinders were obsolete and it mattered not how a ship was painted.

@acfangaming 2 ай бұрын

good photos, good explanation, quality content all around

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@acfangaming thank you so very much, so glad to know

@luckyguy600 Ай бұрын

excellent as it isn't all that straight fwd., depending on the month and year. much thanks!

@navybowie Ай бұрын

@luckyguy600 thank you

@kentbarnes1955 2 ай бұрын

Excellent video. As a naval model builder I always appreciate such information. (Now if someone could produce a video on how to easily "mask" to paint some of the more...elaborate camo schemes...Mighty Mo had a cool one...but I've never been able to paint it).

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@kentbarnes1955 thank you so much, glad you liked it I hear you, dazzle paint schemes are complicated on 3d model also

@LegoStudios-xx9kb 2 ай бұрын

absolutely well done! this video will definitely help me with designing future lego ship models!

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@@LegoStudios-xx9kb thank you so much, so glad I could help you out and best of luck

@rdjhardy 2 ай бұрын

Great video. Thank you.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@rdjhardy thank you so much, so glad you liked it

@legiran9564 2 ай бұрын

That deep blue deck camo must have been real fun to work on in the Pacific tropical sun.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@legiran9564 oh ya, for sure, super hot in the sun and probably fades super quick also

@joethorp6830 2 ай бұрын

Well done. Thanks for your effort.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@@joethorp6830 thank you so much

@JeffreyWilliams-dr7qe 2 ай бұрын

Finally a video not entirely rehashed?

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@JeffreyWilliams-dr7qe yes indeed, thank you

@Allies_USA 2 ай бұрын

nice video mate

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@@Allies_USA thank you so much

@harryjohnson9215 2 ай бұрын

Can you do a british version?

@BillHalliwell 2 ай бұрын

G’day, A most impressive video. I particularly like the effort you put into your illustrations of the many ships which were brilliant. My issue is with the thinking of the USN during this period. The Navy went to great lengths to experiment, trying to find the optimal camo scheme for their capital ships. Your video highlights the near desperate search for the most effective camouflage carried out by all combatant sides in the air, on the ground and at sea. Even before WW2 began, the RAF, for instance, were experimenting with light blue, even all pink Hurricanes and then Spitfires. I understand that, at sea, there are many varied optics due to sea state and weather conditions. Apart from the complex ‘dazzle’ schemes borrowed from the RN, an aircraft carrier, no matter how it’s painted pretty much looks like what it is. Some schemes might have been worthwhile when viewed, briefly, from a submarine’s periscope but, from the air, or viewed from another warship, for any prolonged time; it’s difficult to make a large warship look like it’s something else. Although, I liked the idea of a bow wave painted 20 or 30 feet back from the actual bow. I’m a military historian specialising in aviation and it’s easy to work out that in the decades since WW2 it’s been pretty much established that various shades of grey make for the best camo for modern aircraft; similarly, the USN and most other navies are clad in, basically, all ‘Haze Grey’ or shades close to it. In my spare time I’m a scale modeller and I still concentrate on WW2 aircraft as modern warplanes are visually ‘boring’ even though their liveries of grey are the most effective camo. During WW2 and onwards, perhaps the best aircraft camo were ‘night fighters’ painted all matt black. There was, initially, an unforeseen danger of all black aircraft flying in tight formations. They could easily collide with each other or inadvertently drop their bomb loads on each other. (A risk, by the way, with any bombers operating at night, no matter what their livery; as the RAF discovered over Europe.) Smaller squadrons of, for instance, black Catalinas and P-61s night flying around the Southern Asian theatres were particularly successful in ‘tailing’ Japanese convoys; picking ships off and flying away without being spotted. At first, the Japanese thought these losses were due to sea mines. Black aircraft also made swift raids on grounded bombers, and some fighters, in the middle of the night. This was a great tactic for aircraft if they stuck to the ‘night shift’. Not so much if one painted warships all black; especially on bright, sunny days. My studies, some years back showed me, as you would understand, that wartime camouflage was a huge, complex, experimental aspect of war that had to be applied to the entire range of new weapons, vehicles, buildings etc., as they were developed. It’s hard to believe now, given computer designed battlefield uniform camouflage; that at the very beginning of WW2 a large number of French troops went into action still wearing their old blue trousers with the big red stripe down each leg. Thank you for opening up this fascinating topic. Cheers, Bill H.

@jdunlap2 2 ай бұрын

Re: desperate search. Actually there was no desperation. First of all, the US Navy simply had the wherewithal and logistical ability to enact the various measures that were tried during WWII.The only time they fell short was toward the end of the war when the shortage of blue pigment forced a change in the colors used in several measures. Second, the various measures were a response to the perceived threats at different times and locations. Early in the war, most measures emphasized blending overall colors to the light and atmospheric conditions in local theaters to make detection by surface vessels more difficult at longer ranges. Later, the so called “dazzle” measures were thought to make ranging and speed estimation more difficult for surface vessels, especially in the Pacific. These began to be used in late 1943, but by the end of 1944, most were being painted over as the IJN virtually ceased to exist by early 45, and the fact that these measures were difficult to maintain.

@Nebris 2 ай бұрын

Excellent.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@@Nebris thank you so much

@mikhailiagacesa3406 2 ай бұрын

Rationing of blue paint by the civilians! 😉😉

@DamonCulpeppeer 2 ай бұрын

Nice!

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@DamonCulpeppeer thank you, glad you liked it

@doodledangernoodle2517 2 ай бұрын

Hi! This is a really nice video! What program did you use to make and display the models? Did you model the entire hull, or just the waterline?

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@doodledangernoodle2517 thank you very much, I use a program called sketchup and all my ships have full hulls, I don't believe in waterline models lol

@doodledangernoodle2517 2 ай бұрын

@@navybowie Heck yeah. Waterline modeling is for cowards.

@navybowie 2 ай бұрын

@@doodledangernoodle2517 heck ya absolutely true