Color and Scale

Never built anything smaller than 1/35, but you would lighten as you got bigger and darken as you got smaller.

Personnal opinion time ... when it comes to armour, scale colour means nothing, zero, zilch, nada.

By the time weathering is done it's going to be a completely different colour anyways.

German armor is suposed to be dark yellow with dark green and red-brown. The colors work pretty good and look pretty relistic on a 1/35 except the dark green. I used to use Tamiya dark green acyrlic for the dark green camo in the paint scheme on my tigers. But I realized that Tamiya's JA green and Nato green is a little lighter and looks more real and less like a model. Even my signature picture has a lighter green than the real thing. But that would be reversing your theory meaning that smaller gets lighter, not darker. I don't know. Maybe because of the fading of the paint or something, but this is all the experience that I have in color and scale. I do think colors should be manipulated in accordance of scale though, I just don't understand all the science of wavelengths and light and all that. I just do what looks good for the scale.

I thought 'scale effect' meant the smaller the subject the lighter the color. But what do I know. I've been lightening up my Tamiya acrylics for my German WWII armor as much as to show fading from weathering as much as anything.

Glenn

i think it is smaller = lighter, Eric.
the 'scale effect" articles i have read always indicate that.
i believe the theory is that the smaller scale is like being farther from the subject,
which in turn mutes and 'fades' the colors.
this is the link to the pdf (you need Adobe Acrobat to read) dealing w/ scale effect
from Testors website:
http://www.testors.com/tes_cds/hobby_guides/08%20Special%20Effects.pdf

for those w/ out Adobe (get it, it's free you know!) or don't want to read it,
here is a summary:
scale______________percentage of white to add
1/32 & 1/35________________7-10%
1/48_____________________10-25%
1/72 & 1/76_______________15-30%
1/87_____________________20-35%
1/144____________________23-38%
the article points out that these ranges are a consensus,
and that 'color' is a very subjective thing, varying from viewer to viewer.

i really recommend this resource.
here is the link to the testors page w/ all the modeler's guides:
http://www.testors.com/hobbyist_guides.asp

i admit that Robert has a point, in that after all the washes & weathering,
it is debatable how beneficial this 'scale effect' is.
i like to lighten mine just so the dark washes that follow don't make my models
'too dark'. considering the endless argument over what most of these colors
'really' looked like, you are probably safe either way.

ed.

ed.

53ryder, that's what I allways read as well. I think wild william hit the nail on the head as to why this happens. However, I personally agree with shermanfreak. When all the layers of washing, highlighting, dusting, and further weathering are applied, it grealy alters the original colour anyways, so much so that the less than 10% lighting difference between different scales really makes no difference to the end product at all. At least from my experience anyways.

Thanks guys. Your informations are very helpful. I do agree that with proper weathering the color/scale thing is not such a big deal. But I am still struggling in my weathering skills. Hopefully when I improve my skills in wathering, I won't have to worry that much about scale.