German Dapple Camouflage

One of the things that make the Great War interesting, especially for modellers, is the great variety of painted camouflage used during that conflict. It was the first conflict when camouflage painting was used on a broad scale, and in most countries a an amazing range of experimentations were carried out. Often very fanciful colours and schemes, sometimes bordering on the bizarre, were used. This has been long known and well explored by Aircraft Historian, who during decades of animated  debates, plus trial and error, have slowly established a sort of canon when it comes to what colours were used on aircarft, and in what way and in which period etc. Sadly, much of this work remains to be done when it comes to World War One Military equipment. This is a small contribution to this work.

One rather spectacular scheme used by the German Army is the one that I, for want of a better word, want to call the "German Dapple Camouflage". It was obviously mostly used on Artillery pieces - I for one have seen no other usage, but I may stand corrected. Opposite from here, you can see a number of examples of guns painted in this camo. (I could easily have gathered more, which only goes to prove that this was at least an semi-official scheme, rather than a local variation.)

What can one deduce from these photos?

A. That the Dapple Camo probably was a 1915+ scheme, or at least introduced at that time. This ties in with what we know of German 1914 camo, which was pretty simple: Field Grey overall, and which was supplemented (not over-painted) with other colours from 1915 on. (See this article on German Camo Colours.)

B. The fact that is pretty easy to find photos of guns in Dapple Camo goes to prove that this was at least an semi-official scheme, rather than a local variation.

C. The scheme consists of one medium bright ground colour (with almost 100% probabilty Field Grey) overpainted with spots of two colours: one darker than the ground colour, one considerably brighter than the ground colour. First, the bright colour: it has been stated that White was used, and it ties in with what Muther says in his book from 1925. At the same time: one CAN NOT deduce exact colours from black-and-white photos. (If we have learnt something from decades of debates between the Aero Historians, it is that.) It could also be a Yellow or Sand hue. Secondly, the dark colour: as I see it there are two possibilities: Dark Green or Dark Brown, both colours were used on guns. Black is of course a possibility, but not a strong one, as I know of no example of Black being used as anything else other than demarcation line colour.

See the colours on this 7.7cm FK 96 n.A below (that can be seen in the Military Museum in Périgeaux in France) and that we know are AUTHENTIC WW1 colours. We have black, sand and dark green blotches over what must be seen as a brownish Feldgrau. These are the colours then: Sand, Dark Green and Black over bronish Feld-Grau.

D. Note that the spots were not applied haphazardly, but often in pretty neat ROWS. This is probably in accordance to some Camouflage Theory of the same variety that prompted the German and Austro-Hungarian Airforces to adopt the famous multi-coloured Lozenge type camo. Checking the pics of the dapple camouflaged 7.7cm gun on the right, and above, it is possible to see that the spots have been applied pretty crudely, perhaps even with a rag. No neat air brushing here!