WWII Finnish Colours

 

Vallejo Modelcolor recommendations from IPMS Finland

I've just printed a Finnish BT-42 SPG, for no particular reason except that I'm fond of tanks that look kind of dorky, and the BT-42 is one of the dorkiest of them all.

Fresh off the printer

I know very little about the Finns in WWII, especially in the Continuation War, but I do know that they adopted a three-colour camouflage scheme for their AFVs. It was a pretty standard group of colours — a sandy yellowish, a green, and a brown — but they were subtly different than the colours used by the Germans or Soviets.

IPMS Finland recommend these Vallejo colour mixes, and I'm willing to trust that they know what they're talking about.

They will certainly need to be lightened a tad for use on 1:100 scale vehicles, and I'll have to do that by eye. I'll use the mixes as shown as the base colours, and then highlight with tints of each, which should lighten the scheme overall. 

Several days later...

I've finally got on to doing the base coat on this model.

I was originally going to use blu-tak masks and airbrush it, but in the end it was less trouble just to brush-paint it. The finish is less even, but once the weathering goes on, and at tabletop distances, I doubt very much that it will be noticeable.

The markings are going to be a little bit problematic. I have no decals for the Finnish hakaristi (swastika), and no way of getting any very soon, so it's going to have to be paint. Getting nice clean, sharp lines and corners in this size will be a bit of a challenge.