Hataka Blue: First Impressions
I just got a package containing Hataka Blue “Early Luftwaffe” paint set. The paint seems to be very nice. It has an ammonia smell and it’s not too thick or too thin.
So far, so good.
The packaging is horrible. Plastic squeeze bottles. I’ve removed all the “spouts” and intend to pour the paint into glass jars from Amazon of this type:
24 Pack 1oz Clear Round Glass Jars – Empty Cosmetic Containers with Inner Liners, black Lids and Glass Sample Jars with labels For Slime, Beauty Products, Cosmetic, Lotion，Powders and Ointments
Yeah. Made in China. For slime.
I’m hip. I’m hip. A man needs a place to put his slime.
Once I get the paint into usable jars I’ll be able to see what I have, but from what I can tell now, the RLM 02 is the “beige” type. That’s good. The RLM 70 is nice and black. That’s good too.
But the RLM 65 is the “green” type. It matches the Model Master Acryl color perfectly. I don’t know if it’s “correct.” I do know that I don’t like it. I prefer a nice, clean pale blue with no yellow in it. So, there’s that.
But the biggest headache is the RLM 71. To begin with, I pity the fool who tries to use this paint by shaking it. I’m laughing a little bit deep inside at this. This paint appeared to be a VERY bright blue green (at first) but after a LOT of stirring it began to look more, um, reasonable. Now, it looks like RLM 73. It’s very blue.
I hate to make snap judgements (what a liar!) but in this case I’d have to say that I’m not going to use either of these colors as presented here. The final product will just look wrong to me. The light blue should be baby powder blue. Light and bright. The color RLM 71 Dark Green should REALLY be browner (or redder, if you prefer) because THAT’S HOW IT LOOKS IN COLOR PHOTOS TO ME.
I match color photos. Right or wrong, that’s my hill.
This is a “first impressions” post but I’m going to do several about this paint and I’ll use it to paint some models. I may decide to make a “one off” that uses these shades “as is” just for fun.
We’ll see…
Hmm is that Luftwaffe pilot petting his 109?
“Pay no attention to the bad man, Emmy!”
Some very good photos in this thread for RLM 65
https://ww2aircraft.net/forum/threads/rlm-65-why-the-large-differences.54598/
Note on some of the photos we see the light blue in some areas, and grey on other aircraft parts. Interesting.
Wow. I have never heard of this until now– you would think it would have been mentioned once or twice in “modeling” publications or something. It’s exactly the kind of thing they tend to talk about (in the way that a talking bird talks about the Red Sox or noodles).
Been having a look at the RLM 65’s on the market and I don’t see any matching photo’s of that colour (I don’t do many Luftwaffe aircraft). In fact, the nearest paint match I could find was Humbrol 44 pastel blue. Their supposed RLM 65, Humbrol 65, looks more like something that could be used for RLM 78.