Floquil Railroad Colors Lacquer and Enamel Paint Survey

These are exactly what I needed! If possible can you take your color corrected shots from strait on with the paint samples rather than at an angle, which causes to much glare across the sample. You could lay out each set flat with the color checker below (we could color correct them on our side as every system is set up differently)...and then shoot strait from above (you don't really need to worry about putting the bottles in there, just list what each one is in the post or label/number them)...Thank you for doing this, most of us do not have access to these much needed colors and this is perfect for finding replacements.

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!
 
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FYI, please correct me if I am wrong, in the first image with all of the colors together (I love this image!) in the top row, second color set (the yellows) it appears the colors are reversed compared to the later image with the yellow color chips and bottles...

...also what is the green between BNSF HERITAGE GREEN and SOUTHERN GREEN? Is that PULLMAN GREEN?
 
Thanks guys.

Color corrected scans of each of these cards coming soon, so stay tuned.

You are my hero! I was just getting my (significantly smaller collection of) Floquil paints out to do something very much like this. You're providing a fantastic resource and you're doing a much more thorough job than I would have managed.

I was going to scan my chip charts as well to avoid the problems inherent in photographing anything as a reference color. Here's an older test I did using Reefer Gray and Aged Concrete:

Floquil Chart 001.jpg

From left to right are Floquil Reefer Gray Enamel, Polly Scale Reefer Gray, and Model Master Reefer Gray. Then comes Floquil Aged Concrete Enamel, Polly Scale Aged Concrete, and Model Master Aged Concrete.

Scanning the image gives you a nice flat, even tone with zero reflections. The ambient light is always the same, and with the color chart and reference for setting the black point, white point, and mid-tone, I figured everyone should be able to get a satisfactory representation of the colors on their system.

It sounds like you're doing something similar?

Thanks again!

Dave
 
Let me know if that works for you guys. Again, I'm open to suggestions!

That sounds fantastic! As I suspected, you're doing a much better job than I would have.

I think the details you're going to add, and your methodology sound great. I have a couple of questions:

I'm guessing you'll include answers to these questions in the section on background and methodology, but here goes:

Did you brush or spray the colors?
If airbrushed what was your mix?
Did you use primer?
What is the material/surface you painted the colors on?

I'm also curious to know how old some of the paints are. I know that some of the colors changed a lot over the years. I found this comparison online while researching this.

Floquil 70s_90s.jpg

It shows the two colors from the 70s, 80s, and 90s: top to bottom. This explains why my Reefer Gray (the oldest bottle I have is from 1994) is so much darker than I expected it to be. But I noticed in your first post in this thread that your Reefer Gray looked much lighter than mine. Do you have some paint that is as old as ILM itself?

I think the way you're setting this up will allow everyone to get an accurate representation of the colors on a calibrated monitor, but does anyone have a good idea how to match the colors with new paint? Say I want to duplicate Reefer Yellow in Vallejo acrylics. Is the process going to require mixing by eye from the monitor, painting a test chip, scanning it, adjusting it using your settings (we all have different scanners etc. so I don't know how this would work) and then checking them side by side on the monitor? Or do we print out your chip charts on a calibrated printer and match to that?

Just trying to wrap my head around this. I'm sure there's a simple explanation, no matter how complex it is. :D

Thanks again and sorry for all the questions. I'm happy to help any way I can.

Thanks again!

Dave
 
Wow...I mean, WOW!

You have become my official hero, this is going to be the best resource ever on the Floquil paints...You are going above and beyond all expectation, the ability to download the hi-res versions is awesome and the additional info you want to add is just...cool!
 
So, the above 'reds' chip tiff scan is already color corrected then?

What I did was download that scan and brought it into Photoshop. I then used the color picker in PS to sample Caboose Red. After I sampled it I then chose the 'color libraries' pulldown and selected Pantone and it gave me a Pantone equivalent. I am assuming then, once I have the Pantone color number I would then be able to order a sample chip from Pantone and then use that to match my paint to it? Is that how it would work?

The Pantone color I got for Caboose Red was Solid 201C. Although the Pantone color was about 1 or 2 shades lighter.

That's strange Zenwalker, I did the same steps as you did above (download TIFF, opened in Photoshop, color sampled Caboose Red, chose Pantone Solid Coated in color library) and I got a different result?? Instead of Solid 201C I get Solid 1797C...I kept trying different areas and sample sizes and could not get your result...until...I took a screen shot of the web page and opened that in Photoshop, then I got the Solid 201C off the Caboose Red...Why is that?
 
That's strange Zenwalker, I did the same steps as you did above (download TIFF, opened in Photoshop, color sampled Caboose Red, chose Pantone Solid Coated in color library) and I got a different result?? Instead of Solid 201C I get Solid 1797C...I kept trying different areas and sample sizes and could not get your result...until...I took a screen shot of the web page and opened that in Photoshop, then I got the Solid 201C off the Caboose Red...Why is that?

Hmmm. Not sure. Are you on a Mac or PC? Check the file info. on the downloaded file and make sure it is in TIFF format maybe.

I got the same result every time.

OK, I see, you should have got 1807 EC, but that is a different Pantone color set called 'color bridge cmyk ec' than what I used. Not sure why your PS calls it 'Pantone solid coated'? I used the 'Pantone solid coated' color set.
 
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Hmmm. Not sure. Are you on a Mac or PC? Check the file info. on the downloaded file and make sure it is in TIFF format maybe.

I got the same result every time.

OK, I see, you should have got 1807 EC, but that is a different Pantone color set called 'color bridge cmyk ec' than what I used. Not sure why your PS calls it 'Pantone solid coated'? I used the 'Pantone solid coated' color set.

ok, now I'm getting confused...first off I am on a PC, Photoshop CC (64Bit)...and yes the file is the TIF (although I get the same results with the JPG)...I dont know what the 'color bridge cmyk ec' set is, don't see it in my color library list at all? Confusing...it is.



UPDATE: I re-downloaded the files and now they seem to match up with yours...maybe they were updated after I originally downloaded them??? but anyway it is better now...(just the universe playing tricks on me I guess)

Thanks for taking the time to help Zenwalker!
 
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For what it's worth I got Pantone 201 C without doing any color correction as well, but I had to up the sample size of the eye-dropper tool to 31x31 pixels before it was consistent.

And the result is a Pantone color that's too different from the original to suit our purposes, IMHO.

I'm still thinking of the best workflow to make it easy to match the original colors. Any thoughts anyone?
 
For what it's worth I got Pantone 201 C without doing any color correction as well, but I had to up the sample size of the eye-dropper tool to 31x31 pixels before it was consistent.

And the result is a Pantone color that's too different from the original to suit our purposes, IMHO.

I'm still thinking of the best workflow to make it easy to match the original colors. Any thoughts anyone?

I think the Pantone system is the only way to get close to the original Floquil colors. There were some other Pantone color sets in PS that were closer to the original Floquil Caboose Red than the 'solid coated ' one. I am not sure how those ones work or what they are for. I will do some more checking.
 
I'm not sure if the red paint chips have been corrected but the chart doesn't seem to have been - here's a corrected one (srgb):

ColorChecker_sRGB_from_Avg.jpg
 
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