Aircraft Camouflage & Markings, Nineteen Seven to Nineteen Fifty-Four

by Bruce Robertson

Book by Robertson, Bruce This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0816863555
• ISBN13: 9780816863556
• Release Date: January 1966
• Publisher: Tab Books
• Length: 232 Pages
• Weight: 1.25 lbs.

Customer Reviews

A splendid and ground-breaking work

Today, military modelers and historians are inundated with visual information about aircraft detailing. Publishers like Osprey put out their little 64 page mass production books that offer specificity within an undeliverable context and format. Such was not the case in the 1950s! At that time, most aircraft model kits were of relatively low accuracy and quality. I don't know how many remember the Aurora fighter line for example: molded in one primary color; insignia locations etched into the surface; stick-legged wheels were insertable into holes; each aircraft had underwing bomb mountings and the decal sheet had national symbols only! And I thought that was what WW2 aircraft really looked like until my parents gave me this book as a birthday gift. Despite its being somewhat superficial and dated, Aircraft Camouflage and Markings, 1907-1954 by Bruce Robertson is a definitive study of the subject as well as likely the first such book to be published. Arranged in chronological order by country, the author presents the technical side of aircraft insignia in terms of the specifications issued with an very good set of examples in the form of photgraphs, black and white drawings and some excellent color plates. The coverage is not uniform, however. The quality and quantity of the material falls off after the Second World War. The drop-off is so extreme that there is a sense that author Robertson was time-constrained, near the end of the allowable number of pages, simply could not collect and assemble the materials, or if there were external issues in play. I have always tended toward the last assumption. The book has an odd cover presentation where - despite a typical circumstance of the publishing company's name being on the spine and dust cover, there is also a statement "This is a book." I was intrigued by this as a ten year, but, as a 57 year old in the 21st Century, I had the ability to search out an answer of sorts. Apparently, there were some legal issues (bankrupty, I think) that created the unique circumstances found on the cover. Having said that, one still has to wonder at the vision of the author and publisher both at the time and now! A triumph!