Some of you may remember a cartoon which appeared during World War I, a drawing showing an inquisitive stranger talking with the gateman at a railway crossing. The gate was painted with the usual black and white stripes, and lying on the river beyond the tracks was a steamer painted with similar markings. The stranger asked, “Why do they paint the stripes on the gate?” And the gateman answered, “Oh, that’s to make them more visible.”
And then the stranger asked, “Well, why do they paint the stripes on the vessel out there?” And the gateman replied, “Oh, that’s to make the ship less visible.”
-Everett Warner [paraphrased from his lecture notes]
A ships in costume, gCaptain brings you Razzle Dazzle; history’s most unusually painted ship. What is Razzle Dazzle? GoTouring.com tells us;
During World War I, the British and Americans faced a serious threat from German U-boats. All attempts to camouflage ships at sea had failed, as the appearance of the sea and sky are always changing. 
Any color scheme that was concealing in one situation was conspicuous in others. A British artist and naval officer, Norman Wilkinson, promoted a new camouflage scheme that was derived from the artistic fashions of the time, particularly cubism. Instead of trying to conceal the ship, it simply broke up its lines and made it more difficult for the U-boat captain to determine the ship’s course. The British called this camouflage scheme “Dazzle Painting.” The Americans called it “Razzle Dazzle.”
Artists were enlisted to draw up the camouflage designs. Early in the war, designs were drawn for individual ships, with each ship having its own distinctive pattern. As the war progressed, standard patterns were devised and applied to large numbers of ships. Even the great passenger liners were camouflaged for the duration of the War.
It is unfortunate that there are no color photographs of these WWI ships. 
People who witnessed convoys of dazzle painted ships reported that the scene was quite dramatic. Imagine sailing across the North Atlantic surrounded by dozens of brightly painted ships, each in different colors and patterns. If you compare the colored drawing with the black and white photograph of the ship “War Clover”, you can get an idea of how much we are missing. Read More…
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The problem confronting a submarine, once his prey has been sighted, resolves itself solely into estimating course and speed of the target, in order to determine how the approach to torpedo fire position should be made. The “dazzle” system of painting is based on this one consideration and that is, of rendering the problem confronting a submarine more difficult, confusing him as to how his approach shall be made and thereby adding in some degree to the safety of the vessel attacked.
U.S. Admiral William S. Sims (1917)
Painting by Wendell Tatley
Camopedia has this amazing information on the World War I design team assigned to the project;
ONE METHOD camoufleurs might have used (but did not, apparently) to generate a large number of unique dazzle schemes is the stencil method.
It is indebted to American artist Abbott Handerson Thayer (1849-1921), sometimes called “the father of camouflage,” who (circa 1909) devised a clever, easy way for individuals to design their own camouflage, using cut-out silhouettes.
Whatever the surrounding, said Thayer, a person “has only to cut out a stencil of the soldier, ship, cannon or whatever figure he wishes to conceal, and look through this stencil from the viewpoint under consideration, 
to learn just what costume from that viewpoint would most tend to conceal this figure.” However, the purpose of dazzle camouflage was confusion, not concealment, so, in the examples below, we have used the silhouette as a mask with which to
“find” valuable dazzle designs in an abstract, geometric plan. In studies of human vision, Gestalt psychologists and others have investigated embedded figures or “puzzle pictures” (Wolfgang Köhler called them “camouflaged figures”) in which a simple shape has been adroitly hidden within a larger, more complex surrounding.
In pre-computer days, one could make arbitrary compositions in art by overlapping “systems” on layers of tracing paper, viewed on a light table. 
Today, it is ever so easy to do the same thing (and much more) by using the “layers” function in software such as Adobe Photoshop. This could have been useful as a way to generate dazzle designs, had all that been available in World War I.
This information is from gotouring.com and the amazing design site:
Camopedia
In London this week? Head over to one of gCaptain’s favorite places… the Imperial War Museum, for their exhibition on Dazzle (and other Camouflage):
If you are looking for more information on this topic be sure to read things magazine‘s extensive ship camouflage links section.
Related Posts:
Topic: History · Interesting · Navy · Offbeat · Ship Design
Tags: · blog, british_navy, design, Halloween, History, Interesting, Navy, navy_ships, Offbeat, razzle_dazzle, Ship Design, ship-dazzle, WWI
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Everyone have a safe and very scary Happy Halloween. Great article, my Fast Frigate was just plan haze gray during Navy days of yesteryear. I bet the deck department had a blast with the creative paint scheme.
Everyone have a safe and very scary Happy Halloween. Great article, my Fast Frigate was just plan haze gray during Navy days of yesteryear. I bet the deck department had a blast with the creative paint scheme.
Superb post!
Superb post!
Painting a ship is always a blast, eh!
Painting a ship is always a blast, eh!
You have our intellectual property on you site. Correct by adding a link to origional art and delete you image thieft.
http://www.scari.org/razzle-dazzle.html
Include a link to the proper source from which you have taken. You have no right to pervert origional intent.
Gus O. Kahan
Notice: Fix this problem
http://www.scari.org/razzle-dazzle.too.html
You seem to steal without attribution.
regardless of the highmindedness of you mission, you have stolem the ideas of others. Fix it now. Either link to origional material or delete you thieft.
Gus O. Kahan
You have our intellectual property on you site. Correct by adding a link to origional art and delete you image thieft.
http://www.scari.org/razzle-dazzle.html
Include a link to the proper source from which you have taken. You have no right to pervert origional intent.
Gus O. Kahan
Notice: Fix this problem
http://www.scari.org/razzle-dazzle.too.html
You seem to steal without attribution.
regardless of the highmindedness of you mission, you have stolem the ideas of others. Fix it now. Either link to origional material or delete you thieft.
Gus O. Kahan
Gus,
Thank you for brining my attention to the error. Being a staunch conservative at a young age and living in a predominantly liberal section of Westchester I latched on to the writings and television shows of conservative commentators of the day. Maybe it was because we shared an Irish/German heritage or a passion for sailing but my favorite television personality was an unusual choice for a teenage boy; William F. Buckeley of Firing Line.
During my summer holidays I was a launch driver at City Island Yacht Club in NYC and one afternoon I had the distinct pleasure of taking Mr. Buckeley out to a friend’s yacht. As you can imagine I was quite nervous and for this reason (coupled with my lack experience in the job) I made what you could refer to as a critical error in navigation. Quite embarrassing! To make matters worse I immediately feared the publicly dismissive gesture or facial expression that Mr. Buckley had so eloquently mastered. You can therefore imagine my surprise when he allowed the rest of his party to depart the boat and *privately* acknowledged my error.
That was not the last navigational error I made in my career at sea but it was private and ultimately encouraging acknowledgements by people I respected that helped me along the path to obtaining a master’s license.
Thank you for identifying the mistake as we strive to move beyond the incipient stage of this endeavor. If you have any future concerns please feel free to contact us via our *private* address found on the contact page of this site:
http://gcaptain.com/maritime/blog/contact-us/
-John
Gus,
Thank you for brining my attention to the error. Being a staunch conservative at a young age and living in a predominantly liberal section of Westchester I latched on to the writings and television shows of conservative commentators of the day. Maybe it was because we shared an Irish/German heritage or a passion for sailing but my favorite television personality was an unusual choice for a teenage boy; William F. Buckeley of Firing Line.
During my summer holidays I was a launch driver at City Island Yacht Club in NYC and one afternoon I had the distinct pleasure of taking Mr. Buckeley out to a friend’s yacht. As you can imagine I was quite nervous and for this reason (coupled with my lack experience in the job) I made what you could refer to as a critical error in navigation. Quite embarrassing! To make matters worse I immediately feared the publicly dismissive gesture or facial expression that Mr. Buckley had so eloquently mastered. You can therefore imagine my surprise when he allowed the rest of his party to depart the boat and *privately* acknowledged my error.
That was not the last navigational error I made in my career at sea but it was private and ultimately encouraging acknowledgements by people I respected that helped me along the path to obtaining a master’s license.
Thank you for identifying the mistake as we strive to move beyond the incipient stage of this endeavor. If you have any future concerns please feel free to contact us via our *private* address found on the contact page of this site:
http://gcaptain.com/maritime/blog/contact-us/
-John
John, I too am a sailor. I still campaign my midget ocean racer, wyde lode. I’ve sailed the Long Island sound, Chesapeake, the Med., North Sea, the Nile and Red Sea, Andaman Islands, India, Aegean. I have taught on the San Francisco Bay, raced offshore on the Pacific and made passages up and down the Pacific Coast. I’ve sailed the Sea of Cortez as well.
Not withstanding political affiliation, Nowhere in my sailing experience have I taken a boat without the skipper’s/owner’s permission. I have always asked permission to come aboard. I have never stolen a boat or abused another’s property. So, you as a purveyor of the worship of private property, may understand, despite my progressive leaning, I might take umbrage by one who worships such principles for one’s self but not for others. Ref: scari.org/razzle-dazzle.html
Principles that William F. Buckeley would be in accord with, despite his sharp wit but misguided direction. A Classified Meritocracy is what this nation has embraced and look where we are today. The Collective Subjective is the problem not conservative or progressive thinking. You must Remember Conservatives are about conserving not consuming.
scari.org/ pax_americana.html
Bang around on that page before singing another stanza of God Bless America.
Gus
John, I too am a sailor. I still campaign my midget ocean racer, wyde lode. I’ve sailed the Long Island sound, Chesapeake, the Med., North Sea, the Nile and Red Sea, Andaman Islands, India, Aegean. I have taught on the San Francisco Bay, raced offshore on the Pacific and made passages up and down the Pacific Coast. I’ve sailed the Sea of Cortez as well.
Not withstanding political affiliation, Nowhere in my sailing experience have I taken a boat without the skipper’s/owner’s permission. I have always asked permission to come aboard. I have never stolen a boat or abused another’s property. So, you as a purveyor of the worship of private property, may understand, despite my progressive leaning, I might take umbrage by one who worships such principles for one’s self but not for others. Ref: scari.org/razzle-dazzle.html
Principles that William F. Buckeley would be in accord with, despite his sharp wit but misguided direction. A Classified Meritocracy is what this nation has embraced and look where we are today. The Collective Subjective is the problem not conservative or progressive thinking. You must Remember Conservatives are about conserving not consuming.
scari.org/ pax_americana.html
Bang around on that page before singing another stanza of God Bless America.
Gus
Gus,
Interesting perspective and enjoyable reply. My beliefs were youthful rebellion from my surroundings and are very different now though I still enjoy an intelligent conservative read.
I’m about to make another blunder as I don’t know the source but the saying goes “if you’re not a liberal in youth, you’re heartless. and, as you grow older, if your not conservative, then you’re brainless”.
Apparently I’m heartless AND brainless …which might explain our problem
…but no excuse.
I enjoyed perusing your site and welcome any additional comments or suggestions. -John
Gus,
Interesting perspective and enjoyable reply. My beliefs were youthful rebellion from my surroundings and are very different now though I still enjoy an intelligent conservative read.
I’m about to make another blunder as I don’t know the source but the saying goes “if you’re not a liberal in youth, you’re heartless. and, as you grow older, if your not conservative, then you’re brainless”.
Apparently I’m heartless AND brainless …which might explain our problem
…but no excuse.
I enjoyed perusing your site and welcome any additional comments or suggestions. -John