Graham,
Errrrrrrr, . . . . ummmmmm, . . . . OK, I'm having trouble tracking here.
Warren
If I can but in here – I suspect that there is a bit of misunderstanding between you and Graham, but I have to admit I found your original post a trifle … concerning? Not sure if it is any more than that but I spend a lot of time worrying at the many issues of WWI colour and here’s what bothered me (and I suspect Graham as well but he will no doubt speak for himself) about your post:
In truth, there are not too many real certainties about WWI colours (although there are plenty of spurious ego-driven pronouncements) BUT there are, most assuredly,
some certainties. These broadly relate to existing samples, historical documents, photographs and knowledge of the pigments and processes available during the period we are examining. We also have eye-witness reports, recollections and remembrances but these need to be carefully sifted and where possible used only as corroboration of other concrete information. So there is much room for interpretation and speculation but it is
not an entirely free field, devoid of any structure.
If we look at what I term “ego-driven pronouncements”, these were (and sadly still are) made very often in good faith, sometimes based on careful weighing of the available evidence but almost always without “showing the working” and thus they may have been perfectly valid statements, but when made with no explanation of the reasoning behind them, they lose some or all validity.
Quite often these statements have been made by people who regarded themselves (and were in turn, regarded by others) as “experts” in the field. In some cases this (self) categorisation was, in fact, the result of many years of patient study of evidence and the person concerned may be regarded as deserving of the epithet of expert BUT (and it is an enormous room-filling BUT) it was also often accompanied by a self-regard which rendered explanation to the “common herd” superfluous, a sort of “don’t you know who I am?” arrogance.
This arrogance has led in turn to a self-belief which allowed speculation (sometimes more or less valid but still little more than educated guesswork) to become regarded as FACT. These so-called facts have often been parroted without any questioning by others who, either through ignorance, faith in the originator as an expert (see above) or sometimes with a view to their own aggrandisement, believe them to be or want them to be, accepted as FACTS, which they are assuredly not.
So, getting back to the point (at last! I hear the cry), Drooling Bulldog (I know it’s only a name but come on, guys, seriously?!) seem to be putting some real historical knowledge of pigments into the generation of these new colours, in order to give modellers a suitable basis for arriving at shades which have a good chance of reflecting the right historical appearance and for that they should be supported and encouraged. Your mention of the term “colour police”, and the line “wanting to stay away from the maddening crowd (sic) of “this is the correct colour” and so on.” does seem to indicate that you believe that "anything goes", which as I have tried so verbosely to indicate, is far from the true situation.
One of my personal heroes, Carl Sagan, once said: “We will not be afraid to speculate, but we will be careful to distinguish speculation from fact”. That has always seemed particularly pertinent to our narrow, insignificant obsession with WWI colours – as well as to the rest of life!
Edit: I see that I am repeating the line below.... well it probably bears repetition!