Italy used very dark blue-grey in the early period, but went to pale grey later. The shade of pale grey was so pale as to appear almost white in some photographs. In some cases, ships in northern Italian waters were painted dark grey during winter, and pale grey during summer. The turret tops were painted in dark grey in all schemes. Many upper-deck horizontal surfaces were painted dark grey. Black was commonly used around the funnels and areas where coal was loaded. Decks were smartly cleaned, and appear very pale (as with British and German ships that had been holystoned).
Torpedo boats were black, but later went to pale grey or mid-grey. Some destroyers adopted a camouflage scheme of blue grey and pale grey, of very similar form to that used by Italy in WWII. Recognition of individual units was achieved through a two-letter combination - 'AO', for example, being a shortening of 'Ardito'. These letters were often in red, but occasionally in black.