Hello Annie, This is dazzle camoflage. The ship was requsitioned twice by the Admiralty during WWI. Firstly as an armed merchant cruiser then later as a troopship. The idea behind dazzle camoflage was to confuse rather than conceal. It was frequently used in WWI and less so in WWII. Have a look at this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dazzle_camouflage Regards Hugh
It was used on several vessels: this picture is the aircraft carrier HMS Argus [1918]. Quite literally, it works on the saem princpal as a zebra's stripes. It looks garish at close range, but a distance of a mile or more it breaks up the outline very effectively.
Plus the fact that even at close range it made identification and targeting of the vessel far harder...
A good point Annie. Although I have seen this sort of dazzle effect used by a few ships from the French Italian and German navies it was mainly the RN along with the USN who seemed to use it the most... As well as those I have this solitary example of a Brazilian Battleship Sao Paulo taken in the last year of the war...
