The crazy thing is, the bumper I restored still had original Aleutian (sp?) blue on it, cracked & chipped up, but never repainted. This was just a few years ago and at that time I could care less & never thought I would be worrying about these details. I have restored many cars over the years, & in more recent years I have turned it into more of an art rather than getting the car done on a time line. So, I have been paying more attention to details than I probably should. I painted my car almost 1 year ago & I am still working on small stuff, Haven't even bolted the body back on the frame yet. Yes, I am a putz, but its what I enjoy. There are a bunch of things I have deviated from how the factory did things to clean up the look, but still like to know how everything was done originally & then decide what to do.
So that being said, I found a paint that looks dang close to bare steel. Painting my drive shaft with it this weekend. Yes, Still looks like paint up close as only steel looks like steel, but its the right color/ tone & gloss. I think if I paint the exposed areas of the bumper to look bare it will probably look wrong just because I'll bet those bumpers were rusty in one week
That picture also has me wondering about the core support "bump" brackets. I noticed mine had a type of zink coating on them when I cleaned them up.