I just checked my Turnbull and he just says it's laquered those colours, so you probably misremembered.

In anyways, yes some individuals or groups of warriors did laquer their armor red (usually it's black/brown) or more rarely gold/yellow. This definitely made these warriors stand out on the battlefield, and in the Sengoku these were regarded as the most fierce. The most famous are the yellow/gold of Hōjō Tsunashige of the late Hōjō clan (although I'm not completely sure if Tsunashige just had yellow/gold banners or if the armor was yellow/gold), and the red of Obu Toramasa's men of the Takeda clan. Toramasa's red was passed down to Yamagata Masashige when Toramasa committed seppuku. When the Takeda clan was destroyed, the old red troops was absorbed into the men of Ii Naomasa, who also picked up the tradition of laquering the armour red. The Sanada also picked up the tradition of red armour after the fall of of the Takeda.