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Thread: 100-year-old color photos

  1. #1
    8x10, 5x7, 4x5, et al Leigh's Avatar
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    100-year-old color photos

    Here's a BBC piece about a Russian photographer who invented a color ?reversal? process 100 years ago.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/in-pictures-17449958

    - Leigh
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  2. #2
    Format Omnivore Brian C. Miller's Avatar
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    Re: 100-year-old color photos

    Prior thread: 100 year old color Russian photographs
    Searched on Prokudin-Gorskii

    Prokudin-Gorskii's surviving tri-color negatives are owned by the US Government. When they were about to be thrown out in France, a fellow managed to get Congress to cough up the cash for them.

    The tri-color camera used three 4x5 frames dropped in succession by a clockwork mechanism on the camera. The filters were automatically moved into position.
    "It's the way to educate your eyes. Stare. Pry, listen, eavesdrop. Die knowing something. You are not here long." - Walker Evans

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    Re: 100-year-old color photos

    Three exposure "colour filter" negatives was a pretty common technique even before Prokudin-Gorskii. Autochrome was a bit easier to use.
    The BBC was a bit late to discover this - there has been previous media coverage during the life of LFPF and search reveals lots of previous threads here.

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    Re: 100-year-old color photos

    Every year someone finds his stuff On every single forum i was in years..

  5. #5
    8x10, 5x7, 4x5, et al Leigh's Avatar
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    Re: 100-year-old color photos

    To those who appear to have a problem with my post...

    This showed up on the BBC news feed this afternoon, and I passed it on for those who might be interested.

    If you're not interested, that's your problem.

    - Leigh
    If you believe you can, or you believe you can't... you're right.

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    Re: 100-year-old color photos

    No problem.
    There is just a lot of informative material ready here - from people with real insight (not me!).
    Personally, I am infatuated with autochrome colours - results from the tri-color system are almost too modern for me.

  7. #7
    8x10, 5x7, 4x5, et al Leigh's Avatar
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    Re: 100-year-old color photos

    Here's a link to the Library of Congress exhibit: http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/empire/ethnic.html

    - Leigh
    If you believe you can, or you believe you can't... you're right.

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    Re: 100-year-old color photos

    I guess I have overlooked these images and the source so I appreciate the note.

    Not to derail the topic but the three color process got me to thinking about using it with digital B&W capture with large format Xray panels, as used in the medical profession. These panels (some I think using scintillation technology) are readily available in pretty decent pixel counts but only in B&W of course. Seems with proper color filters one could use them for a color process. Don't know about the cost of these units but this thread got me to thinking about investigating the availability.

    What thinkest anyone?

    Nate Potter, Austin TX.

  9. #9
    8x10, 5x7, 4x5, et al Leigh's Avatar
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    Re: 100-year-old color photos

    Quote Originally Posted by Nathan Potter View Post
    Seems with proper color filters one could use them for a color process.
    That's how the original color television cameras worked...
    Three separate vidicons(?), each with a primary color filter.

    - Leigh
    If you believe you can, or you believe you can't... you're right.

  10. #10

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    Re: 100-year-old color photos

    Quote Originally Posted by Steven Tribe View Post
    No problem.
    There is just a lot of informative material ready here - from people with real insight (not me!).
    Personally, I am infatuated with autochrome colours - results from the tri-color system are almost too modern for me.
    I would recommend looking at http://trichromie.free.fr/trichromie/ for current 3-color work and at http://www.vintagephoto.tv/color1.shtml for a nice collection of 3-color cameras.

    P.S. Then again, according to Edwin Land, you can make "full-color" images using only two BW exposures, using red and green filters. See Edwin H. Land, "Experiments in Color Vision," Scientific American, Vol. 200, No. 5, pp. 84-99, May 1959, available at http://www.psy.vanderbilt.edu/course...n/Land1959.pdf
    Last edited by r_a_feldman; 28-Mar-2012 at 11:19. Reason: Additional information

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