Autochrome Process

[t-dan]

I am trying to obtain information on the Autochrome Process used by Albert Khan.
Does anyone know if this process is still possible?
Do the chemicals still exist?
Thank you,
T-dan

[Steven Tribe]

Be warned! The images created by the original process (in spite of their being somewhat stereotype) are as addictive as soft/pictorial photography! You will find some data here - through the search facility.
A lot of people have done experiments and found suitable modern dyes. I seem to remember that the real challenge is to find a subsitute for starch grains and permanent coupling to a colourless carrier of the sensitive emulsion. The system was also based on long exposures - hence the limited range of subject material.

[csant]

Oh dear… Been reading up on this myself, and I agree with Steven - this is a dangerous path… I am not sure anybody has actually managed to successfully bring back the autochrome process - or am I just misinformed? As for the stereotype, I somewhat disagree - of course there is a lot of insignificant stuff out there, but there are a few that shot marvelous works! In the Albert Kahn "staff" e.g. Léon Busy, just to name one…

[Emmanuel BIGLER]

I am not sure anybody has actually managed to successfully bring back the autochrome process - or am I just misinformed?

hello from France

Prof. Jean-Paul Gandolfo of ENSLL, was the curator of the Albert Kahn collection for many years. So if somebody on this planet knows about autochromes...
He worked hard with his students to re-fabricate autochrome plates with the colored starch process. This is exceedingly difficult although the process is one century old. So far some plates have been fabricated, but as far as I have seen at one of the conferences given by prof Gandolfo on the subject in 2006, his results do not match yet the performance of original autochrome plates.
The hard points :
- the Lumière brothers did not describe everything in their patents, there is a lot of secret know-how which has been lost;
- the manufacturing of autochrome plates was made at an idustrial scale with very special machines, making difficult to re-fabricate it by a small group of people on a kitchen table corner.

More on the subject, in French :

L'autochrome Lumière
Secrets d'atelier et défis industriels
Bertrand Lavédrine , Jean-Paul Gandolfo
Editions du CTHS
20/03/2009 1-st edition 398 pages
* Langue : Français
* ISBN10 : 2-7355-0678-9
* ISBN13 : 978-2-7355-0678-1
* EAN13 : 9782735506781

-----------------

Emmanuel Bigler

[csant]

Hello Emmanuel,
thank you very much for that information. The book looks rather interesting, and probably a must for anybody taking this seriously. It would really be too great if it was possible to bring autochromes back to life…

[Larry Gebhardt]

Saw this on APUG last night. http://www.apug.org/forums/forum42/71151-autochrome-recipe-metropolitan-museum-art.html

[csant]

Interesting… The featured results (http://www.autochromes.fr/english/last.html) look actually rather promising…

[t-dan]

Thanks so much for all your responses!
There are plenty of great contacts to go through!!!!