DT was the most malleable printing process ever invented, so could begin with all kinds of originals : color neg, color transparency of any type, or tricolor in-camera separations onto black and white film. The most common method was starting from a positive chrome and, via quite a bit of intermediate masking, making tricolor separations from those. Up to 15 sheets of film were sometimes involved, plus the matrix printing film itself. DT masking protocols are quite different than for Ciba printing; and both are different from color neg film supplemental masking when it is needed, although the same kinds of punch and register gear can be used for all of them.
Some of Porter's original chromes have been drum scanned and reprinted via inkjet for sake of modern redux exhibitions. Inkjet doesn't have the same richness, hue purity, or transparency as actual dyes. But it's risky to subject the old remaining original DT prints to a lot of harsh display illumination, so certain compromises have been made. It probably would have been too expensive to have Porter's work remastered on actual dye transfer again by the only commercial lab still specializing in that service, which is in Germany and uses their own proprietary materials. But a number of individuals still do personal DT printing using remaining Kodak and Efke materials.
I personally hate it when classic old color work is re-issued in either a different color medium or very different size. These new virtual digitally projected exhibitions of old Masters work, Van Gogh, etc. make me want to throw up. A friend described one of those to me earlier this week, and himself attended only because someone else had bought him a ticket. It's like paying to watch Elvis impersonators.
Lightjet, Lambda, and Chromira laser printers expose regular Fuji and Kodak RA4 papers after scanning the original and then software manipulations. A highly skilled operator can achieve results analogous to Ciba in look, but with better color control, but certainly not in my opinion as well as a highly skilled Ciba printer could have done directly. It was the idiosyncrasies of the Ciba medium which often made it special. Fujiflex Supergloss is easier to handle and somewhat more affordable than Ciba was, and certainly keeps better before exposure. I need to order another big roll of that.
There were some tricks to getting the greens of Ciba spot on; but I figured that out long ago. With color neg printing, the problem is with the film itself not well differentiating the warm tones - traditional CN films are engineered to dump all of that into "pleasing skintones". Ektar has solved that problem, but has trouble differentiating blue and cyan under certain circumstances.
I won't go into the social issues. But I'm not thrilled about moving to space. We've already darn near wrecked one planet. Now that small amounts of water have been found on the moon as well as on Mars, we'll probably dry them up a thousand times faster if stations are ever planted there, and then go to war over the last few drops. I rooted for the Martians in "Mars Attacks".
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