What a Colorful Life.
It is well known that color film appeared only in 1935 (when Kodak introduced Kodachrome). But does it mean there was no color before? Does it mean that the world of photography was black and white and sometimes sepia? Definitely NOT. You remember the Lumiere brothers don’t you? And what extremely invigoration entrepreneurs they were. However, let us be frank. Let us admit that color photography has several fathers. Sounds like blasphemy, you think?
Well, let me tell you a story. A colorful story, indeed.
Once upon a time in France… (Have you noticed that most of the turning points for the history of photography are connected with France? Guess, there must have been some conspiracy)
Louis Ducos du Hauron (1837–1920). In 1868 he patented the three-color photography technique (RGB – sounds familiar right?) – the first practical method to capture color pictures, actually. Well, to tell you the truth that was not him who brought up the idea of three- color photography. Nevertheless, the aforementioned Monsieur du Hauron was the first to use it for practical photography, which deserves some respect, doesn’t it?
The idea itself was proposed by James Clark Maxwell – a Scottish theoretical physicist. He tried to make three separate black and white negatives through first red, then blue and then green filters. Later on Ducos du Hauron made his first color separations on three separate sheets of paper. However, there is no happy ending here, because the sensitivity of emulsion to the red part of the spectrum was extremely low and poor. Monseur Hauron had to wait for hours while exposing the scene to the red filter. Just think what pain in the neck it must have been.
And here step up two more legendary figures. I would call them saviors… no, no Saviors. They managed to tremendously improve the sensibility of the emulsion to the red light. Ladies and gentlemen, Mesdames et Monsieurs, comrades, let me introduce…
Professors Vogel (1834–1898) and Miethe (1862–1927). Two German guys who were the pathfinders, the messiahs, the (your noun could be here) To make a long story short they let the color photography move on. Especially Miethe, who also developed quite a good design of the triple-color camera. The camera used a negative plate 8x24 cm.
And then, there was a spy. There should be always a spy in a case of a good detective story, right? Why can’t I invent one? Would a Russian guy do as a spy?
Oh, well, though it is less exciting, but I’ll give you the facts which you are craving for.
Yes, there was a Russian. A Russian scientist and photographer Sergei Prokudin-Gorsky (1863-1944). He worked at Miethe’s laboratory and he became one of the most devoted disciples of the technique called ‘Dreifarbenphotographie nach der Natur’ (three-color photography in natural colors, pardon my German).
Mr Prokudin-Gorski became so obsessed with this sort of taking pictures that he devoted all his life to the development of this technique. Most of his color pictures were shot between 1904-1916 (Yes, I do remember that the Lumiers patented their method in 1903, but as I said, I want to tell you a bit more about other members of the color photography clan ;)
Prokudin-Gorsky’s enthusiasm was so contagious the Tsar Nikolai II decided to somehow participate. He made Prokudin-Gorsky an official photographer of the Empire and asked the man to travel across Russia (1907-1915) and picture everything that seemed to be interesting.
The process of shooting was the same: three RGB filters involved. After that a contact triple black and white positive was printed on a glass plate and then projected through a special triple projector. Each of the three positives was projected on the screen through a different filter.
Unfortunately, classical methods of reproducing three-color images are quite expensive and time-consuming. That was why until recently Sergei Prokudin-Gorskii ‘s pictures have not been seen by the public. The advent of digital technology made things easier and the color images could be composed from scanned negatives (more than 1,900) in the computer and then printed as color digital photographs. The first book ‘Photographs for the Tsar: The Pioneering Color Photography of Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii’ by Robert Allshouse appeared in 1980. And in 1986 the US Library of Congress exhibited a small collection of Prokudin-Gorski’s works to the public.
Now you can compare those works by the Lumiers and Prokudin-Gorskii yourself.
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/
and here is some more infomrmation about Sergei Prokudin-Gorskii (just in case)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prokudin-GorskiiWell, you must be really tired of my story. But haven’t I proposed to introduce a spy and you preferred mere historical facts?
Of course, I could tell you a bit more about, for example, John Joly but I am afraid it will not be as jolly as it sounds. So my Old Curiosity shop is closed for today.
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