SolaresLarrave
My M5s need red dots!
Check this collection out... Site's reliable: The Boston Globe's.
It's a series of photographs taken a century ago, between 1909 and 1910, in Russia, as part of a documentary commission.
I'd like to hear about the method used to create color projections. According to the introductory text, at least what I understood, is that these plaques showed elements in color when projected. They're viewable online also through the Library of Congress. Just click on the small LOC link next to the caption of every image.
Enjoy!
It's a series of photographs taken a century ago, between 1909 and 1910, in Russia, as part of a documentary commission.
I'd like to hear about the method used to create color projections. According to the introductory text, at least what I understood, is that these plaques showed elements in color when projected. They're viewable online also through the Library of Congress. Just click on the small LOC link next to the caption of every image.
Enjoy!
rxmd
May contain traces of nut
Those are the plates of Sergei Prokudin-Gorskii, who is quite famous in the history of photography as well as among historians of Russia. I use the plates a lot in lectures and presentations on Central Asia, for example, where they contain some fantastic material.
His technique was basically similar to most colour photography from before the 1930s. He took three plates in sequence, each of them through a red, yellow and green filter. That's why whenever there is motion in the picture, you see it as a coloured blur, because the object would be positioned slightly differently on each of the three plates. What Prokudin-Gorskii did was that he built himself a special camera that allowed him to change plates quickly.
The Library of Congress has its own page dedicated to the collection (http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/empire/). They are slowly postprocessing their negatives and have a page dedicated to how they do it, which also explains how the pictures were taken in the first place (link). You can also download scans of the original plates as high-resolution TIFFs. For historians, these are immensely valuable, and in this case, by publishing all of the original material as well as the postprocessed subset, the LOC is delivering a real showcase of what an archival library is supposed to do.
His technique was basically similar to most colour photography from before the 1930s. He took three plates in sequence, each of them through a red, yellow and green filter. That's why whenever there is motion in the picture, you see it as a coloured blur, because the object would be positioned slightly differently on each of the three plates. What Prokudin-Gorskii did was that he built himself a special camera that allowed him to change plates quickly.
The Library of Congress has its own page dedicated to the collection (http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/empire/). They are slowly postprocessing their negatives and have a page dedicated to how they do it, which also explains how the pictures were taken in the first place (link). You can also download scans of the original plates as high-resolution TIFFs. For historians, these are immensely valuable, and in this case, by publishing all of the original material as well as the postprocessed subset, the LOC is delivering a real showcase of what an archival library is supposed to do.
Last edited:
blw
Well-known
thanks for the extra info rxmd. I saw those photos last week and was amazed. I didn't post here because I assumed someone else already had.
I knew color went back to those days, but I hadn't seen any pictures from that time to back it up. Those photos are amazing.
I knew color went back to those days, but I hadn't seen any pictures from that time to back it up. Those photos are amazing.
Arvay
Obscurant
It's famous Prokudin-Gorsky, the pioneer of color photography in Russia
Here is his technology:
Prokudin-Gorsky's own research yielded patents for producing colour film slides and for projecting colour motion pictures. His process used a camera that took a series of three monochrome pictures in sequence, each through a different-coloured filter. By projecting all three monochrome pictures using correctly coloured light, it was possible to reconstruct the original colour scene. Any stray movement within the camera's field of view showed up in the prints as multiple "ghosted" images, since the red, green and blue images were taken of the subject at slightly different times.
The exposure time of the frames is likely to have varied, even if the developed negatives were later on similar glass plates. In a letter to Leo Tolstoy requesting a photo session, Prokudin-Gorsky described each photo as taking one to three seconds, but, when recollecting his time with Tolstoy, he described a six-second exposure on a sunny day.[11][7] Blaise Agüera y Arcas estimated the exposure of a 1909 photo taken in broad daylight to have had combined exposures of over a minute, using the movement of the moon as comparison.[12]
Though colour prints of the photos were difficult to make at the time and slide show lectures consumed much of the time he used to demonstrate his work, his studio worked in publishing prints of the photos in journals, books, postcards and large photogravures.[4] Many of the original prints from his publishing studio have survived to this day.[13]
Wiki
Here is his technology:
Prokudin-Gorsky's own research yielded patents for producing colour film slides and for projecting colour motion pictures. His process used a camera that took a series of three monochrome pictures in sequence, each through a different-coloured filter. By projecting all three monochrome pictures using correctly coloured light, it was possible to reconstruct the original colour scene. Any stray movement within the camera's field of view showed up in the prints as multiple "ghosted" images, since the red, green and blue images were taken of the subject at slightly different times.
The exposure time of the frames is likely to have varied, even if the developed negatives were later on similar glass plates. In a letter to Leo Tolstoy requesting a photo session, Prokudin-Gorsky described each photo as taking one to three seconds, but, when recollecting his time with Tolstoy, he described a six-second exposure on a sunny day.[11][7] Blaise Agüera y Arcas estimated the exposure of a 1909 photo taken in broad daylight to have had combined exposures of over a minute, using the movement of the moon as comparison.[12]
Though colour prints of the photos were difficult to make at the time and slide show lectures consumed much of the time he used to demonstrate his work, his studio worked in publishing prints of the photos in journals, books, postcards and large photogravures.[4] Many of the original prints from his publishing studio have survived to this day.[13]
Wiki
SolaresLarrave
My M5s need red dots!
Thanks a lot for the additional information. I had no idea about the man and his work, and stumbled upon it when reading a column on language published in the Boston Globe.
I will bookmark the LOC site on this collection. It's certainly impressive... and also fascinating; I feel like I'm staring into the past...
Have a nice day!
I will bookmark the LOC site on this collection. It's certainly impressive... and also fascinating; I feel like I'm staring into the past...
Have a nice day!