Landships II

Fray Bentos · Corporal

A Genuine Colour Photo of a knocked out 'German' captured British tank...

TinCanTadpole · Legend

Nice, thanks for posting. Hope there's a colour pic of a Mk II, IV, V, or Whippet out there...

Morgoth · Major

It always surprises me that colours existed back then, that the world wasn't really in shades of gray.

MehdiT · Lieutenant

I don't want to sound insulting, but it looks hand coloured to me. Aside from the tank and the grass, everything else is gray. Hand tinting was common in that era and some people were very good at it. I have also seen hand coloured images of an abandoned Mk IV at La Pompelle..

Morgoth · Major

MehdiT wrote:
I don't want to sound insulting, but it looks hand coloured to me. Aside from the tank and the grass, everything else is gray. Hand tinting was common in that era and some people were very good at it. I have also seen hand coloured images of an abandoned Mk IV at La Pompelle..

A forgery, then! So, it's still possible that the world used to be grey biggrin !

James H · Legend

Sorry, but it's a tinted photo.There are some genuine autochromes on that site, part of the Albert Kahn collection.�

geod-LA · Sergeant

Morgoth wrote:
A forgery, then! So, it's still possible that the world used to be grey!

�Actually it's a bit more complicated than that, as this explanation from Calvin and Hobbes makes clear:

http://www.reoiv.com/random.asp?img=dadbandwandcolour.jpg&page=2

�

mad zeppelin · Commander in Chief

The image originally belonged to the collection of the SFP (soci�t� francaise de photographie). Their colour photographs of WW1 are not perpetually online like that other only too well known host of French colour pictures; nevertheless, I've seen the photograph in several publications - and each time, the colours are reproduced in slightly different hues (says perhaps more about the present day art of electronic tinkering than about the quality of the original, which I haven't seen). Because the SFP is quite a serious artistic institution, I'm inclined to believe that this is a genuine colour photo, even if the image nowadays seems to be in ECPAD custody too. �

Fray Bentos · Corporal

If you check the link provided you will see that it IS genuine and not a tint.

Lothianman · Colonel

Not sure that the greyness of the soil and road is unexpected - if it was chalk terrain as the pale road implies then maybe that is to be expected. Maybe someone knows the location and geology?

James H · Legend

The site claims they're genuine, but Wikipedia also claims a lot of things.

What the site says about the autochromists is largely true, but there's no guarantee that all the photos are genuine. There's one amongst them showing French troops in red kepis with their officers in dark blue tunics, according to the caption, in 1916. I'm certainly not having that.

Some of these are gen, but some aren't.

nurgle · Sergeant

Hi,

it is a genuine Autochrome. This is a B&W plate, that is placed behind a plate with has a "screen" of coloured starch grains.
when the film "pack" (of the coloured screen plate and the B& W plate) is in the camera, the exposures where far longer that the same B&W film on its own. It had to be a Panchromatic plate (sensitive to all colours), which was also a lot slower than the standard authochromatic plates (only sensitive to Greens & blues). and the density of the coloured starch grains made for Long exposures (compared to today) of half to quarter seconds almost standard in daylight. ASA down to 10 even ASA of 4 where common.

the B&W film was then processed in a reversal B&W chemistry to make a B&W positive, and then the plate was re bond back with the screen plate... no colour chemistry at all involved. but is was staggeringly expensive then.

the extremely grainy appearance comes from the starch grains NOT from the B&W film. and the colour shifts from one side to the other come from very slight mis alignment between the plate and the screen from their original taking positions. only has to be out by less than a fraction of a hairs with to give one side of the image a green tinge, and a slight pinkie tinge to the other... (which is how they are easily picked up. genuine hand colouring would have had the same coloured sky from one side of the print to the other...). I was appointed the Australian Governments art dept Valuer for Photography for Qld, 1989 to 2004...

and had a few Autochomes in my collection, but was luckily to start work at a studios where photo were hand coloured in the traditional way... and had thousands of them, now lost...(due to the flood.) I do however own a very large collection of original photographic photo colouring outfits going back to the 1880's... and retouching items going back to the 1860's...

the greyness of some colours often comes from the fading of the yellow grains, making browns in to bluish looking etc... also the shadows were never as rich as normal B&W prints.

I will try and post scans from an and original Autochome manual...

I also have a copy print made from an WW1 Australian soldiers autochrome portrait while on leave in england. Though the film was made in France, it was to expensive for the depressed french war time economy, and so rarely used in France, and mostly exported overseas... Americans however could not get enought of it... and George Eastman, (KODAK fame) tried to invent a two pack Red&Green colour film in 1914... (i was personaly presented with a modern print made from Georges origianl experiment neg, by th teen Chairman of Kodak, when he visited Australia. (I have shown of Kodaks first Professional digital cameras at two ofd my Photography events, and had Taken the first Australian know digital direct (to computer) �portrait in 1986... (arnt I a name dropper..)

on the subject of french "red' trousers, some journals and news papers I have seen showed some officers still wearing "Red" trousers well into the war, but is is more likely they were Staff officers, and to be a bit picky, the actual colour was called 'Madder', which was a slightly magenta-shade of red... never Pure Red... (strangely, many Hand coloured photos, actually used true Red colouring for this, which they should not have....

Regards, Sandy Barrie. (photographic collector and historian.) keep an eye out from my future posts on this subject here.

-- Edited by nurgle on Thursday 14th of November 2013 07:38:29 AM

-- Edited by nurgle on Thursday 14th of November 2013 07:43:25 AM

-- Edited by nurgle on Thursday 14th of November 2013 07:47:40 AM

nurgle · Sergeant

Here is the Autochrome of the Australia solider. the Grain (cause dby the starch grains) is unbelievable, as the shadow detail lost and the highlight's are muted.

Autochromes have a "look" of their own that no other film/photographic process can do.. and I like it..

regards, Sandy

.p.s will try and dig out Autochrome book, as it was not in the place I though it was

Rectalgia · Legend

Lovely portrait Sandy.� Do you have name, number, unit details?� Just thinking family genealogists, medal collectors, etc. are always scouring the internet for pictures of "their" man, you could earn their undying gratitude and maybe even attribution - for yourself and the forum - as well as furthering the memory of a soldier.� As Dame Mary Gilmore says

They are not dead; not even broken;
Only their dust has gone back home to earth;
For they, the essential they, shall have rebirth
Whenever a word of them is spoken.

nurgle · Sergeant

HI,

Sorry no details. a customer brought this in the studio to be copied and made into print in 1975..

must be taken in England.. though Autochrome Film was advertised in Australia, there are so few known genuine Australian examples.

regards, Sandy

CharlieC · Legend

I found the attached on the web - it's a 370mm railway gun - is it another autochrome?

To be precise it's an "Obusier de 370mm Modele 1915 sur aff�t � berceau Batignolles et Schneider"

The exposure times with autochrome must have been quite long - there are a couple of guys in the image who seem to have moved.

Regards,

Charlie

-- Edited by CharlieC on Monday 18th of November 2013 01:20:10 PM

nurgle · Sergeant

Hi, Autochrome was from 10 to 4 ASA, that meant from 1/10th to quarter second of exposure at F16 in BROAD Daylight. as most standard lenses in those days max aperture were F6.8 to F8, that would generally rule out Hand held exposures, and most large format plate cameras were tripod mounted. Since the focal lengths were longer than small format cameras of today, most photographers would have opted to get extra depth of field by stopping down to F18 for even F22 as normal �(high speed lenses of T4 To F1.8 were not available till the 1930's and even then not common)

but also considering europe is not that sunny, �could drop the shutter speed two to three stops also �(its slow speed one of the main reasons night or dusk autochromes are almost non-existent)

I lost a lens in the flood that stopped down to F 256 but it was a 1,800mm lens (yet only a standard lens fro my giant camera)

odd looking colours are often the result of both fading of some of the dyed grains, e.g. the Grays ground, and also the original neg, and also over processing caused a high base fog (D-Min) with resulted in strange coloured shadows like in my soldier.

so in short. yes more highly likely an autochrome.

Being such an expensive process it was reserved for the rich, or those with government connections. we know through example sin the Australian War memorial, that Frank Hurley (one of Australia's Official War Photographers) took Autochromes in the Middle east WW1 campaign. there are no known examples of any soldiers taking any

regards, Sandy

-- Edited by nurgle on Wednesday 20th of November 2013 06:36:23 AM

Fray Bentos · Corporal

nurgle, thank you for fascinating and informative replies, and of course supporting the validity of the photo shown.

nurgle · Sergeant

Hi,

40 years a Professional Photographer. I was trained in 1971 in negative retouching & hand colouring in a very old studio, though I had my first camera when I was 8, and darkroom when I was 9. (the studios started 1928) but the building was a Photographic studio back to the 1890's. I joined the IAP (Institute of Australian Photography) 1974, and been a member ever since, now a Honorary Life Member. I started Collecting photographic equipment, and till the floods in 2011, had the largest private collection in Australia. I was appointed Federal Government Valuer of Photography, and have held historical commemoration of Photographic events in Australia. Sorry about the short bio, little name dropper me added so you did not think I was the local camera shop guy.!

but happy to ad my expertise in the one field I am very expert in the photo below i am celebrating the first Photo taken in Australia (Kodaks managers flew out from America)

sill trying to find my autochrome book (but my place is a mess.. it was enter after the flood waters went down)

(I do have a large collection of early photographic retouching & photo colouring equipment going back to the 1870's now.

Regards, Sandy (

OH and by the way, the one way to pick 90% genuine hand coloured photos, is that almost all B&W photo prints (done on silver gelatine, not the photos hoped ones) are sepia toned first before colouring and so should have slightly biased to warm colours, and had to make true neutrals such a blue blacks (boots etc), and skye looked slightly muddy (just troll bays postcard section and you will see what I mean)

-- Edited by nurgle on Friday 22nd of November 2013 11:35:06 PM