Color photos of pre-WWI Russia

[Lud]

For some reason this is REALLY interesting to me.

When I think of the world before WWI I usually think in black and white. Even though intellectually I know it was not so, every picture I've seen from that period was black and white and rather drab looking so that is how I visualized everything (I guess I'm not very right-brain).

So when I ran across this exhibit on the Library of Congress website, I was absolutely fascinated. You can see the world (well, at least the Russian Empire) as it really was. The land, the architecture, the people all in vivid color.

The technique is a combination of a photographer who figured out how to use color filters with black and white plates and modern image enhancement. The results are stunning. Here is an example of some Jewish boys studying with their teacher in 1911.

The exhibit is at http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/empire/

 

[NSXLNT]

My father worked as a photoengraver, and I remember when I was young and visited his shop he took four different pieces of film, one black, one red, one yellow and one green
( four primary colors ? ) and as he laid them one on top of the other, before my eyes appeared the final result in full color. I have always been fascinated comparing black/white and color photos. This picture you posted is beautiful, not anything like the cheesey colors seen in some of those older movies that have been "colorized"
Every now and then, the History Channel on cable TV has a show on WW2 that is actually in color, from real color film used at the time. Quite a bit different then the Black/white stuff we're used to seeing.
Wasn't the Wizard of Oz great , the way they went from B/W to color then back again? Great trick for the time it was done.