You might be wondering what a run of the mill colour photo is doing here. A photo from a time when colour photography was well established. But this print was made from a the negatives used to make a colour print in 1877 ! But involves a Journey involving a Scotsman, Lots of Frenchmen, a Swiss Badass painter, Murderous Highwaymen, an abandoned wife and a dubious preacher

It’s not the best walked into the pub joke, but the birth of colour photography.

Goodness 1877 ? What was the original like

The actual original image was taken by Louis Ducos du Hauron (1837-1820. It stands up pretty well although not as colourful as the later print.

The 20th Century image was created using a more modern Dye imbibition print. That was by photochemical wiz and maker of violas Louis Condax (1897-1971). Condax was instrumental in developing an updated Kodak Dye Transfer process for colour printing and copying. A process that was launched in 1946 which was used for almost a half century. That process is a direct link back to du Hauron’s work and that of his rival Cros.

This print was sadly undated. But given processes involved and other du Hauron images that Condax printed (and dated). This seems likely to have been around the 1950’s.

Meet Louis Ducos Du Hauron

Here is du Hauron is taken appropriately in colour by Louis Lumière. Lumière was one the French brothers that not only pioneered early Cinematography but produced the first commercial successful Colour film. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves

Our man was born in Bazas a small commune near Langon in South West France. Interestingly he is also hailed by some as the inventor of cinema. In 1864 (ironically when Louis Lumiere was born), du Hauron patented a device for taking motion picture and projecting it. He also foresaw roll film in his writings. However he never produced a working model of his cinema camera.

But Colour Photography was what he would be known for. But he wasn’t the first.

Painting by Numbers

Daguerre may have given us the first publicly announce photograph in 1839. But within a couple of years Daguerreotypes were being coloured. Enter Swiss painter and one of the first professional photog Johann Baptist Isenring (1796-1860). Isenring just took one look at photography and ran with it. He’s credited with having the first Photographic exhibition in 1840 (which ran to a 5 page catalogue). And this was also the first touring photo exhibition travelling through cities in modern Switzerland, German, and Austria in 1841.

And that’s when he developed a technique for hand tinting photos. He was so successful at that within 8 months he was able to by his Sonnenwagen. Arguably the first Darkroom on wheels.

Sadly few of his tinted photos survive. The process wasn’t easy using Isenring and later techniques as Daguerreotypes and other early photo stocks were fragile. But it became a thriving business and even lasted up to the 1930’s

But this is just coloring monochrome. For true colour photography we need to boldly go.

The Colour from space

French scientist Edmond Becquerel (1820-1891) does have a legit claim to creating the first colour images. He’s the discoverer of the photovoltaic effect which is the key principle behind solar panels. But perhaps overshadowed (pun excused) by his son Henri . Henri was a pioneer of radioactivity whom gave the becquerel name as a measure radiation.

Edmund produced colour images in 1848 of the solar spectrum using what was a precursor to Lippman’s inference method. But Edmonds’s images required insane exposure times and faded rapidly. A few images do survive in the dark of French museums over 175 years later. But are these photograms true photographs ?

Hillbilly or Hillotype ?

And then enter our bad boy of colour, Levi Hill (1816-1865). Hill was a Baptist minister in upstate NY. But in 1851 claimed to have invented a colour process. His Hillotypes were tweaked from Daguerrotypes. And these, he claimed were colour images.

His work was initially met met with excitement but rapidly switched to scepticism. It was not helped by the suspicion that Hill did weak his images. Professional Photogs got narked as they were worried his claims would put folk off wanting to wait for a Hillotype. And he didn’t help by never presenting his finding. He kept saying he would but pushed the dates back. So he ended up being dismissed as a fraud…..

But more recent research has shone a light on Hill’s work. In 1981 photography professor and historian Joseph Boudreau used Hill’s methods. And was able to produce muted partially coloured Heliotypes, although colours did not necessarily appear how you think they would.

More recent examination in 2007 has shown whilst Hill did indeed add colour to his images after they were developed. But he also he did actually did produce rudimentary red and blue pigmentation in his process. So technically (in a very rudimentary & non-matching way) he did do the first sort of colour photos. But screwed up by over-egging & falsifying his work.

But neither are seen as the the father of colour photography. For that we need to travel to London and a rather clever Scot who delivered a lecture in 1861. And where that lecture was, was thanks in part to some dandy Highwaymen.

Stand and Deliver the Ri

The Royal Institution (Ri) has been at 21 Albemarle St, Mayfair in London since 1799. The building dates from the 1756 and the Ri got lucky. The previous owner a City financier called John Mellish was robbed on Hounslow Heath by 3 Highwaymen in 1798. Although the robbery went without a hitch one of the trio discharged a pistol. The bullet struck Mr Mellish in the forehead and although he initially seemed aright, he succumbed a few days later.

Mellish’s untimely demise ended up being for the nation’s benefit. Ri as it would become had been established earlier that year. That was due to a proposal by Sir Benjamin Thompson (aka Count Rumford). Sir Benjamin although by this point was part of the wallpaper of British Scientific establishment has a really colourful past. He’s actually an American whom sided with the British during the War of Independence. He famously permanently left his wife behind when fleeing from the patriots. He also ended up being a Count of the Holy Roman Empire. And he is credited with inventing things like thermal underwear, modern chimney’s. And that’s just for starters.

But I digress too much from our tale today. Our American/Bavarian count proposed the following

“formation by Subscription, in the Metropolis of the British Empire, of a Public Institution for diffusing the Knowledge and facilitating the general Introduction of useful Mechanical Inventions and Improvements, and for the teaching by courses of Philosophical Lectures and Experiments, the application of Science to the Common Purposes of Life”.

Once this idea got going in scientific circles the precursor of the Ri was formed. And by luck (or bullet) Mr Mellish’s abode came on the Market. His old gaff has had 15 Nobel prize winners as members, 10 elements presented to the world. And has had lectures galore from titans of science like Michael Faraday, Humphry Davy etc. Even Albert Einstein delivered a lecture here. And our Scotsman was a titan whom Einstein held in great esteem.

But what’s this got to do with photography ?

Not much, but it is a good tale.
The Ri becomes important thanks Einstein’s favourite Scottish physicist and polymath James Clerk Maxwell

Maxwell was born in Edinburgh in 1831. But he spent much of his early Childhood in rural Kirkcudbrightshire, just down the road from where I type. He returned as child to to the private Edinburgh Academy. He wrote his first scientific paper at the age of just 14. Which given his age was presented on his behalf at the Royal Society of Edinburgh the following year. By just 16 he started at Edinburgh University.

Best known for his contribution to physics and is most notable for the Classical theory of electromagnetic radiation. Today he is regarded as the founder of electrical engineering, pioneered thermodynamics, predicted radio waves. And paved the way for the theory of relativity and quantum physics. He was voted in 2000 by physicists 3rd most important Physicist of all time behind Newton and Einstein. Einstein famous retorted when a student accused him of standing on the shoulder of Newton – “No I don’t. I stand on the shoulders of Maxwell”

And that’s me being brief.
Away form physics he contributed to a range of kinetic, mathematics and engineering issues. Another of his interest was colour vision which he published heavily on. He won the Rumford medal in 1860 for his “On the Theory of Colour Vision”. This surmised correctly the human eye had 3 colour receptors (red, blue and green).

And those 3 colours would be important with something else which he demonstrated at the Ri in 1861

Tie a ribbon

The Ri has seen a few Keymark presentations over it time. And on 17th May 1861, Maxwell step up not only to lecture but to show something never seen before

The lecture theatre bar some upgrades and AV equipment is the same as when Maxwell stood up in 1861. If you’re British you’ll have probably seen it on the Ri Christmas lectures on the telly as a kid.

Maxwell’s lecture back in 1861 discussed his theory on colour. Colour perception had been of interests for scientists for centuries. Newton demonstrated that if you split white light into to monochromatic colours you could recombine them to make white light. Thomas Young (1773-1829) had already postulated that the human eye could only perceive colours through 3 separate “channels”. This foreshadowing Maxwell work. And Maxwell was aware of Hermann von Helmholtz work. Which like Maxwell suggest 3 colour receptors (or cones as we call them now).

But hey this would have been all exciting stuff for the function of the eye but Maxwell demonstrated something else. A projected colour photograph of a tartan ribbon.

This is widely seen as the first colour photo. But he actually didn’t take it and as we’ll discuss later the colours are a bit off. The Photographic plates of which you can still see online or in person today a Maxwell’s birthplace in Edinburgh

So how did he do this and who did take it ?

Maxwell had already proposed his concept back in 1855. This video by the James Clerk Maxwell foundation demonstrates it well

Wikipedia sum it as below if you don’t want to watch the video

” if three black-and-white photographs of a scene were taken through red, green, and blue filters, and transparent prints of the images were projected onto a screen using three projectors equipped with similar filters, when superimposed on the screen the result would be perceived by the human eye as a complete reproduction of all the colours in the scene”

wikipedia (en), re James Clerk Maxwell

Thomas Sutton (1819-1875) took the 3 plates for Maxwell. Sutton was another photographic pioneer and an actual early pro photog. He was also inventor of the SLR amongst a host of other stuff.

You might notice Maxwell’s 1861 colours are a bit off unlike the modern example above. Sutton and Maxwell were at a disadvantage by time. Early B&W photographic emulsions had very poor colour sensitivity. This was decades before Panchromatic let alone orthochromatic B&W films.

As a result the emulsions available were mainly sensitive to blue light. And were hardly sensitive to green and frankly insensitive to red. It’s actually believed now that Maxwell’s image does not show true red. His red filter also allowed the transmission of UV light. So it’s believed the red elements on the 1861 ribbon are actually UV light elements falsely shown in red.

Modern colour film relies on the process (although colour correct). But instead of 3 separate negatives there are multilayered emulsions with at least 3 colours sensitive dye layers. We call Maxwell’s method the additive or 3 colour method.

Others take thing forward

In addition to our main man du Hauron, several others worked on colour using Maxwell’s ideas. And there were several attempts create commercially successful process. One notable one was by Frederic Eugene Ives (1856-1937).

Ives cut his colour chops devised as colour system called Kromoskop launched in 18971. This used the same principles as Maxwell did projecting to form either a single image. Or as stereoscopic pair as above using a special stereoscope.

Both Ives & du Hauron were able to access better emulsions a decade or so later with much wider sensitivities. They depended on new discoveries around dye sensitization by Hermann Wilhelm Vogel in 1873 allowing for better colour sensitivities. Hence we get reds and decent greens

It was one of the first commercial colour photographic techniques. And recently discovered Kromoskop stereo pairs of the aftermath of 1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fire are arguably the earliest colour photo journalism.

Interestingly Louis Condax worked for Ives when he was just 16 and would become friends with him

Was He alone ?

Du Hauron credited with the first colour print. Although he briefly had a rival claimant with fellow Frenchman Charles Cros (1844-1888). Both submitted similar ideas to the French Society of Photography on the 7th of May 1869. Neither knew of the other and their research. In a very Gentlemanly move Cros stood down and passed the credit to du Hauron who turned up with prints. Cros’s ideas however influenced the the techniques that Louis Condax would use to print our item and others.

Interestingly Cros is better remember for something else he got pipped at the post. He arguably created the phonogram although Edison would take the credit for it.

Subtractive Colour

What du Hauron and Cros did was take the additive three colour principle of Maxwell. And then they added the subtractive colour principle which we still use in colour & photo printing.

Broadly Additive (or RGB) colour mixing is created by mixing light whilst Subtractive colour is created by mixing materials. These 3 colours in each group can be used to create any other color perceived by the human eye.

For additive colour we use Red Green and Blue (RGB). Which is what we describe displays as. Mix all 3 equally you get white and have no light to get black.

Subtractive colour mixing rely today on Cyan (a blue with a hint of green), Magenta (purplish blue) and Yellow. They make up what we call CMY colours used in photography & printing . Mix all 3 equally you get black. And use no colour and you get the paper colour (usually white).

You’ll more commonly see them as with black as a 4 colour in the CMYK model used for printing. Black (called Key hence the the K) acts as the detail aka contrast to the image.

So how does that work in practice ?

Du Hauron used both Maxwell’s additive 3 colour model for taking the negatives. But then a subtractive colour process similar for his prints.

He published his ideas in 1868 in a French Patent. Either in 1869 or 1870 he produced the first colour photographic print from a set of 3 colour filtered photograms. Photograms are images made without a camera. That’s done by placing objects directly onto the surface of a light-sensitive material and then exposing it.

Colours are muted here compared to his later images. That’s due to the poor colour sensitivity of photographic material in the 1860’s. The later images benefitted from work by by Hermann Wilhelm Vogel.

But it would be his stills taken in the lates that would really be seen as the first colour photos.

Going to Print du Hauron style

Du Hauron used those negatives to print on paper by making 3 dye coloured emulsion layers in turn. Replicating his process today we’d use a red-filtered negative to create a cyan dye layer. Then a green-filtered to create a magenta dye layer. And finally a blue-filtered to create a yellow dye layer. These three dye superimposed form a complete colour image. If you look on his image you will see the emulsion layers over lapping at the edges

And the only major difference to du Hauron, is that more modern photographic papers have those 3 layers coated already. But today most negatives are now digitalised. And we print using CYMK inkjet printers which apply droplets of ink to achieve the same subtractive effect

He interestingly commercial developed single shot cameras notably his Le Mélanochromoscope (patented in 1874 but not built ’til later). This used a set of semi transparent images to reflect the image through 3 filters. That allowed for 3 images to be made on the same plate simultaneous. Although when he did his original shots he would have had no such luxury.

So du Hauron deserves his credit for the first colour prints but it wasn’t exactly practical.

His work is known as the trichrome method.

Colour me wildly

Du Hauron would spend much of his time getting his idea up and running commercially. And he wasn’t alone

Best known is Russian Photog exemplar Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky (1863-1944). He trained under Professor Adolf Miethe ( 1862-1927) in Germany . Both using exactly the same principles that Maxwell & du Hauron developed. But with much more modern turn of the century emulsions. Prokudin-Gorsky produced detailed fantastic colour images using Maxwell’s Technique of Russia and Asia.

Both would sell prints in colour. Including ones made using lithographically for mass publication (less quality but easier to do en masse).

But you still needed 3 negatives. That was until 1907.

Lumière Autochrome

Autochrome was patented in 1903 and would launch in 1907. It is an additive colour process. It’s a single plate you could load into any plate camera and later roll film. It produced a positive image.

The irony is the Lumière brothers are better known for inventing cinema as we know. But they walked away form it. Whereas d Hauron theorised it but never went there. And on the flip the Lumière bros spent much of their life with their colour photographic method. Which du Hauron helped pioneer.

In a sad twist du Hauron was trying to set up yet another colour photography business when autochrome arrived. Our man du Hauron would die in perhaps appropriately in Agen in 1920. And has largely been forgotten until recent years.

Autochrome became the dominant force in colour photography for the next 2 decades. And it would survive well into the 1950’s just outliving both the Lumières. However it isn’t like modern colour film which has more in common with du Hauron. It was expensive and had some limitations.

We’re going to come back to this another day. But simple colour photography for the masses (with enough money) had arrived. For the rest of us we were still paying for tinted B&W photos until the 1930’s.

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Location of the du Hauron’s views of Agen (with Cathedral)

Both the Du Hauron’s panorama and the later reprint are in the George Eastman Museum located in Rochester, New York. The image are available online on both the Museum website and on wikicommons

References

• Wikipedia (numerous)
• Eastman Museum page on Contax’s modern print of de Hauron
• Louis Contax at Met Museum site
• Louis M. Condax and the Kodak Dye Transfer process, Stephanie C. Hofner (2016)
• Royal Institute – Wikipedia
• Historic England’s entry on 21 Albermarle St (aka Ri)
• Royal Institute’s own online timeline
• Highwaymen and women on Hounslow Heath
• The James Clerk Maxwell Foundation website which includes a online virtual tour of his birth place (plates are Exhibition room 1)
• Les amis de Louis Ducos du Hauron website
• Nicéphore Niépce Museum, City of Chalon-sur-Saône. (images)