Introduction: Early Colour

Author(s): Kim Tomadjoglou

Source: Film History, Vol. 21, No. 1, Early Colour Part 1 (2009), pp. 3-6
Published by: Indiana University Press
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/27670754
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Introduction:
Early Colour
One of the most fascinating (yet misunderstood
and overlooked) aspects of silent cinema his
tory is that of colour technology and aesthet
ics. Like early sound, colour was incorporated
with the black-and-white image through a variety of
processes. From the turn of the last century through
the end of the 1920's, applied colour processes
(hand-colouring, stencil, tinting and toning) were
used, often in combination. Later, 'natural colour'
processes (colour photographic reproduction) sur
faced in the form of such short-lived two-colour sys
tems as Kinemacolor, Multicolor, and Prizmacolor,
which had limited success but eventually failed due
to both technical and business related problems. At
the same time, colour processing was affected by
how silent film prints were generated, assembled and
distributed. Several distinct techniques, including
positive cutting, joining separate negative rolls, and
producing a cut negative, determined when the col
our process was carried out (either before or after the
release print was assembled for example).
Moreover, colour in silent film served a diverse
range of overlapping and sometimes contradictory
functions that could be motivated by both aesthetic
considerations (as an attraction in its own right; to
enhance realism and replicate the natural world ac
cording to established norms; purely sensual, im
pacting the spectator's emotions and senses; as a
stylistic and narrative storytelling device) and com
mercial factors (a means of product differentiation;
random effects of distribution or exhibition practices;
a marketing device to promote high-class pictures;
a vehicle for advertising consumer products, such as
fashion). The question of why colour was added to
black-and-white images may still be contentious. But
as Tom Gunning has underscored, colour's 'inva
sion' of everyday life since the mid-nineteenth cen
tury (through both mass culture and commercial
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Film History, Volume 21, pp. 3-6, 2009. Copyright ? John Libbey Publishing
ISSN: 0892-2160. Printed in United States of America
practice), constitutes, alongside mechanical repro
duction, one of the principal perceptual transforma
tions of modernity - one that threatened pre-existing
notions of elitist high culture. From the 1860s on
wards, colour's overarching influence and predomi
nance - its sensual rather than rational nature - was
such that it was a force to be reckoned with and even
elicited fear. Colour was thought to be dangerous
because it represented the emerging mass culture:
a 'chromocivilization', in which colour was not only 'a
power in itself, but one which opposed the traditional
values of the monochromatic black-and-white world.
Placed within the historical context of moder
nity, colour becomes a focal point for the vast spec
trum of aesthetic and scientific inquiry taking place
throughout the late nineteenth and early twentieth
centuries, one which intersected such diverse fields
as medicine (as in chromotherapy), chromolithogra
phy, textiles and fashion, advertising, window display
and interior design, art and architecture, and, of
course, the cinema. Not surprisingly, colour has al
ways been a challenging and elusive subject for film
historians. Equally relevant are the numerous tech
nological and financial challenges faced by preser
vationists and curators, who through attempts to
photochemically and digitally restore the colours of
the silents, confront ethical and practical questions
that have an enormous impact on how scholars and
viewers interpret what they see. Through restoration
projects and special conference and festival screen
ings, preservationists and curators have taken initial
steps towards bringing colour to the black-and-white
world of silent cinema; however, they have done so
largely in isolation behind laboratory doors. This is
not to ignore significant collaborative efforts at con
ferences, seminars, and publications that address
colour in silent cinema, nor individual restoration
projects that have benefited from the expertise and
4 FILM HISTORY Vol. 21 Issue 1 (2009) Kim TomadjoglOU

I knowledge contributed by both scholars and preser I tern slides, paper print toners, and English and Ger
vationists, but simply to point out the current need man chemists experimenting with new organic dyes,
within the entire moving image community to im but also explains how these dyes were used in the
prove our approach to preserving and restoring the laboratory and then applied to film. Read's detailed
colour of the silent cinema, and to enrich its scholarly and informative explanation and analysis of the dif
inquiry, investigation, and instruction as well. ferences among the various techniques and proc
The international conference 'II Coloure nel esses of early colour (hand-colouring, stencil, tint,
Cinema Muto' (The Colour of Silent Cinema) held in tone and experiments with two-colour processes and
Udine, Italy, 23-25 March 1995, and the forthcoming imbibition printing systems like Technicolor) pro
'Colour and the Moving Image: History, Theory, Aes vides an invaluable resource for both preservation
thetics, Archive', to be held in Bristol, UK, 10-12 July ists and scholars, as does his personal database of
2009, are specific events in which the topic of early original recipes and references for these colour proc
colour was, or will be, jointly addressed by archivists, esses.
preservationists and scholars. In general, the Euro In his survey of the Technicolor Corporatio
pean community of preservationists and academics notebooks at the George Eastman House, chemis
is significantly ahead of their North American coun and preservationist Ulrich Ruedel narrows the d
terparts. Numerous publications, special work cussion by exploring how early Technicolor evolv
shops, conferences, and joint projects attest to an within the context of the development of early a
ongoing dialogue with regard to issues of colour in tive and subtractive, two- and three-colour system
silent cinema. I do wish to note that these two special An overview of the documents and artifacts in
issues of Film History were inspired by an AMIA collection is provided and three of the notebooks
conference panel dedicated to early colour that I explored in detail. Curator Thomas Christens
organized in Austin, Texas in November 2005. Spe raises specific concerns about the numerous phi
cial thanks to Josh Yumibe, and to Anthony L'Abbate sophical, practical, and ethical decisions that info
and David Pierce for help with the colour illustrations. moving image restoration, and explains why cert
David's photo essay 'Advertising Colour Films to the techniques were used for restoring a selection o
American Film Industry' appears in the colour insert Danish silents, including the specific case of the 1
section. feature film Atlantis, where electronic distributi
We cannot afford to ignore how colour has (High Definition DVD) was the driving force for car
been reproduced in the laboratory over the past thirty ing out a digital restoration.
years, nor how we will confront the problems of Why certain colours appear in different ver
colour reproduction, and to what degree economic, sions of a film and what these colours signify is
commercial and industrial factors may drive our de question raised by preservationist Nicola Mazzant
cisions in the future. In these two issues of Film who confronts the issue of the relationship betw
History, an international array of preservationists, ar colours and their audiences by analyzing the com
chivists, and scholars come together to present a mon practice of producing multiple versions of a fil
wide and diverse selection of historical research For Mazzanti, the technological and aesthetic histo
projects that examine a range of topics encompass of the colour of the silents must take into account n
ing the technological, aesthetic and cultural history only different aesthetics and aesthetic experienc
of early colour. While by no means exhaustive, the but different systems and modes of representatio
range of approaches and perspectives on early col Moreover, Mazzanti's in-depth and systematic ana
our presented here can serve as a springboard for sis of films produced by Film d'Arte Italiana in t
launching a closer dialogue between the archival and years 1910-1917 provides an exemplary case f
academic communities as we continue to rethink considering the polemical question, 'can one d
efforts to preserve and conserve moving image his nitely discuss the use of colour as a stylistic and
tory in written, filmic, and now digital form. narrative device by viewing contemporary resto
Simple questions often have very complex ex tions of early unique silent films?'
planations, as preservationist Paul Read demon Early colour techniques developed an
strates when he answers the question 'where did evolved through the ingenuity of pioneers, such
colour technologies originate?' Read not only pro Spanish animator and special effects artist Segun
| vides a comprehensive history, beginning with Ian de Chom?n, who as early as 1902-1904 tinted fil

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 Introduction: Early Colour FILM HISTORY Vol. 21 Issue 1 (2009) 5
role (based on purely sensual colour and metaphor)
for Path? while still living in Spain. Joan M. Minguet
Batllori provides a much needed account of to demonstrate how tropes used by these
in order
Chom?n's career interest and investigation ofearly
earlypioneers became the focus of later debates and
concerns
colour techniques. After being lured to Paris by Path? about the relation of colour and sound to
in 1905 it was Chom?n's attraction-based films thatand the spectacular.
realism
were first informed by colour, but he soon went on Kaveh
to Askari examines the cross-medial con
explore and incorporate colour into more elaborate
text of early colour films, as exemplified by silent
narratives, where it took on different functions.
pioneer Alexander Black's long career working with
Batllori provides a context for Chom?n's latercolour
colourin photography, the publishing industry, and
amateur
work for Giovanni Pastrone's Itala film company, as film. Black's media work encompassed
well as his own production of La natura a color?both
(1923)
his public and private life, in the form of lectures
made with a bichrome mechanical colouring and system
books, as well as personal images documenting
obtained from Swiss engineer E. Zollinger. his family. Askari looks at how, in his 'colour craft',
The garment industry was closely related Blacktomerged these two spheres by combining fa
early colour cinema, with which it shared similar
milial based amateur films (inspired by personal
technological, aesthetic and ideological roots.memories,
In his ancestry, and fantasy trick devices) with
analysis of the fashion newsreel genre of thepractical
1910s technical experimentation in the form of
and 1920s, which begins the second of our twoprinting, projecting and colour processes.
various
special issues on early colour, Eirik Frisvold Hanssen
Askari demonstrates how Black successfully built a
explores how stencil-coloured and 'natural colour'
career as art director and Sunday editor for the
fashion newsreels functioned as part of a common illustrated New York World by promoting and featur
discourse in which colour was associated with ingthe
these technologies while remaining a popular
spokesperson in the debate about the potential
notion of the 'feminine' within contemporary visual
and commercial culture. moral harm caused by the proliferation of colour and
While a host of 'natural' or photographically
illustration in American popular culture.
produced colour processes emerged during the At the turn of the last century, popular experi
silent period, for a variety of reasons most did not with colour often explored its various
mentation
survive in the long-term, whatever their impact on theand influences in relation to psychological
meanings
development and expansion of the motion picture and physiological effects on viewers' perceptions
industry. Luke McKernan describes how British and Roy
emotions. This line of inquiry is evident in the
alty played a principal role in the international
worksuc
of such pioneering film technicians as Charles
cess of Kinemacolor, which wooed a high-class Francis Jenkins, who designed the Phantoscope film
audience and emerged as the world's first commerprojector and experimented with early colour im
cially viable natural-colour motion picture system
agery, and Loyd Jones, who worked during the
1920s at the Kodak Research Laboratories. Jones
through its theatrical presentation, display of colour
ful British pageantry, and royal endorsement and colour techniques and theorized both
developed
cooperation. applied and natural colour systems, exploring the
The British film industry of the 1920s and early various meanings and influences of colour in relation
1930s witnessed the emergence of a number of later to its psychological and physiological effects. Josh
natural colour processes, including Cinechrome, Yumibe describes how these aspects of Jenkins's
Prizmacolor, Spectracolour and Raycol. It was also and Jones' work should be understood within the
a period in which intellectual debates circulating context of a modernist tradition of colour and ab
about sound and colour were engaged by an emerg straction, and as such constitute a form of 'popular'
ing breed of British intellectuals, who revived the or 'vernacular' experimentation. Jenkins's discus
earlier realist/spectacle discourse about British na sion of film tinting methods in his 1898 volume Ani
tional production that had been promoted by silent mated Pictures, and Jones' 1924 kaleidoscopic
pioneers seeking to create a sense of patriotic ap device 'for producing and recording mobile color
peal for a slumping British film industry. Simon Brown effects' in film, are shown to be representative of a
applies Tom Gunning's analysis, in which colour in broadly construed 'synaesthetic' approach to colour
early motion pictures shares both an indexical role that was crucial not only for experimental modes of
(based on a realist perspective) and a spectacular filmmaking, but was central to how colour in the

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6 FILM HISTORY Vol. 21 Issue 1 (2009) Kim Tomadjoglou

cinema had been thought about since the emer by women, who were given the opportunity to dem
gence of the medium. onstrate they had the patience, talent, and attention
In 1923, Jacques Mayer, a prot?g? of Charles to detail required. At the young age of fourteen,
Path?, became manager of Path? Cinema's Joinville Germaine Berger worked as a colourist in the Path?
factory just outside of Paris. St?phanie Salmon, ar Joinville studio's colouring workshop. Screenwriter
chivist at the Foundation J?r?me Seydoux-Path? and director Jorge Dana's 1984 interview with Ber
(Paris), briefly describes Mayer's notebook (ca. ger, translated by Niki Kolaitis, provides a first-hand
1910-1927) where an overview of the factory's work account of working conditions and colour practices
shop procedures (manufacturing methods, proc experienced by the women employed by Path?. It
esses and equipment) and details of the Joinville also reveals how women's social relationship to the
plant's colour chemical formulas are explained. A cinema was limited to employment rather than leisure
sample from a collection of hand-written tinting (te activity.
inture) and toning (virage) recipes found in Mayer's
notebooks is reproduced.
Most early colour production work was done Kim Tomadjoglou

Film History 21,4 (2009)

"ssueT/"9 Film HistorV 21' 2 <2009>
Call for Ear|y dolour Part 2
Edited by Kim Tomadjoglou
Films and Filming
Edited by Richard Koszarski
papers
Film History 21,3 (2009)
Producers and Directors
Edited by Janet Bergstrom

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