Two women and a young boy next to a balcony of roses at the Trutat chalet, Foix in the Midi-Pyrénées of France.
The autochrome was taken ca. 1903 by Eugène Trutat, via Bibliothèque de Toulouse Commons on flickr.
Look, Delia, how w’ esteem the half-blown rose
The image of thy blush and summer’s honour. . .— Samuel Daniel, from “Delia 31“
“Woman and child in a field in front of a white house,” an autochrome taken between 1906 and 1942, by Arnold Genthe, via Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division.
“If an autochrome was well made and has been well preserved, color values can be very good,” according to the Wikipedia entry on this early color photography technique.
“The dyed starch grains are somewhat coarse, giving a hazy, pointillist effect, with faint stray colors often visible, especially in open light areas such as skies. The smaller the image, the more noticeable these effects are. The resulting “dream-like” impressionist quality may have been one reason behind the enduring popularity of the medium even after more starkly realistic color processes had become available.”
. . . The trees rustle
and whisper, shimmer and hiss.— Amy Gerstler, from “Bon Courage“
“Girl with carnations,” ca. 1915, an autochrome by Charles C. Zoller, via George Eastman House Collection on flickr.
Zoller was an American from Rochester, New York, who worked in the first decades of the 20th century. The George Eastman House holds almost 4,000 of his autochrome plates.
Another wonderful photo of (April 1945) pink is here.
“Glass dish with classical figures, ceramic bowl and vase of flowers,” ca. 1915, an autochrome by H. Wormleighton, via George Eastman House Collection on flickr.
I couldn’t find out anything about H. Wormleighton except that he or she was English and worked in the first three decades of the 20th century.
Detail of first photo.
“Schoolchildren with teachers under Magnolia trees on Oxford* Street,” c. 1910, an autochrome by Charles C. Zoller, via George Eastman House Collection on flickr.
Click on the photo to get a better look. I like the outfits, particularly that of the little girl on the far right.
The Collection describes the process of making an autochrome like this:
After decades of wishing for a practical color process, photographers were thrilled when Auguste and Louis Lumière announced the invention of the autochrome process. . . in 1904. The process used a screen of tiny potato starch grains dyed orange-red, green and violet. Dusted onto a glass plate, the dyed grains were covered with a layer of sensitive panchromatic silver bromide emulsion. As light entered the camera, it was filtered by the dyed grains before it reached the emulsion. While the exposure time was very long, the plate could be processed easily by a photographer familiar with standard darkroom procedures. The result was a unique, realistic, positive color image on glass that required no further printing.
*Commenters on the image’s flickr page thought the cross street in the picture was either Harvard St. or Brighton St.
enclos*ure 