Once I received a wedding announcement in a form of a photograph taken after the wedding ceremony on a beach in Jamaica. I could not resist to put them into a Costarican church.
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When in Kenya in 1983 on a photographic safari I took a picture of two brindled gnu or wildebeest, (Connochaetes taurinus taurinus) The picture was very flat and dull. I printed the slide on graphic arts film as a black and white negative. From this negative I made a large b/w paper print, then immersed this into yellow food coloring. When satisfied with the yellow coloration, the print was partially immersed into red food coloring. To achieve the darker upper part I immersed it into blue food color. To avoid straight lines I continuously moved the paper. Today I can achieve this effect much easier on the computer.
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The
original photo
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The
end result
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At the turn of the Century photographers liked the warm tones. This could be achieved two ways, first using special developing solutions. The color could be controlled to accomplish, from yellowish brown to brownish black color depending on the dilution of the developing solution, developing time and temperature. The other way is to have a black and white photograph, before toning soaked them for about 30 minutes then put them into a fading solution, wash for 5 minutes, then tint for about 5-15 minutes, then wash again for minimum 20 minutes. The tinting chemicals could be bought packaged in photo stores, but when I first started to use this process we had to measure and mix all our developers and tinting solution. When I worked with sepia toning in the photo lab, everyone nearby knew it, because of the very strong sulfuric smell which resembles rotten eggs. Today the same effects can be done on a computer in minutes, and the final results are very much controlled. Below there are examples from the 1920's of various toning. From the photographs I can't establish which techniques were used, but each photographer had a shade and tone preference.
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| Toning the picture "frogs" took me about 2 minutes compared to the lengthy procedure in the old days. Just the soaking, fading, tinting took about an hour. After this came the drying procedure on chrome plate or on a sheet of glass. |
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If you have photo restoration questions, ask me
