When was the earliest Maori photographic portrait taken?

Originally the earliest Maori photographic portrait was thought to be that of Caroline and Sarah Barrett taken ca. 1853.Ref: A71.462. https://lnkd.in/gi_3Z7f

A recent finding has now revealed an earlier portrait - that of Hemi Pomara taken in 1846 by Antoine Claudet. The hand tinted daguerreotype portrait of Hemi was taken in London (Hemi was taken to Britain in the 1840s). This portrait is in the National Library of Australia's collection and was identified by Elisa deCourcy and Martyn Jolly as part of their research for their forthcoming publication Empire, Early Photography and Spectacle: the global career of showman daguerreotypist J.W. Newland (Routledge, November 2020). See their article in the Conversation

https://lnkd.in/gDrQ-Vd

Kelburn Normal School Centenary dramatic colour photo transformation

I am busy scanning Kelburn Normal School class photos for the Centenary celebrations to be held in May 2014.  In the 1970s school photographers started offering school photos in black and white and colour. I can see why they did both...they were not sure about the stability of colour photographic processes.....this one is from 1977...

It looked a little red...I was delighted to discover that it responds well to a bit of photoshop magic!

 

 

For information about the reunion go to  http://www.kelburnnormalschool100.com/index.html or the facebook page  at https://www.facebook.com/KelburnNormalSchoolCentenary

Early colour photography





Sergey Prokudin-Gorskii

One of the most amazing collections of early colour photographs is held by the Library of Congress, known as the Sergey Prokudin -Gorskii collection.  These early colour photos were not easily viewable because the images were made up of three separate black and white glass plates which had been shot simultaneously with three separate lenses covered with a different coloured filter-  red, green and blue.  The colour image was formed when the plates were combined in a specialist viewer.  It is believed Gorskii's camera was similar to one developed by Miethe in 1903.   Between 1909 and 1915  Gorskii travelled around Russia documenting the country at the time producing both colour and sepia images. He managed to leave the country with around half of his collection that was later bought by the Library of Congress. 

 

 

In 2000 the Library started scanning these images and many have now been restored, using the process of digichromatography.  http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/empire/making.html 

 

 

One of the striking things about these images is the fact they are so real, yet they document a time that we most commonly see in black and white or sepia. 

 

 

View of Vitebsk taken in 1912

 

 

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