Kodak Kodachrome 1922: The Earliest Colour Motion Film You Will Ever See

[Ghost]

Kodak’s 1922 Colored Film Test a sample of some of the earliest colour motion picture film you will ever see.


Recently I saw a piece of film at the George Eastman House International Museum of Photography and Film that mesmerized me. It was a test of Kodachrome color motion picture film from 1922. To provide context, the first full length color feature film did not appear until 13-years later (Becky Sharp). Watching this little film clip was like time travel for me!

I thought that it would be interesting to share during Oscar® week. In order to share we had to scan the original piece of film to create the version you will see below. That is where Kyle Alvut came in.





Kyle works in our Entertainment Imaging division, the movie people, and is an expert in motion picture film and digitization. I visited our labs to get the film scanned and was impressed with the technology there.





I knew that this little piece of footage was in good hands. I learned that the flicker that you will see is a result of two different things. First, early cameras were hand cranked, or hand wound, to feed the film through. This could result in slight variations in speed. Second, there could be uneven densities in the film itself because of its age. These two physical characteristics combine to produce the "flicker" that you see. There are digital enhancements that can be made to address this but we thought it better to keep this in its original form.

I wonder, who were the ladies in this test? Were they Kodak employees? What kind of lives did they lead? Those questions are lost to the ages.

So without further adieu, here from 1922, a full 7 years before the first Academy Award ceremony, is some of the earliest colour motion pictures that you will ever see.

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That was kind of like time travel wasn't it? What did you think?

UPDATE March 11, 2010: This just in from friend and fellow film geek Mike C. more information on this piece of footage from a Silent Film Festival site. Well done!

"In these newly preserved tests, made in 1922 at the Paragon Studios in Fort Lee, New Jersey, actress Mae Murray appears almost translucent, her flesh a pale white that is reminiscent of perfectly sculpted marble, enhanced with touches of color to her lips, eyes, and hair. She is joined by actress Hope Hampton modeling costumes from The Light in the Dark (1922), which contained the first commercial use of Two-Color Kodachrome in a feature film. Ziegfeld Follies actress Mary Eaton and an unidentified woman and child also appear.

George Eastman House is the repository for many of the early tests made by the Eastman Kodak Company of their various motion picture film stocks and color processes. The Two-Color Kodachrome Process was an attempt to bring natural lifelike colors to the screen through the photochemical method in a subtractive color system. First tests on the Two-Color Kodachrome Process were begun in late 1914. Shot with a dual-lens camera, the process recorded filtered images on black/white negative stock, then made black/white separation positives. The final prints were actually produced by bleaching and tanning a double-coated duplicate negative (made from the positive separations), then dyeing the emulsion green/blue on one side and red on the other. Combined they created a rather ethereal palette of hues."

Of Note:
This footage is from the George Eastman House collections. Preservation was completed by the museum's Motion Picture Department, a project of Sabrina Negri, a student in Eastman House's L. Jeffrey

Selznick School of Film Preservation and a recipient of the Haghefilm Foundation Fellowship.


Source 04/03/10

[redsin7]

Interesting

[jsimon8585]

really kool, never seen a video that old in color!

[curious observer]

Oh to wake up in 1920's Manhattan town...

[güttsfükk]

i find this video incredible.

when i look at how clear the image is i am reminded of these images : http://www.documentingreality.com/fo...-1912-a-60047/

[bdjackass318]

those women are hot! seriously though cool video

[URBANXENTITY]

nice !!!!

[Eaton]

Fantastic!

[güttsfükk]

i cant help but come back and view this video again and again.
there's just something about it.

[GODREKR]

Originally Posted by güttsfükk

i cant help but come back and view this video again and again.
there's just something about it.

It's the womenz! They're quite comely and mesmerizing aren't they?