The international photographer (Jan-Dec 1935)

August, 1935 The INTERNATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER / hree Just Another Color Process? By Milton M. Moore 330NG ago, when the movies were new in Holly'" wood (so the story goes) a young writer jour neyed from the east to the land of the Cahuengas. He came with a great idea which was not only an idea but a working continuity of the idea, which the young man believed would furnish the plot for the world's greatest movie. In due course, the young man and the script were ushered into the presence of the Producer. The writer enthusiastically described his art and, with a dramatic gesture, laid the script on the Producer's desk. The Producer (so the story goes) coldly surveyed the young man, nonchalantly brushed the script aside, leaned back in his chair, took a couple of good drags on the Perfecto and said: "So, young man, you come in here with an idea with a script wrapped around it and try to sell me something. You try to sell me a script. Well, young man, let me tell you, I already got one!" The color situation in Hollywood today is somewhat comparable — Hollywood has a color process. This is as it should be. Technicolor has spent a tremendous amount of energy and money in bringing color to the screen. That organization has done more to advance the color art in motion pictures than has any other similar organization. By their success color has been popularized and the public interest stimulated. The race is to the swift. Much ballyhoo, in the form of publicity for new color processes, has come out of Hollywood. Exaggerated claims have not developed much of great value and so many "perfected" processes have failed to deliver that new methods are referred to as "Technicolor and the other fellows." While public interest in and demand for color quickens the producer's interest in new developments lessens. He has been fooled too often. He has a color process available, which brings no technical processing grief to his laboratory. He can pay for it and it is good. All of which explains why those who have developed the process about to be discussed have kept away from the studios and have avoided making any claims publicly. Having spent some twenty years behind a moving picture camera, we did not realize that there was any other business of importance, where real money was available for improved methods. Much to our surprise and delight we discovered for the first time a vast new world of industry beyond the walls of moviedom. Our color process has stood the acid test in the commercial world. It is being used by hard boiled men of business simply because they can make money out of it. The process is simplicity itself. All of the color range is produced from two negatives which are made by the bi-pack method. It is a subtractive method, the front negative being of a special type and characteristic not ordinarily employed in this method ; the rear negative is standard pan-chromatic. Any ordinary still camera using cut him may be em ployed ; any movie camera fitted with a bi-pack color plate may be used. We have made exposures with a roll film type camera simply by rolling the two negatives together. No lens filters are needed. No more illumination is required than for black and white, excepting that, as in all color photography, interiors must be illuminated by sources having full color range emanations. Exposure latitude is the same as black and white — the better the negative the better the color. The writer is at present using a 5x7 Graflex and making speed at .550 of a second with a lens aperture of F:4.5. Close-up still life is photographed with the same outfit at .15 of a second at F:.ll. Negatives are always developed to a normal black and white gamma in a developer giving a long tone gradation scale and fine grain. No excessive contrast is necessary. Positives are always of normal gamma, brilliant, with excellent gradation, tone, detail and drawing. The most subtle shades of monochrome color values are retained. The process is essentially a chemical development, embracing some new elements in photo processing. These formulae, for various reasons, are not made public. In the case of motion pictures, prints are made on Eastman's duplicating stock and processed in machines. Not being at the present time in the motion picture business, we have not produced any pictures by this method. Processing machines for 16 mm. subjects will be available in the near future. Our present efforts are directed toward natural color photography in the field of lithographing, illustrating and advertising, the making of transparencies and lantern slides for educational purposes and color reproductions. When and if we enter the motion picture field we will be in a position to deliver all the colors at a price which will be something new and startling in Hollywood. The process, being based on proper photographic monochrome color values, is heir to the inherent photographic variables. Color processing adds to these difficulties only to the degree of stability of the processing solutions, which have about the stability and life of the average developer. Blue, green, yellow, orange and red in various shades are easily and faithfully reproduced. The delicate compound colors in the lighter shades are more difficult. This is especially true of lavender and purple, which result from almost perfect negatives and positives and careful color processing. No attempts have been made to finance a large scale enterprise. We prefer to expand slowly, building as we go by means of capital earned. We are not in the experimental stages of development. Our problems now are the same as those which any new business must encounter — costs, sales, profits ; and Business is good — thank you ! 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