Colorized History is a collection of photographs from the past completely recolored and restored to see what life was like long ago. Many photo editing enthusiasts and experts have measured themselves with history and creativity to give us back the colors that we have never seen.
Until a few years ago a documentary on TV it looked black and white. The photographs of the great-grandmother Maria, what to pick up had to use the tip of your fingers in the corners, were in black and white. Then came the colors and changed the way to re-live past events.
In recent years many historical footage and photographic evidence passed through the skilled hands of video editors and graphics and have acquired a new identity, telling a part of the past that did not even know existed.
Yeah, I know… colors have always been there, but I must admit that for me it's like the past had always been black and white. To disrupt this my (and not only my) vision were some history buffs thanks to photo editing software have leveraged their expertise to return the reality in technicolor.
It's called Colorized History and it's a very interesting project hosted on the platform Reddit who collects photographs in black and white, more or less known, converted into color. Many artists, technical and photography enthusiasts can participate and post revisions to color photographs also well known, I would say almost iconic, from photographers like Yousuf Karsh famous portrait of the personalities of the last century.
Because I love history and iconic photographs I wanted to post some examples of photographs that best document the events of the past and telling our story with a different interpretation, and perhaps more complete.
But there is always a “but” the controversy is around the corner and some community sites and many readers / users do not seem to like this distortion and consider the advent of color as a distortion of reality is not authorized and not respectful of the wishes of photographers.
Colorized History: The collection of photographs from the past in color
The American President Abraham Lincoln photographed by Alexander Gardner towards the end of the war, February 1865.
Stalin and Churchill in Livadia Palace during the International Conference of Yalta in February 1945.
Sigmund Freud, Austrian neurologist and psychoanalyst founder of psychoanalysis, photographed by Max Halberstadt in 1922 for the periodical New York Times. The original black and white photo comes from the archive of Life magazine.
The famous British artist, designer and writer William Morris considered one of the founders of the movement of Arts and Crafts, photographed at the age of 53 years.
Audrey Hepburn icon of film and fashion in 1953.
Edson Arantes do Nascimento the Brazilian legend of world football Pelè in São Paulo, 1958.
Thomas Alva Edison in New Jersey nel 1911
Louis Armstrong try in the dressing room of the Aquarium in New York before a concert, photographed by William P. Gottlieb in 1946.
Frank Lloyd Wright the famous and renowned architect drinking tea at Taliesin in Wisconsin 1955.
This picture is special for the location where it was taken, it would seem that Wright built Taliesin residence in Spring Green in 1914 to house his mistress Martha (Mamah) Borthwick Cheney. In the same year, the architect took the cook, Julian Carlton and his wife as servants, and two months after taking seven people died under the blows of an ax from the chef, including Wright's mistress and her two children. Later the same Carlton set fire to the house and killed himself. The motivations of the act are still unknown. Via
Otto Heinrich Frank attic above his office that hosted him and his family during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. This photo was taken on 3 May 1960, the day of the official opening of “Anne Frank House” (Anne Frank Huis) in Amsterdam.
The scientist Marie Curie, awarded the Nobel Prize for physics (with her husband Pierre Curie in 1903) photographed in 1905
The English writer Virginia Woolf photographed in 1902 by George Charles Beresford.
The American writer Edgar Allan Poe, 1848
“War is Hell“, this photograph you can find it in black and white in the article Iconic photos won the Pulitzer Prize.
Ernesto “Che” Guevara wounded in the arm photographed in Havana (Cuba) by Joe Scherschel in January 1959.
My dear photography or history enthusiast fun does not end here!
Guys from Colorized History are not the only ones who have dealt with color and restore luster to the photos of the past. This selection of GIF is realized by Jordan Lloyd with his site Dynamichrome has made an experiment very good looking and equally exciting recreating color the faces of many celebrities. Look here.
P.S.
In case you're wondering how you can make the colored versions of your family photos, you can watch the tutorial that produced one of the users who runs the official page Reddit: Mads Madsen.
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