Historical Color Prints and Creating them today

[Mustafa Umut Sarac]

Ron ,

If Someone requested help from you about this Austrian Hungarian Banknote and asked an analog solution to his photographs which all colors might come from this banknote color family - expanded to all colors - what would you advise ?

Thank you ,

Umut

[holmburgers]

If someone requested help about this, I'd ask on APUG!

No but seriously, I'm contemplating an answer....

[holmburgers]

I think it's a difficult thing to consider, because the color is of this subject and so how can it be found in another subject?

But, to utilize the same palette, which is what you're asking, I don't know.

Superficially, it kind of resembles 2-color photography, but that's not a good enough answer.

One option would be to find dyes/inks/pigments that match these 3 colors (the orange, green and indigo) and assign color separations to these colors and print them. The result would be very strange, and muddy in places, but these color would be present.

Or, let's say you have a monochrome b&w positive. You could make an acidic mixture of these dye colors and paint them onto the picture where you want them. I dont' know the specific procedure, but if there is a mordant, the dye will be stronger where more silver is present. The silver can then be removed with a bleach. This is like F.E. Ive's dye-mordanting procedure, and kinda similar to Kodak Flexicolor.

Check the dye-transfer/carbon thread for Flexicolor. This might be the best way actually, since it melds the art of photography and painting.

But, I'm not sure if it is possible that these colors can expand to all colors. We know the requirements to reproduce all colors, and it's subtractive 3-color synthesis. These are not the subtractive primaries and therefore that is basically impossible. BUT, approximations will exist, and perhaps if your separations are made with filters that match these colors, unique results could be obtained.

It is a lovely banknote.