Hand-colouring of photographs
Hand-colouring refers to any method of manually adding colour to a monochrome photograph, generally either to heighten the realism of the image or for artistic purposes. Hand-colouring is also known as hand painting or overpainting.
A hand-coloured daguerreotype by J. Garnier, c. 1850
Original monochrome photo
Hand-coloured version
A typical ad for a photographic colorist, Seattle, 1917
Color photography is a type of photography that uses media capable of capturing and reproducing colors. By contrast, black-and-white or gray-monochrome photography records only a single channel of luminance (brightness) and uses media capable only of showing shades of gray.
The first color photograph made by the three-color method suggested by James Clerk Maxwell in 1855, taken in 1861 by Thomas Sutton. The subject is a colored ribbon, usually described as a tartan ribbon.
A color photograph made by Gabriel Lippmann in the 1890s, containing no pigments or dyes of any kind.
A 1908 Autochrome Lumière photograph of American author Mark Twain.
A 1914 color photograph of the Taj Mahal published in a 1921 issue of National Geographic magazine.