In the 1980s, my daughter Jennifer asked point blank, “Daddy, when did the world turn into color?”
She was looking at a photo book from my parents, which, of course, was filled with black and white images.
Although we’ve had color images almost from the start of photography via hand tinting, for the majority of people, black-and-white was the default, and color was an aesthetic choice. But that changed with digital. Black-and-white digital images are shot in color first, meaning that with digital, it’s color by default, and black-and-white by choice.
When photography was invented in 1839, it was a black-and-white medium, and it remained that way for almost one hundred years.
By 1880, once the early technical hurdles had been overcome, portrait photographers began experimenting with color.
In 1935, while working at the Kodak Research Laboratories, Leopold Godowsky Jr. and Leopold Mannes ushered in the modern era of color photography by inventing Kodachrome.
After World War II, color film photography hit a cultural, technological, and commercial sweet spot, and there it flourished for several decades.
One of the earliest champions of color photographers, Ernst Haas, once explained,“Color is joy. One does not think of joy. One is carried by it”.
“Mere color, unspoiled by meaning, and unallied with definite form, can speak to the soul in a thousand different ways.” – Oscar Wilde
It wasn’t until 1954 that the first newspaper, the St. Petersburg Times, began using full color on its news pages; four years later, another Florida newspaper, the Orlando Sentinel, followed.
By 1979, 12 percent of American newspapers incorporated color, and by 1990, all but a few included color, at least partially in their publication.
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You haven’t changed much, Jack. I enjoyed your trip down Memory Lane focusing on the progression of color photography. 🙂
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You are too kind, Nancy! Interestingly, Dodie and I were just talking about you yesterday morning. How kind, witty and intelligent you are. Thank you.
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From the bottom of my heart, I appreciate your compliments. Thank you for keeping me well informed so I appear smarter! God bless you, Jack and Dodie, for your kind words. 🙂
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That was nice! I remember our transition from b&w television to a color TV, which happened for us in about 1972. I was a junior in high school. And what a perfectly logical thought – seeing b&w photos and thinking y’all grew up in a grayscale world.
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Oh. Follow on thought! Squirrel! The first several times I saw The Wizard of Oz, it was on our b&w TV. As a child, we watched in on TV every year around Easter time. Not sure why that was when it aired, but it was. So, I associated the two events with each other. In any case, when I finally saw it ‘in color’ – probably after I was married, which meant, like, I don’t know ’75 or so – I was SO AMAZED at how it made that switch from b&w to technicolor! WOW! 😎
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I had the same experience. Also in reverse. About 4 years ago our library has a $1 sale on DVD’S. We bought the Wizard of Oz.
Of course, we both knew when Dorothy opens the door after the house lands from the tornado spin, everything turns to color!
The DVD was probably worth .75 cents. All black & white.
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This one’s a real keeper; it is packed with so much American and personal memories, and photos that are just so cool. Our high school pictures were black and white, but you could opt to have them tinted. A few years later, my little brothers and sisters were of course, all in color. The Wizard of Oz, yes, after all those years of seeing it around Easter in black and white; suddenly, in Living Color!
I was wondering the other day just when photography began. In 1839, wow.
That first picture of your dad holding you–he looks like Elvis from the side. Nancy is right: you are totally recognizable!
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Thank you. Yes, both parents were big Elvis fans. They were so excited when I went to Memphis in 1976 and interviewed him.
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good post, lots of the pictures brought back memories from my wonderful past, i have lots of B&W pictures of my father and mothers family, don’t care what anyone says, i will take the simpler past over now time any day, i see this digital world we live in an annoyance
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Agree. Agree. Agree.
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