Wednesday, May 06, 2009

In Living Color


I am a purist by nature and by training as a visual journalist. For these reasons, the thought of colorizing images instantly strikes me in a negative tone. However, when I reflect on the many Civil War period photographers who tinted cartes de visite, or employed colorists to artfully add a bit of pigment to enhance a black and white image, my gut instinct is challenged. Moreover, when I consider the value of examining images from different perspectives, and realizing the power of modern technology (in this case, scanners and Photoshop), my curiosity is aroused. What did these soldiers look like in living color? We'll never see these men exactly how they appeared. But, thanks to Photoshop, as shown here in this carte de visite of Maj. Edward Burgin Knox (left) and Capt. Alexander McRoberts of the Fourty-fourth New York Infantry, we can get an idea of what they might have really looked like.

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