Colourised Seafire?

[Etiennedup]

This enclosed image appears on the cover of the book  " The Disastrous Fall and Triumphant Rise of the Fleet Air Arm from 1912 to 1945"

by Henry 'Hank' Adlam

Although very nice it looks colourised to me................do you agree?

 

 

[Fernando]

Hi, Etiennedup,

 

Agree, "looks like" colorized.

 

FErnando

 

[Bedders]

Looks colourised to me too. I've seen the black & white version in a few places, and this "colour" one just looks odd.

 

Justin

Edited March 27, 2018 by Bedders

[Max Headroom]

Colourised. If you zoom in on the ship in the background it’s black and white.

 

Nice photo though.

 

Trevor

[ClaudioN]

You can find the black and white original on www.iwm.org.uk, search for reference number A 17996 in the picture collection.

The nice thing is that colourising makes the winged trident emblem of No. 801 Sqn. better visible below the cockpit.

 

Claudio

 

[Etiennedup]

Aha!....thanks Claudio.

..............and here it is in all its B/W glory.

 

[JPuente54]

I noticed that the ship in the background is b&w as well. Still, as Claudio mentioned; the squadron emblem does stand out better in the colourised photo.

Joe

[Finn]

Here is another example of a colour adjusted image:

 

 

Jari

[Kallisti]

Colour adjustment is better than colourised as at least there is some colour information in the photo that can be brought back to life using appropriate filters, especially if you can match the 'faded' colours to the correct colour. Most photographic emulsions will fade and deteriorate over time, so it is totally sensible to colour correct using other reference materials.

 

In the above example you have grass, sky, roundel red and other colours that can be colour matched to acceptable values, which can then be used to calculate the RGB losses due to fading and therefore restore the overall photo back to something approaching a real photo. I think the colours in the restored are a little too saturated for the weather conditions - its overcast, its unlikely the grass would appear THAT green in my opinion, however its not that big a deal.

 

Colourisation like in the upper photo is pretty much a work of fantasy and guesswork. Yes you know what some colours SHOULD look like, but in a greyscale image, ALL colour information has been lost. It is not possible to infer different colours from different shades of grey - there is no colour information left! The same shade of grey could be representing any number of real colours, all you are seeing is the relative light intensity of the surface, the spectral information has gone.

Edited March 27, 2018 by Kallisti

[tempestfan]

9 hours ago, Kallisti said:

Yes you know what some colours SHOULD look like, ...

On all three screens I used to look at the "original" image, it looks decidedly greenish and brownish. While the greenish hue may be compatible with DSlateG, I am not that sure about brownish EDSG, even on a well used airframe.

[Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies]

10 hours ago, JPuente54 said:

I noticed that the ship in the background is b&w as well. Still, as Claudio mentioned; the squadron emblem does stand out better in the colourised photo.

Joe

 

The ship in the background is King George V class battleship HMS Duke of York, the battleship which displayed absolutely remarkable gunnery in the Battle of North Cape on Boxing Day 1943 against German schlachtschiff Scharnhorst in darkness using radar range finding at 30,000 yards range and in seas heavy enough to have forced Scharnhorst's destroyer escorts to stay behind. The cruiser HMS Belfast also played a notable role, but there were more cruisers and destroyers present in the British ambush of Scharnhorst's intended convoy raid.

[Kallisti]

35 minutes ago, tempestfan said:

On all three screens I used to look at the "original" image, it looks decidedly greenish and brownish. While the greenish hue may be compatible with DSlateG, I am not that sure about brownish EDSG, even on a well used airframe.

 

Don't look at the camo colours which we all know are not constant, bbut look at the colours of other things in the photo, eg sky, grass the wing roundels etc which tend towards a more constant and reliable colour

[tempestfan]

I meant the Seafire in the opening post - should have clarified this better than with the ambiguous "original"...

[Kallisti]

Ahh well you are on even trickier ground there as any colour you see is something that your brain is adding as there is no colour information in the photo. Its black and white - there is no green, brown, red or anything. Because you've seen aircraft or photos with those colours before, your brain is trying to impose those colours on something that has no colour. You cannot infer colour hues from black and white tones, the information simply isn't there. The only thing you can be sure of is one area is lighter or darker than another - thats it!

 

Everyone is familiar with the RGB colour table, but another way of mapping colours is HLS, Hue, Lightness and Saturation. In this the Hue value tells you one part of the colour information, the bit that says what general colour it is on the red-blue-yellow scale, while the saturation determines the strength of the colour ie whether its a muddy green or bright green while the lightness describes the actual brightness of the image. In a B/W image the Saturation and Hue values have been turned down to zero, leaving just the lightness value. You can take that photo into any photo editing software and check - there is absolutely no colour information in the photo, therefore any 'colour' you see is your own interpretation and there is no factual basis for it.

[Etiennedup]

Here is the original colour slide as it appears in the Library and Archives Canada  (just click on the fuzzy image)

http://collectionscanada.gc.ca/lac-bac/results/images?form=image&lang=eng&FormName=Image+Search&PageNum=1&SortSpec=score+desc&HighLightFields=title%2Cname&Language=eng&QueryParser=lac_mikan&Sources=mikan&Archives=&ShowForm=show&SearchIn_1=&SearchInText_1=Seafire&Operator_1=AND&SearchIn_2=&SearchInText_2=&Operator_2=AND&SearchIn_3=&SearchInText_3=&Media[]=1200&Level=&MaterialDateOperator=after&MaterialDate=&MaterialDate=&DigitalImages=1&Source=&cainInd=&ResultCount=50

[Britman]

For all those that wish to have flaps down on their Spitfire / Seafires check the wooden wedges setting the flaps for a shorter take off. This was often used when re supplying Malta with replacement aircraft. 

Edited March 28, 2018 by Britman

[noelh]

1 hour ago, Britman said:

For all those that wish to have flaps down on their Spitfire / Seafires check the wooden wedges setting the flaps for a shorter take off. This was often used when re supplying Malta with replacement aircraft. 

Yes that's interesting. A bit of lateral thinking on the part of someone. Just proving once again that the Seafire wasn't exactly an ideal carrier aircraft. With its fully down or fully up flaps.

 

On the issue of colourising photos. I do feel that it's helpful in some ways because it can bring out details otherwise lost in the greyscale. In this case the general scruffiness of this aircraft. Maybe it's because we are creatures who see in colours? 

[Graham Boak]

It is only brought out because the colouriser chose to do so.  There are enough signs of scruffiness on the b&w, but how exaggerated has he made these?