The gallant Pelham

[byron ed]

 

[jcrook]

View attachment 181304

A mounted John Pelham directs the fire of his men at Fredericksburg in Bronze Guns and Iron Men by Don Troiani

 

[Stony]

Gettysburg tintype. 2013. Mom and kids all have blue eyes. Notice the washed out eyes.

 

[Mike Serpa]

How can one tell what color a person's eyes are from a B&W image? Does the colorizer just have to guess? I've wondered the same thing about gold versus silver oak leaves on shoulder boards.

Here's the largest I could make his head. IIRC there are a couple threads here that have B&W color charts that equate to real color charts.

 

[Mike Serpa]

Perhaps @Zuzah knows about these things? I sure don't.

http://www.jaredjared.com/chroma.html

Edit: See posts 26 and 27 below.

 

[CW Watch & Sword Guy]

Perhaps @Zuzah knows about these things? I sure don't.
View attachment 181330
http://www.jaredjared.com/chroma.html

That chart doesn't make a lot of sense to me, Mike. It suggests that a red area should like white in a B&W image. Why? If so, what would a white area look like? Would the red and white stripes on an American flag blend together in a B&W image? I don't think so.

 

[Mike Serpa]

That chart doesn't make a lot of sense to me, Mike. It suggests that a red area should like white in a B&W image. Why? If so, what would a white area look like? Would the red and white stripes on an American flag blend together in a B&W image? I don't think so.

Thanks for calling me on the carpet. I should have said the chart I saw at CWT was similar to this and not exact. That's why I paged Zuzah. Sorry for the confusion.

 

[Zuzah]

Thanks for calling me on the carpet. I should have said the chart I saw at CWT was similar to this and not exact. That's why I paged Zuzah. Sorry for the confusion.

At least in Civil War era technology, reds would get washed out due to the emulsions used. Deep, dark colors wouldn't get picked up as well either - one such example is the difference between brown and blue eyes. Blue eyes come through light, transparent almost, while brown eyes are almost black, you can't see the detail because the camera wasn't sensitive to certain colors.

It's hard to explain, even harder when it was explained to you years ago, but that's the story as I got it.

 

[Zuzah]

Blue eyes from a tintype photo are washed out or ghostlike. The lighter the eye color the lighter they appear.
Pelham's don't so his eyes are prolly brown.

Pelham's eyes are still light enough that you can clearly distinguish the detail in his eyes. They were probably blue, maybe hazel, but definitely a light color.

 

[FarawayFriend]

Great find, @Andersonh1.
First thing that came to my mind is the famous quote by Robert E. Lee:
"It's glorious to see such courage in one so young!"
When I look at that photo, I can imagine what he meant.
Poor Pelham died much too young...



https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/04/01/the-gallant-pelham/

 

[rebelatsea]

I have not run across L. J. Hayes colorizations before, but the work done to colorize this photo of Major John Pelham is excellent. It really brings him to life in a way that the black and white original does not.

https://www.facebook.com/379724698876561/photos/rpp.379724698876561/884368385078854/?type=3&theater

I'ts a great job, but he looks about 19!

 

[redbob]

I'ts a great job, but he looks about 19!

He was 25 when he died and the blue eyes make him look more like the heartbreaker that he probably was.

 

[CW Watch & Sword Guy]

At least in Civil War era technology, reds would get washed out due to the emulsions used. Deep, dark colors wouldn't get picked up as well either - one such example is the difference between brown and blue eyes. Blue eyes come through light, transparent almost, while brown eyes are almost black, you can't see the detail because the camera wasn't sensitive to certain colors.

It's hard to explain, even harder when it was explained to you years ago, but that's the story as I got it.

Interesting. What about gold vs silver oak leaves on a shoulder board? Any hope of distinguishing those?

 

[CW Watch & Sword Guy]

Thanks for calling me on the carpet. I should have said the chart I saw at CWT was similar to this and not exact. That's why I paged Zuzah. Sorry for the confusion.

On second thought, putting my physicist's hat back on, perhaps the primitive emulsions they used had a frequency cut-off above the red. So IF the unexposed plate were white, then red light would keep it that way.

 

[Stony]

Somebody pull his war documents from fold three. Sometimes they put physical descriptions on those.

 

[kevikens]

I have been staring at that face for several minutes now and have been thinking how awful our Civil War was that this image, multiplied by a few hundred thousand, is the reflection of the stark truth that our young men, many of them looking just like him, were expected to kill other young men, looking just like him. Geeze, how I despise those men whose actions brought about that war.

 

[NH Civil War Gal]

I have been staring at that face for several minutes now and have been thinking how awful our Civil War was that this image, multiplied by a few hundred thousand, is the reflection of the stark truth that our young men, many of them looking just like him, were expected to kill other young men, looking just like him. Geeze, how I despise those men whose actions brought about that war.

Exactly. I keep coming back to look at his face - at least 6 times now - his eyes and determination are so compelling and so sad to think about all the thousands of smart, brave young men who died on either side. And not only them but all their unborn descendants who would have been born and contributed to the country.

 

[Equestriangirl93]

Thank you for posting.....Pelham has always been one of my favorites

 

[redbob]

I have been staring at that face for several minutes now and have been thinking how awful our Civil War was that this image, multiplied by a few hundred thousand, is the reflection of the stark truth that our young men, many of them looking just like him, were expected to kill other young men, looking just like him. Geeze, how I despise those men whose actions brought about that war.

The phrase back in the Viet Nam days was: An old man's war and a young man's fight.

 

[redbob]

Exactly. I keep coming back to look at his face - at least 6 times now - his eyes and determination are so compelling and so sad to think about all the thousands of smart, brave young men who died on either side. And not only them but all their unborn descendants who would have been born and contributed to the country.

It's called the Thousand yard stare from eyes that have seen too much.