this is a post i wrote as contributor to the amsterdam ad blog ‘something related to amsterdam’ column, originally posted on the 18th of may ’12…
foto chroma
The building in the foreground (shown above) is currently a rather expensive restaurant frequented mainly by wealthy american tourists staying at the ‘Renaissance Hotel’ (across the road) on the corner of the ‘Kattegat’ near Central Station in Amsterdam.
I have lived in the narrow street to the left for almost 20 years and (give or take a few cars, lots of sign posts and graffiti) this is basically what i still see everyday. The only big difference is that this colour image was taken almost 100 years ago by local photographer ‘Bernard F. Eilers’ whose ‘foto chroma eilers’ technique was one of the earliest and best of its kind.
To see more of his fascinating ‘Amsterdam in colour’ series, also worth a look is the enormous collection of the Amsterdam City Archive online: Stadsarchief.
Eilers was briefly celebrated for his work but soon overtaken by american competitors such as Kodak and Agfa, now themselves in turn, just a part of history…
see also this related post on the same subject, back in ’10
