This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (April 2010)

This article may contain original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding references. Statements consisting only of original research may be removed. More details may be available on the talk page. (April 2010)

An Agfacolor slide dating from the early 1940s. While the colors themselves have held up well, damage visible includes dust and Newton's rings.

Agfacolor was the name of a series of color film products made by Agfa of Germany. The first Agfacolor, introduced in 1932, was a film-based version of their Agfa-Farbenplatte (Agfa color plate),^[1] a "screen plate" product similar to the French Autochrome. In late 1936 Agfa introduced Agfacolor Neu (New Agfacolor), a pioneering color film of the general type still in use today.^[2] The new Agfacolor was originally a reversal film used for making "slides", home movies and short documentaries. By 1939 it had also been adapted into a negative film and a print film for use by the German motion picture industry. After World War II, the Agfacolor brand was applied to several varieties of color negative film for still photography, in which the negatives were used to make color prints on paper. The reversal film was then marketed as Agfachrome.

Agfacolor Neu, called simply Agfacolor after its predecessor had been retired, was the German response to Technicolor and Kodachrome. Like Kodachrome, introduced by Eastman Kodak in 1935, the new Agfacolor film was an "integral tripack" with three differently color-sensitized emulsion layers. Unlike Kodachrome, the corresponding color-forming dye couplers were made integral with each layer during manufacture, greatly simplifying the processing of the film: with Kodachrome, the dye couplers had to be introduced one at a time during a very complicated development procedure that required special equipment and could only be done at a Kodak processing plant.

History of Agfacolor[link]

Background[link]

Realizing they were at least one year behind their American competitors, German technicians decided to steer away from Kodak’s approach to capturing color images on film and invested on their own technology. Their work bore fruits in the summer of 1936, when chemical engineers of the Agfa company in Germany tested their new material Agfacolor at the swimming competition of the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin. Although the German technology promised the use of one and the same material for different purposes, ranging from photographic negative film for prints to photographic slides and motion picture films, it took another three years—until July 1939—for any German film studio to experiment with the film.

The Third Reich's Minister of Propaganda Joseph Goebbels was in a hurry. He admired Hollywood movies and examined them carefully in regular private screenings (sometimes with Adolf Hitler and his staff). Technicolor films such as The Garden of Allah (1936), A Star Is Born (1937) and Disney's Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937) made him realize that Hollywood feature films presented a threat to Germany's internal market and that Hollywood's dominance of color film technology should be matched, at least if Germany was serious about engaging in a cultural war with the U.S. and Britain.

[edit] Women Are Better Diplomats

It was not until the beginning of principal photography for Women Are Better Diplomats (German: Frauen sind doch bessere Diplomaten) a 1939 musical starring the popular singer/dancer Marika Rökk and actor Willy Fritsch that Agfacolor was used to shoot a major motion picture. The use of Agfacolor was reinforced by the top of the Nazi film industry, Reichsminister Joseph Goebbels, and the executives at UFA eventually gave in to his pressure. Agfacolor was then used throughout the entire film shoot of Women Are Better Diplomats.

Throughout the shoot, the film yielded mixed results as it was still very sensitive to different color temperatures caused by solar altitude at different times of the day. Thus, outdoor shots were difficult to handle: A lawn in front of a castle appeared completely yellow, later brown, then bluish. The technology was not fully developed yet, and Agfa labs were virtually using the shooting of the film as testing grounds for their new stock, continually changing the formula throughout the shoot based upon unsatisfactory results so that entire scenes had to be repeated once a new formula was being tested.

Meanwhile the production costs had risen from 1.5 to 2.5 million Reichsmarks. More than two years after its start date, Women Are Better Diplomats opened in October 1941. Despite its rather weak color quality, the film proved to be a major hit, earning more than 8 million Reichsmarks by the end of the war.

[edit] The Golden City

After the process's growing pains had been overcome throughout the production of Women are better diplomats, the following Agfacolor movies were shot and printed much quicker and with better results. The technology was improved at a rapid pace. Veit Harlan, perhaps the most prominent 'official' film director of the Third Reich, was allowed to shoot his next picture in Agfacolor. Between the summers of 1941 and 1942, Veit Harlan finished Die goldene Stadt (Eng: The Golden City), a dreamy propaganda fairytale starring his wife Kristina Söderbaum as a young, innocent country girl who comes to the golden city of Prague and is seduced by an unscrupulous gigolo.

The Golden City premièred at the Venice Film Festival in September 1942 and was awarded for its outstanding technical quality and actress Kristina Söderbaum won an acting award.

Shot by cameraman Werner Krien, who had done black-and-white pictures before, and assisted by special effects specialist Konstantin Irmen-Tschet (once in charge of the SFX camera in Fritz Lang’s Metropolis), the film displays an impressive symphony of colors.

Later Agfacolor films throughout the Third Reich[link]

Made for UFA's 25th Anniversary, Münchhausen (1943) was the third German feature film––out of over a dozen––to be produced using Agfacolor film between 1939 and 1945.

Other notable Agfacolor productions include Kolberg (1945), a dramatization of German resistance throughout the Napoleonic Wars and the regime's last major propaganda feature film.

A significant number of Agfacolor movies shot between 1939 and 1945 survived the war, but most of them exist only in fragments today.

Legacy after WWII[link]

Towards the end of World War II, large quantities of raw Agfacolor stock were seized by the Soviet Union and served as the basis for the Sovcolor process, which was widely used in the USSR and other Eastern bloc nations. One of the best-known Sovcolor films is War and Peace (1965-'67).

After the war, Agfa's former production plant at Wolfen was located in the Soviet occupation zone which was to become East Germany. For several years after the war, the Wolfen plant continued producing Agfacolor films, until in 1964 East Germany lost the licence to the Agfa brand name. From 1964 onwards, the plant was renamed into ORWO (short for Original Wolfen), producing color films under the name of ORWOcolor.

Agfacolor consumer products were also marketed in North America under the names Ansco Color and Anscochrome (from Agfa's U.S. subsidiary, Agfa Ansco, which was later merged with General Aniline and had the name changed to General Aniline and Film), but met with limited success.

Ansco Color was also used in Hollywood films, including some produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, where it later appeared under the handle of Metrocolor (the generic name used for all films processed by MGM's lab). Films shot in Ansco Color included The Man on the Eiffel Tower (1949), Brigadoon (1954), Kiss Me, Kate (1953), Seven Brides for Seven Brothers (1954) and Lust for Life (1956), the final film shot on this film stock.

In 1978, Agfa ceased production of color film based upon the original Agfacolor process, switching to Kodak's E-6 process.

Notes[link]

References[link]

• Coe Brian, Colour Photography: The First Hundred Years 1840–1940, Ash & Grant, 1978
• Gert & Nina Koshofer, Dr. Rolf Giesen, Friedrich-Wilhelm-Murnau-Stiftung, Wiesbaden, 2005
• www.pixpast.com a source for collectors of original 35mm and 16mm agfacolor film from 1936 to 1945.

James Pliny Whitney
The Hon. Sir James Pliny Whitney
6th Premier of Ontario
In office February 8, 1905 – September 25, 1914
Preceded by	George William Ross
Succeeded by	William Howard Hearst
Member of the Legislative Assembly
In office January 31, 1888 – September 25, 1914[1]
Preceded by	Theodore F. Chamberlain
Succeeded by	Irwin Foster Hilliard
Constituency	Dundas
Personal details
Born	(1843-10-02)October 2, 1843 Williamsburgh Township, Upper Canada
Died	September 25, 1914(1914-09-25) (aged 70) Toronto, Ontario
Political party	Ontario Conservative Party
Spouse(s)	Alice Park[2]
Religion	Anglican

Sir James Pliny Whitney, KCMG (October 2, 1843 – September 25, 1914) was a politician in the Canadian province of Ontario. Whitney was a lawyer in eastern Ontario, Conservative member for Dundas from 1888 to 1914, and the sixth Premier of Ontario from 1905 to 1914.

Early life[link]

Whitney was born in Williamsburgh Township in 1843 and attended Cornwall Grammar School before articling the law office of John Sandfield Macdonald in the 1860s, but did not resume his legal studies until 1871. He was called to the bar in 1875.

Early political career[link]

Whitney became leader of the party in 1896 taking it from a narrow, bigoted rump into a forward-looking party determined to build the province.

Premier of Ontario[link]

In the 1905 election, he led the Tories to victory for the first time in 33 years by defeating the Liberal government of George William Ross.

Statue of Sir James Whitney by Hamilton MacCarthy, Queen's Park, Toronto.

Whitney's government laid the basis for Ontario's industrial development by creating the Hydro-Electric Power Commission of Ontario, with Sir Adam Beck as its chairman and driving force. His government also passed the Workmen's Compensation Act and enacted temperance legislation. He also appeased the anti-Catholic, anti-French-Canadian sentiments of supporters of the Orange Order in his caucus (such as George Howard Ferguson) by passing Regulation 17. This regulation banned the teaching of French in schools beyond the first three years of school. The measure inflamed French-Canadian opinion across Canada, particularly in Quebec, and split the country as it entered World War I.

Death[link]

Whitney died in office shortly after winning the 1914 election.

References[link]

External links[link]

• Ontario Plaques - Sir James Pliny Whitney

v t e   Premiers of Ontario Macdonald · Blake · Mowat · Hardy · Ross · Whitney · Hearst · Drury · Ferguson · Henry · Hepburn · Conant · Nixon · Drew · Kennedy · Frost · Robarts · Davis · Miller · Peterson · Rae · Harris · Eves · McGuinty Book:Premiers of Ontario · Category:Premiers of Ontario · Portal:Ontario

v t e Leaders of the Progressive Conservative Party of Ontario and its antecedents Liberal-Conservative (1867-1873) Macdonald · Cameron Conservative (1873-1942) Cameron · Meredith · Marter · Whitney · Hearst · Ferguson · Henry · Rowe · Drew Progressive Conservative (1942-present) Drew · Kennedy · Frost · Robarts · Davis · Miller · Grossman · Brandt · Harris · Eves · Runciman · Tory · Runciman · Hudak

v t e   Attorney General of Ontario Attorneys-General of Upper Canada White · Gray · Scott · Firth · Robinson (acting) · G.D. Boulton · Robinson · H.G. Boulton  · Jameson  · Hagerman  · Draper Attorneys-General of the Province of Canada (Canada West) Draper · Baldwin · Richards · J.A. Macdonald · J.S. Macdonald Attorneys-General of Ontario J.S. Macdonald · Crooks · Mowat · Hardy · Latchford · Whitney · Foy · Lucas · Raney · Nickle · Price · Roebuck · Conant · Blackwell · Porter · Roberts · Cass · Wishart · Lawrence · Bales · Welch · Clement · McMurtry · Scott · Hampton · Boyd · Harnick · Flaherty · Young · Bryant · Bentley · Gerretsen