It is an art in itself – bringing aging black and white Boeing photos to life with brilliant color.
And for 24-year old Frenchman Benoit Vienne who brings color to aviation, it is a passion that started years ago when playing historical video games. That passion was ignited when he discovered colorized photos on the internet.
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“Bringing black and white aviation to life” – Benoit Vienne
Check out the stunning work of Benoit Vienne as he expertly brings these black and white aviation images to full color.“The aim of the colorist is to bring back to life a moment that was captured through a photo. When you colorize, you bring back people to life, it’s a sort of second life for them,” explains Benoit.Which is your favourite image? Let us know in the comments section below. ?To see the full article go to: https://www.airlineratings.com/news/frenchman-brings-color-aviation/
Posted by Airlineratings.com on Monday, 29 October 2018
“I was so impressed by the feeling a colorized photo can bring.
“A lot of young people feel a bit disconnected when they see a black and white photo but when it’s colorized, the feeling is completely different.
“When you see a colorized photo, you feel close to the people. You connect.”
But it is far from a simple process taking hours of meticulous work.
“Colorizing a black and white photo can take a lot of time and sometimes you have to repair it first, says Mr. Vienne.
“The aim of the colorist is to bring back to life a moment that was captured through a photo. When you colorize, you bring back people to life, it’s a sort of second life for them.”
“Of course, most of the colorists (including myself) are trying to respect the colors of the past. When you are colorizing a photo of a soldier or an aviator, you have to respect the colors of the time.“
But first Mr. Vienne had to master photoshop – an art in itself.
“I started to colorize in early 2015 but it was really hard to use photoshop because it was the first time that I was using the program. “
But months of practice had paid big dividends with Mr. Vienne colorizing hundreds of military photos of British, French American, and German soldiers as well as civilian portraits and weddings.
For AirlineRatings.com Mr. Vienne has colorized hundreds of airline interior and aircraft pictures that have proved very popular with the website’s millions of followers.
Mr. Vienne has done work for Qantas and Boeing as well.
Many of the Boeing and McDonnell Douglas colorized images have also been donated back to Boeing’s Historical Archives.
And it is one thing to colorize a photo the research into the right colors is another.
One example is a wine bottle from 1955 in one image (below) that Mr. Vienne was able to research and get the correct color palette.
And the end result is many people do not believe that the photo has been colorized.
“Sometimes, a colorized photo can look so real that people say it isn’t colorized.”
AirlineRatings.com Editor-in-Chief Geoffrey Thomas says that Mr. Vienne’s work is extraordinary and he really does bring “color to aviation.”
“His work with skin tones is amazing. With so many colorized photos you know immediately that it is colorized but with Mr. Vienne’s it’s almost impossible to tell,” said Mr. Thomas.
“What thrills me is that great people and great moments in aviation are brought to life.”
“The photos are of Boeing heroes like Bill Allen, Tex Johnston, and Joe Sutter (below) father of the 747.”
“Each photo we now colorize of Boeing aircraft or people goes back to the Boeing Historical Archive,” said Mr. Thomas
The photo above took lots of research and fortunately Mr. Thomas had been in the Boeing archives and photographed some of the historic models in the foreground so Mr. Vienne had the right colors.
The photo above is of Sir Freddie Laker who fought the British establishment to launch his Skytrain service across the North Atlantic which revolutionized low-cost travel.
