Bringing History to life...

[Alex K]

Talking of Royalty, three more

 

King, Father and Grandfather

 

George VI

George V

Edward VII

[922F]

Amazing set, Pieter!  Thank you for sharing your images.  Documents and original cases, of course, much rarer than the insignia which itself is very hard to find.  Is the case or star marked by Halley of Paris? If so and there's an address is it: 

1. 143 Galerie de Valois, Palais-Royal (c. Napoleon III period)
2. 5 Galerie Montpensier, Palais-Royal
3. 14 Galerie de Valois, Palais-Royal?

The address helps narrow down manufacture date.  Some sources suggest that A. Kretly also made Hawaiian insignia--their address would be 46 Galerie Montpensier, Palais-Royal, Paris in 1888. Besides these two, a San Francisco supplier provided some Order insignia allegedly manufactired in Paris by Lemaitre et Fils, 40 or 42 Rue Coquilliere. 

Thanks again Alex, as always, for your brilliant work!

 

[pieter1012]

Alex, feel free to keep the pictures on file. I took them so there is no copyright on them.

922F, both the case and breaststar are completely unmarked, so I cannot tell who the maker is. However, the breast star is very finely made, so I would suspect Kretly, who is known for it's fine work. I have added some more photo's so you can have a better look of the case and star.

Pieter

[Alex K]

Hi Pieter Thanks

 

regards

[922F]

Hello and Thank you Pieter!!  Excellent images!!

[Laurence Strong]

Very nice work Alex, love to research.

 

 

Cheers

Larry

[Alex K]

Hi Larry , thanks, when I first started colourising it was about blobbing bits of colour onto an image and hoping for the best, as times went on it became more about "Getting it as accurate as possible", this led onto actually researching the subject, which in turn became as interesting as the image itself.

 

regards

 

Alex

[piekenier]

Alex your work is amazing as always with great detail to the orders.!

[Alex K]

Hi Andy, thanks for the comments, much appreciated, it helps if I have large good quality images to work on, this allows me to "Zoom" right in and pick out details more easily, you tend to get less "Pixilation"

 

regards

 

Alex

Edited July 2, 2016 by Alex K

[922F]

Spot on again Alex, Thank you!

[Alex K]

Thanks to all, just to finish off King Kalakaua, came across this image, it seems Prussian influence spread far and wide!!

[Tony]

Not in the same league a Alex and Larry but I've had another dabble at colouring, I'm having no luck whatsoever with the background so left it as is.

An unknown soldier, possibly in the 1920s or may be a little earlier.

[Alex K]

Hi Tony just spotted this after a break, actually quite nice work, wouldn't worry about backgrounds too much, as they are, well backgrounds, the soldier and bike are the point of interest, my tip use a faint colour wash (Say mid/dark green) for the background, it will show up but won't be distracting, you could also give the road surface a similar faint red/yellow wash

 

regards

 

Alex

[Alex K]

Talking of backgrounds, they can at times be a pain, lots of work and don't always add to the image, attached is a well known image, I don't normally do the more brutal side of war but in this instance the story and image is well known, "Death of an SS General" Ernst Fick,

"On April 29, 1945, during the Murnau Oflag (Offizierslager) VII-A assembly, a plane with Polish insignia had appeared in the sky, circled above the assembly square, tried to signal something and went away. Soon on the road to the camp appeared American tanks. At the same time from the other side of Murnau, two German cars approached. They stopped upon noticing the tanks. Germans had been taken by surprise. SS officer in the first car opened fire from the machine gun, at the same time his companion jumped out of the vehicle. Both men were killed on a spot by the Americans (SS-Hauptsturmführer der Reserve Max Teichmann and SS-officer Widmann). The same fate met the passangers of the second car. Among the dead Germans was SS-Brigadeführer und Generalmajor der Waffen-SS Ernst Fick (in the above picture lies at left, while at right is his driver with the rank SS-Untersturmführer) who rides in the second car. His briefcase contained the letter signed by Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler. It was an order to kill all 5,000 Polish POW officers encamped in Murnau! To execute this task Fick had had at his disposal an SS group in 40 armoured vehicles that started from Münich. Most likely the SS-man intended to assemble the POWs and killed them with the machine guns fire from guard's towers. After finishing off the Germans, one of the Americans' tank smashed the entrance gate and entered the assembly square. The representative of POWs welcomed American soldiers. He had addressed them in English. The commander of the tank shook his head and answered in Polish: " My name is Szewczyk, we came to liberate you". He was from Kalisz, Poland

Source World War II Pictures In Details

 

Here whilst I did the entire background, I actually cropped the image as it concentrated the view on the main subject, (Some may disagree), my apologies to anyone who finds the image disturbing, it's the only one I've done and thought before posting

[Alex K]

Another one where the background actually contains very little detail "A family day out"

[Tony]

Thanks Alex and thanks for the tip as well. I'm using a programme (PS Pro x4) on the laptop to do the colouring and I think my main problem is just not understanding exactly what I can do with it. I've coloured the bike now but still haven't attempted the background.

That SS Generalmajor had an unfortunate surname but I bet no one laughed in his face.

[Alex K]

Hi Tony, you're not alone, we all go through that period of not understanding what you can do with the software, me included, I just experimented with different tools, effects etc, eventually you get to know what you can and cannot do, I sometimes deliberately use multiple tools and effect on the same piece of the image, the results can be suprising and effective, I personally don't use the original image but make a working copy, that way if I do Goof up (and I do) I've always got the original to try again, it's perseverance. I had PS Pro X1 and it had some useful features, I currently use my old (1996 vintage Photoshop V4.0) and it still keeps going, amazing bit of kit

[Alex K]

Hi all, a few from my clear-out file

 

Marschall Petain

General Pershing

Ritterkreuztrager Wilhelm Crinius

 

Regards

[Alex K]

I don't often re-visit colourizations I've done but leave them as they are, however reviewing this thread I looked at the first post which started the thread, it was a colourisation I did of Rudolf Witzig, sooo, I thought how would I do it now several years down the line so I did a "ground-up" attempt without looking at my original, here are the results, not a great deal of difference really (Uniform a bit different in colour I suppose)

Edited September 10, 2016 by Alex K
oversite forgot to attach original

[Alex K]

The real Oskar Schindler

And finally for the moment someone who doesn't get much mention, Mussolini and his friend

[peter monahan]

Still fascinated by your avatar.  Did he collect all those European orders BECAUSE he re-introduced the Hula-Hula?  And who on God's green earth decided that a Hawaiian monarch would look good in a pickelhaube?  Really?

Lovely work on the colourizations though, Alex.  I wish I had the patience!

[Alex K]

Hi Peter, thanks for the thumbs up, I suspect that King David got many orders not only for the Hula-Hula but for the fact that he did a Euro-blitz tour and maybe he was a welcome newcomer so they showered him with gongs, I believe he many more than he could sensibly wear on one uniform, as for the Haube, agreed, who knows maybe he saw them and said I like them, make me some

 

regards

[Paul R]

Awesome job on these latest images.  How long do they take you to do?  I have one for you, if you want!

General Pershing's stars were Gold, while he was the Supreme Commander.  

[TacHel]

Great job!  IMHO, the top one of Rudolf Witzig is as good as an original colour shot!

[peter monahan]

Ah!  yes, a European tour would explain that lot, and I can see how eager the Europeans would be to welcome a 'cvivilized' monarch from one of the more benighted corners of the world.  And there are probably odder combos than a Hawaiin in a Haube out there.  The kilted regiment of the Afghan Army comes to mind!  'Like that' would explain it.

The last version of the movie Vanity Fair has some truly horrendous uniforms in it, between 17 year olds apperaing on Major General's uniforms and an art dierctor who used plum, burgiundy, pink etc instead of the proper red, which apparently he disliked.  My comment on first seeing it was that a lot of them looked like what one got when Native States rulers pointed at pukka outfits and said 'Like that, only with more bling!'