About copying Lippmann photography

This is a forum exploring Lippmann photography.
walschuler

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by walschuler »

With respect to the above discussion and questions raised:



I have looked hard (as Martin knows!) for all photos in the world made by this process, including any on materials other than silver gelatin.



1) I have seen none that look like they were made on DCG, or on albumen emulsions, the latter which Lippmann tried and succeeded with as he succeeded on gelatin.



2) Of the 500+ images I have seen made by Lippmann and others, I have seen none that show complimentary colors. Nearly all made back then were painted black or bonded to black glass on the rear, and those unblackened were experimental failures, I think, and of too low contrast/saturation/brilliance to show this effect. I have seen images by Lippmann, made early on, around 1891-3, I think, that were in the nature of physics experiment portrayals, such as crossed spectra, Newton's rings, and line spectra, but no complimentary colors.



2) My own experiments with narrow band and line sources have gotten me some extremely bright images in reflection, but in transmission in only maybe one case have I seen a hint of complimentary color. Otherwise, I see the same color as in reflection, but weaker. All were on silver gelatin plates.



Any Lippmann experimenter should start by recording narrow band, line or spectra sources; they each have longer coherence lengths than white light and thus deeper, stronger interference fringes than the latter. Darran Green may have bypassed this and is now the only person I know who is getting fairly consistent results in ordinary light, on emulsions of his own making, without a mercury reflector. His color saturation, by eye, is about 85-90% of the best old pictures I have seen. Some years back (early '90s) Chris Rich, in LA, got excellent results in ordinary light, duplicating the old emulsion formulae and using mercury, if I remember correctly.



3) I think that Jeff's objection to copying fails for the reason above in previous letters (Sogonka +): if you can make a wide spectrum Lippmann in the first place (which demonstrably you can), then the complimentary colors will, in ordinary light, be of comparable band width and should record. But the difficulty will be in getting a strong enough complimentary effect. If you want to try this first use narrow band or spectrum sources.



Can't think of anything else at the moment.
Sogokon'A

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by Sogokon'A »

Considering special importance mentioned by Jeff a question, and also that similar questions and doubts can arise and in the future, I have decided to show as much as possible convincingly, how interfere beams of different spectral structure. Basically, it can be shown within the limits of any interference experiment. But most evidently and most simply it can be made by means of experiments with rings of Newton. If to compare process of formation of standing waves and process of formation of rings of Newton it is possible to notice, that rings of Newton show us « spatial prolonging/stretching » (more precisely radial) that in a standing wave occurs in one point and is hidden from our eyes.

The scheme of experiment is shown here. http://syneko.narod.ru/SCHEME.JPG

Image



As a light source I used a bulb. Optical filters it was possible to have in positions №1 and №2. Results are presented here. http://syneko.narod.ru/RINGS3.JPG

Image



The basic conclusions

1. The least coherence length white light possesses. The result obvious and predicted but to be convinced once again is not harmful.

2. Complementary colors the cores give the same coherence length, as well as basics.

3. Introduction of any filter, even with the minimal distortion of spectral structure leads to increase of coherence length.

4. The result does not depend on the location of the filter (a position №1 or №2). At use of the compound filter (from two glasses) the result does not depend on, where and as glasses (together or separately) are located

5. Optimum thickness of layer for work in white light makes 4-8 microns.



Thus, the interference picture in white light represents the sum of interference pictures created by each spectral component of white light. Removal from a spectrum one component will inevitably be reflected in a total picture and will be shown in the form of increase of coherence length. It is other formulation of thought Sergio « …light standing wave with a sum of infinite (or almost) locked spectral standing waves that are self interfering and with neighbors spectral interference… »
walschuler

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by walschuler »

Sogokan'A gives one very nice explanation of coherence in broad band light.



One can add that some years back, in the 1970s I think, Wolf did an experiment using a laser, neutral density filters, and a TV-like detector looking at the output of an interferometer. With the system running at full intensity, he recorded the usual interference pattern. Inserting the filters he saw a fainter version of the same thing. He eventually achieved a photon flow rate demonstrably just one photon in the interferometer at a time. One would think that at this level the pattern would not be present. However, as quantum mechanics predicts, it is still present. All that is required to see it is to wait long enough to accumulate a lot of single photon hits. The pattern gradually builds up. The interpretation is that each photon is, in this experiment, non-localized, occupies both paths in the interferometer, and only interferes with itself!



I believe Bjelkhagen has argued, and I agree, that for full visible spectrum exposures, 1-2 microns emulsion thickness is optimum, since the single wide-band fourier spectrum maximum, the blend of all the separate color maxima, is only about 1 micron deep, and is either in contact with or about 1/2 wavelength (about 1/2 micron) in from the surface, depending on whether there is not or is a mirror in contact with the emulsion surface. Thicker emulsions will suffer from exposure to non-useful, non-interference pattern photons, which constitute noise. (Is that clear?)



For narrow band exposures, the coherence length goes up, the interference pattern is deeper, and a thicker emulsion is useful. Published photos of microscopical emulsion sections from the time of Lippmann, by Senior and by Neuhauss, for instance, show the single maximum or the repeated layers, as the case may be, quite clearly.
Sogokon'A

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by Sogokon'A »

Thanks, walschuler, that has taken part in discussion. Thanks for the interesting and useful information.


Of the 500+ images I have seen made by Lippmann and others, I have seen none that show complimentary colors. Nearly all made back then were painted black or bonded to black glass on the rear, and those unblackened were experimental failures, I think, and of too low contrast/saturation/brilliance to show this effect. I have seen images by Lippmann, made early on, around 1891-3, I think, that were in the nature of physics experiment portrayals, such as crossed spectra, Newton's rings, and line spectra, but no complimentary colors.
It simply fantasy that there was a person who has seen more than 500 images! It is the impressing project. I envy and I remove a hat! I cannot be kept from a question, which I lifted at a forum:
One question is interesting me for a long time: why Lippman or his followers haven’t discovered hologram? They were so close just in 100 microns from the discover. Hasn’t anyone of them commit that «useful mistake» of putting a foreign solid between the surface of mercury and photosensitive layer? Hasn’t there really been a single grain, air bubble, a hair or bread grit able to move the surface of mercury?!! There should have left some fingerprints on the other side of the plate. The coherence length was enough for hologram producing. Usagin was recording the emission spectrums of metal vapors. In that case the length of coherence was sufficient even for making image of fastening elements. If such phenomenon would occur Lippman as a man interested by volume could not ignore it (he has also created integral photography!).
What do you think in this occasion? Whether you observed effect of " a grain crumb » even in one picture from 500?
My own experiments with narrow band and line sources have gotten me some extremely bright images in reflection, but in transmission in only maybe one case have I seen a hint of complimentary color. Otherwise, I see the same color as in reflection, but weaker. All were on silver gelatin plates
Whether you used bleaching?
Here that wrote Usagin:
It is significant that violet and light blue colors are absorbed inside the gelatin layer what has never been noticed with red or orange colors for which the plate is almost transparent. Therefore a complex color consisted for example of red and blue colors will undergo a change due to partial blocking of blue rays. To avoid this defect I have to make a plate transparent for all colors. I put the plate into a 5% solution of sublimate in water. Then I wash it in clear water and dry. After that it becomes transparent and gives supplementary colors if watched on passing light. If examining the image for example a sun spectrum in reflected light through a spectroscope we’ll see a bright color line. Its color will be changing according to which part of the image the spectroscope will be aimed. If examining the plate in a spectroscope on passing light we’ll see a spectrum with a dark line of absorption. That line will move through the spectrum if you move the image before the spectroscope slit. These observations may be used in researching the quality of emulsion as the smaller are the grains of emulsion the sharper is the line of absorption or reflection seen in spectroscope.

I think, that the most part of old pictures has been bleached. And only that they are stuck and painted over from the back party by a black paint, does not allow to observe complementary colors.
Any Lippmann experimenter should start by recording narrow band, line or spectra sources; they each have longer coherence lengths than white light and thus deeper, stronger interference fringes than the latter.
I support this point of view. At a Russian-speaking forum I recommended beginning experimenters to use light of a mercury lamp in the first experiments.
One can add that some years back, in the 1970s I think, Wolf did an experiment using a laser, neutral density filters, and a TV-like detector looking at the output of an interferometer. With the system running at full intensity, he recorded the usual interference pattern. Inserting the filters he saw a fainter version of the same thing. He eventually achieved a photon flow rate demonstrably just one photon in the interferometer at a time. …. The interpretation is that each photon is, in this experiment, non-localized, occupies both paths in the interferometer, and only interferes with itself!
It is very interestingly and exclusively important for understanding and an explanation of many interference phenomena! It is the answer to statement Sergio: « I think we need another approach here … » But I do not absolutely agree with « One can add … ». If two identical conclusions are made independently, by different methods and from different initial positions, they possess multiplicative effect. It is not so simple sum of knowledge, and more likely them multiplication. :D
I believe Bjelkhagen has argued, and I agree, that for full visible spectrum exposures, 1-2 microns emulsion thickness is optimum, since the single wide-band fourier spectrum maximum, the blend of all the separate color maxima, is only about 1 micron deep, and is either in contact with or about 1/2 wavelength (about 1/2 micron) in from the surface, depending on whether there is not or is a mirror in contact with the emulsion surface. Thicker emulsions will suffer from exposure to non-useful, non-interference pattern photons, which constitute noise. (Is that clear?)


I completely share these judgments as a way of struggle against absorption and dispersion for the layers, which have been not intended for bleaching.

When I spoke of 4-8 micron about optimum thickness of a registering layer, I started with following reasons:

1. The standing wave in the given point is there is an autocorrelation function of the radiation falling in the given point

2. Diffraction of light on layered structure is described by Fourier-integral in which sub integral function describes properties of layered structure

3. Wiener-Khenchen theorem approves, that the spectrum of a signal can be received by performance of Fourier transformation over autocorrelation function of this signal

4. Item 3 is the basic idea of Fourier-spectroscopy, see, for example “ Introductory Fourier Transform Spectroscopy ” Robert John Bell 1972

5. On the basis of the above-stated, we come to conclusion, that Lippmann picture represents Fourier-spectrograph, working exclusively on an optical principle.

6. Quality (accuracy) of the received spectrum depends on accuracy of calculation of autocorrelation function. It is a conclusion from book Robert Bell. Therefore the standing wave needs to be registered as much as possible precisely and without distortions.



Lippmann’s photography is such exclusively interesting and mysterious thing, which up to the end is not understood by us, is not realized, not experienced, not studied, and it will present us even greater surprises in the future.
Martin

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by Martin »

Sogokon'A wrote:Whether you used bleaching?
Here that wrote Usagin:
It is significant that violet and light blue colors are absorbed inside the gelatin layer what has never been noticed with red or orange colors for which the plate is almost transparent. Therefore a complex color consisted for example of red and blue colors will undergo a change due to partial blocking of blue rays. To avoid this defect I have to make a plate transparent for all colors. I put the plate into a 5% solution of sublimate in water. Then I wash it in clear water and dry. After that it becomes transparent and gives supplementary colors if watched on passing light. If examining the image for example a sun spectrum in reflected light through a spectroscope we’ll see a bright color line. Its color will be changing according to which part of the image the spectroscope will be aimed. If examining the plate in a spectroscope on passing light we’ll see a spectrum with a dark line of absorption. That line will move through the spectrum if you move the image before the spectroscope slit. These observations may be used in researching the quality of emulsion as the smaller are the grains of emulsion the sharper is the line of absorption or reflection seen in spectroscope.


That's interesting. Usagin's observations somehow got unnoticed.

I wonder how much the transmission phenomenon relates to the mercury bleach in this case. A look at the refractive index produced by AgHgCl2 (1.82) indicates it's rather moderate compared to AgBr (2.25). So the refractive index may not be important here. Perhaps it's rather the shape of AgHgCl2 grains formed that is responsible for the transmission effect.
walschuler

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by walschuler »

Sogokon'A - I really have seen 500 plus Lippmanns. I do plan to publish a Catalogue Raisone of them in the not too distant future. Did you know that Richard Neuhauss, a doctor of tropical medicine in Berlin, left lab notebooks of more than 2,500 experimental Lippmann exposures? These notes are held at the Preus Fotomuseum near Oslo. Both I and Hans Bjelkhagen have photocopies. We think that most were failures, and the glass was reused. I know of only about two dozen still in existence and they are beautiful. Images of some are posted on the museum website.



In my experiments I tried images with and without bleach. I got different results for broadband than with narrow band sources. Bleach worked best with narrow band. I have used FeEDTA rehologenating bleach, and stayed clear of mercury, PBQ and other nasty chemicals, both for my own peace of mind and the safety of my holography students who use my lab space. If you look at the old literature, just about every chemical used for holography now, except for the above 2 and perhaps 1 or 2 others, was tried out by Lippmann and his contemporaries. Developers both tanning and non-tanning, deep and shallow, and various bleaches and occasionally redevelopment were all tried out. Darran Green's work suggests that photochemistry and emulsion recipies are important, but also the weather.



Thank you very much for translating Usagin. Those are very interesting passages. If by any chance you could translate complete documents of his

it would be valuable to have them on the Wicki here. I have seen a half dozen of his images. They ended up in Canada not long ago through a family connection and were in a museum show there. Their size was unusually large, about 5x7 inches (12.5x17.5cm), but their quality was not high. They had emulsion defects and color sensitization failures. All were landscapes.



As to emulsion optimum thickness, if you have not seen the published thin sections, check papers by Edgar Senior in England or Neuhauss in Germany from the era 1893-1905. They show the Lippmann exposure layer structure clearly. I have not tried to make such images myself. Your item #5 says what needs to be said.
Martin

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by Martin »

walschuler wrote:Did you know that Richard Neuhauss, a doctor of tropical medicine in Berlin, left lab notebooks of more than 2,500 experimental Lippmann exposures? These notes are held at the Preus Fotomuseum near Oslo. Both I and Hans Bjelkhagen have photocopies. We think that most were failures, and the glass was reused.
Bill, I made a transcription of Neuhauss' notebooks, see:
http://www.holographyforum.org/lippmann ... _Paper.pdf

By the way, there's a large section of papers about Lippmann photography at: :
http://www.holographyforum.org/HoloWiki ... ann_Papers
If you look at the old literature, just about every chemical used for holography now, except for the above 2 and perhaps 1 or 2 others, was tried out by Lippmann and his contemporaries. Developers both tanning and non-tanning, deep and shallow, and various bleaches and occasionally redevelopment were all tried out. Darran Green's work suggests that photochemistry and emulsion recipies are important, but also the weather.


On the latter subject, in his journals Neuhauss scrupulously noted meteorologic parameters when preparing new emulsion batches.



Interestingly, there's a paper on the “meteorotropy” of photographic dichromate gelatin (Hans Baumer, Zur Meteorotropie der fotografischen Dichromat-Gelatine):

http://www.e-smog.ch/wetter/2001/april/gelatine2.html
walschuler

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by walschuler »

I forgot to answer one of Sogokon'A's questions above: did/why didn't Lippmann or one of his contemporaries discover 3-D effects in their images, in effect holograms, if only very shallow ones?



None of the 500+ old images I have seen showed such an effect, nor did Lippmann make any remark about this. I think that several things explain this:

1) Lippmann was aiming only to record color, and in spite of his interest in 3-D, did not expect to find it in these images, so he did not look for it

2) He was using a mercury mirror, which was in perfect contact with the emulsion everywhere, thus no obvious depth cues would turn up

3) He did not try a single color narrow band source, which filled his whole field of view, without any other subject in view, also making detection of 3-D difficult



I have tried such images, using a single line color (yellow sodium D-line photo safelight) filling the field of view, and with an aluminized (mirror) plastic film, held imperfectly to the emulsion with water or an organic liquid evaporant (see Nick Phillips articles some years back) in place of the mercury, and I did see ripples and bubbles in the film as 3-D, no question about it.



I have always thought that if lasers had existed in Lippmann's time, he would have invented holography.
Sogokon'A

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by Sogokon'A »

Thank you very mach, walschuler, for the developed and detailed answers.

What is your name, Bill or William?



walschuler wrote,


Your item #5 says what needs to be said.
I do not object. But mine 6 items unanimously declare all, that it is necessary to act.

But of it later



Now I wish to continue the analysis of experiment with rings of Newton. If the arrangement of the filter does not influence result of an interference of standing waves the filter it is possible to arrange directly in the registering medium. And moreover, such filter sensitizing dye can be used. We shall admit, that the spectrum of absorption of a sensitizer coincides with a transmission spectrum one of the filters used in my experiment, for example, green. Then, at an irradiation of such layer white light, in it will register the standing wave formed by spectral components, getting in a strip of absorption of a sensitizer, i.e. the registered layered structure, which will reflect green light. And to extend in depth of a layer as follows from results of experiment, this structure will be on 10 or more microns. I used the filter, with a passband of 30-40 nanometers, intended for emission from a spectrum of radiation of a mercury lamp of a line of 578 nanometers. In this case a diagram of Lippmann’s registration follows. http://syneko.narod.ru/layers.bmp



Image



Complementary colors will leave the interference trace in two layers, and white light – in all three layers.

Provisional spectra of absorption sensitizing dyes are shown on this diagram. http://syneko.narod.ru/sp_senc.bmp



Image

Not necessarily endeavors to such spectral sensitization. I wished to show, that thickness of layers and their order should be coordinated from of width strip of absorption.



Thus, at such approach the color image is formed as by the classical scheme of summation of three primary colors, and by exact reproduction of length of wave by Lippmann method.

If I have correctly understood, Martin and Sergio has monochrome photopolymeric compositions for any length of a wave. But they achieve uniform sensitivity all visible area of a spectrum. So can be it is not necessary aspire to it, and simply water one layer on another?
walschuler

About copying Lippmann photography

Post by walschuler »

Sogokon: I just recently realized, in looking back at older correspondance, that your last name must not include the A, and that you are Alexander. Sorry! I am William, known as Bill to my friends...



Your 3-layer idea takes us back to traditional color photography. I am not sure it gains us anything compared to "pan" sensitization of a single layer. For one thing, my impression is that you really need major technology to produce emulsions like that. It should be noted that Herbert Ives published 3-color filtered Lippmann experiments back around 1908, using "pan" emulsions.



I want to mention here an idea I had back in 1995 or 1996. (I will have to check my notes.) I mentioned it to Denisyuk at the last Lake Forest symposium, the only one I have been to and the only time I met him. He was really fascinating by the way, a fountain of ideas. He said he had a similar idea but never tried it. To my knowledge, this is the first publication of this idea.



The idea arose in thinking about the speed limitations of Lippmann and holographic emulsions. At the time, T-Max (triangular grain) emulsions were new in the market. I looked into the grain shape and discovered that, while large in surface extent, these grains were very thin in depth, and all were oriented large face parallel to the surface of the emulsion. (This gives them thier speed advantage, at the same time coonserving silver.) So I asked, were they thin enough to record interference at the half-wavelength level for a Lippmann or Denisyuk holo (their surface dimension was clearly too large to do transmission holos)? Eventually I found that their thickness should work. Then the problem was that all such commercial emulsions include an anti-halation layer, to kill back surface reflections, making the emulsions opaque and thus useless for 2-sided work. It took an age to find someone at Kodak to talk to about this, but eventually (more than a year and a half later (!), I got someone's attention, and telling them I had a "research purpose," I got them to produce a box of 4x5 plates, at a cost of $300! You would have thought that omitting the anti-halation would have been simple and thus cheap, but no such luck.



When they arrived, I tried them out with zero results. When I sacrificed one and looked at it in the light, the emulsion looked opaque, almost normal for commercial photographic emulsions. I never settled whether they sent me the wrong plates, or whether even minus the anti-halation layer, the density of the T-grains was such as to cause the opacity. I never tried to section them and look at them under a microscope.



I wonder if some version of this, perhaps at low grain concentration, could be made to work. But it is likely not simple to trick the grains to line up with flat surfaces parallel to the emulsion face.



The possibility of a perhaps 10xs faster emulsion still tantalizes me. Lippmann silver emulsions have an ISO around 1. If we could get to 25, it would be equal to Kodak Panatomic X. Snapshots!
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