New Delhi Durbar Elephant (1 Viewer)

A

Ana Donzino

First Sergeant
Joined
Apr 25, 2005
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1,439
Hello,

Here is it: Set #303, The Elephant of the Maharao Rajah of Bundi
303lg.jpg


303detlg.jpg


Bundi2.jpg


Bundi6.jpg


303clg.jpg


It was worth the wait, right? ;)

Ana
 
Hi Ana,

I expected nothing less than an extremely beautiful new elephant and I was not disappointed! Your work is fantastic! I very much look forward to the day when I might be able to add this elephant to my Beau Geste collection!

Warmest personal regards,

Pat :)
 
Thank you, guys. It looks even better in person. You have my word for it :)

Ana
 
Ana can I ask how you determine what colours to use for things like the blankets and clothing as most of the pictures are black and white. Just curious :)

Scott
 
Scott,

The first thing to have in mind for the back and white of those times (that were developed with a gold treatment) is that yellow and red photographed as almost black. As well as other dark colours, which makes the process confusing.

I first check the newspapers of the date. Many journalists describe the first bunch of elephants with some colour reference, quite poor really, but something you can base on.

Then, I look for state references, like the colour of their flag or coat of arms, so I can check if the elephant is wearing a similar pattern.

For this particular elephant I had two colour references from the period: a Menpes plate, and a coloured glass slide.

Bundi4.jpg


Bundi3.jpg


I must say that, in my opinion, Menpes tended to colour the plates with the colours that he had at hand, and not the real ones. You can see that everything is yellow and red in this painting. The glass slide colouring is absolutely random. So these turned to be a reference that I had to decide if I should trust or not. Not having any other choices, I went for a yes.

The maharajas choice was easier. The source images are quite a reference:

Bundi1.jpg

This image was taken the day of the Durbar

Bundi5.jpg



In the cases I don't have any plate or painting to use as source, I use intuition and common sense combined with state colours. That has worked fine so far :)

Ana
 
Thanks Ana for taking the time to explain and illustrate your process. I found it quite fascinating how you come to decide when and what colour to use. I think all of your elephants are splendid and a real credit to you.

I think you have much more patience that I would ever have, I would choose the nearest, brightest colours and hope for the best. :D

Thanks again.

Scott
 
Hi Ana

I agree with everyone, that is a beautiful elephant

Cheers

Martyn:)
 
Ana Donzino said:
Scott,

The first thing to have in mind for the back and white of those times (that were developed with a gold treatment) is that yellow and red photographed as almost black. As well as other dark colours, which makes the process confusing.

I first check the newspapers of the date. Many journalists describe the first bunch of elephants with some colour reference, quite poor really, but something you can base on.

Then, I look for state references, like the colour of their flag or coat of arms, so I can check if the elephant is wearing a similar pattern.

For this particular elephant I had two colour references from the period: a Menpes plate, and a coloured glass slide.

Bundi4.jpg


Bundi3.jpg


I must say that, in my opinion, Menpes tended to colour the plates with the colours that he had at hand, and not the real ones. You can see that everything is yellow and red in this painting. The glass slide colouring is absolutely random. So these turned to be a reference that I had to decide if I should trust or not. Not having any other choices, I went for a yes.

The maharajas choice was easier. The source images are quite a reference:

Bundi1.jpg

This image was taken the day of the Durbar

Bundi5.jpg



In the cases I don't have any plate or painting to use as source, I use intuition and common sense combined with state colours. That has worked fine so far :)

Ana
Click to expand...

Hello Ana,
Congrats on nice painted elephant! I noticed that ornament of the drapes on this elephant and on previous one not exactly match ornament on b&w photos included. Is it any reason for it?
There are special software programs that let you guess a color based on gray scale of the B&W photo. This is pretty similar to technique used to color B&W movies. I also know that some colors just very rarely used in that time like light green... Eyewitnesses' descriptions are quite important but they mostly commented on parade participants' clothes rather then elephant drape's colors :(.. The NY Times archives have a lot interesting newspaper articles about 1903 Delhi Durbar.
Al
 
Thank you, Al. The ornaments of the drapes are as similar as I could sculpt them. Many times you don't have enough detail in the pictures to guess what is in a certain guard or ornament, so you have to go with what you see. And as the patterns are not machine but hand made one by one, without any sort of digital engraving nor machine transfer design, I stop when it is similar enough to me :)

The usual software programs to go from B&W to colour are no good for the pictures of these period, mainly because of the developing process that they used, as I mentioned before. Colours developed in a different way. You can't use the same process that is used for movies, because the only important thing in these last ones is that skin tone, wood or water tones are as they should be. Nodoby cares if the actress was wearing red or green. Any colour will do. That's the reason why no one was able to protrait the Durbar in colour from the many B&W existing photographs. If you turn a colour picture with yellow or red in it to B&W, you will see that they don't turn in black, but a medium to light grey. That's why the inverse process is no good for these picture. In the times of the Durbar, red and yellow looked black in the photographs. No standard program works for them.

Unfortunately I don't have copies of the NY Times files. I should check those. I have all comments from the Daily Express, Graphic 1903, La vie illustrée, Madras Times, The Pioneer Mail, Times of India, The Times, The Civil & Military Gazette, Illustrated London News and L'illustration. I also have the copies of a handbook that belonged to Sheldon-Williams, with sketches and notes of the colours used. Raven Hill book of drawings from the Durbar are very good for details too. Wheeler mentions many colour references in his book, and so does Menpes. Half of them talk about the elephant clothes.

Finally, the colours used in India were like nothing else. They were so bright that the journalists had a hard time describing them as they were. Many of the texts show this. Here is the description about the Bikaner camels, which we used for the ones we made:
The desert state had mounted fifty sheathed warriors on camels, each with a chrome yellow and rice green saddle cloth. They passed in procession quite noiselessly, the only audible sound being the gentle pad-pad of the camels, and the slight rustling of the loose flexible armour.


Ana
 
Hi Ana,

That is an amazing Elephant! As I do a lot of research on this event I too am amazed by the sketchy details some of the people used to describe the draperies on the elephants. Now the two colours you mentioned are probably readily found out by finding out where the person who wrote the description was from and seeing if they have a Standard colour scale from that era hidden away in the National Library etc. I have seen some rather interesting books like these from various era's so I am sure they exsist for the 1903 Durbar. I also recall having Chrome Yellow as one of my oil paints in my palette box it was a pretty bright colour that I used in a few Still Lifes of flowers a little goes a long way... I will have to see if I left that in storage or if I have it here in Germany. Anyway I am sure you already knew all of this so I will say again I love the Durbar sets you make!

All the best

Dave
 
Dear Ana,

Your work is beautiful. You are a true artist!

Rgds Victor
 
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