La danse du diable
R: Gaston Velle. P: Pathé Frères. Fr 1904

Pathécolor / Pathéchrome / stencil coloring
“Stencil coloring required the manual cutting, frame by frame, of the area which was to be tinted onto another identical print, one for each color. Usually the number of colors applied ranged from 3 to 6. The process was highly improved by the introduction of a cutting machine. Thus the cutter could follow the outlines of the image areas on a magnified image from a guide print projected onto a ground glass. A pantograph reduced the enlargement back to frame size. The machine performed the cutting on the stencil print with a needle. When cut-out manually, the gelatin had to be removed from the stenciled print to form a transparent strip. In the machine cutting process the stencil was cut into a blank film directly. For every color the stencil print was fed in register with the positive print into a printing machine where the acid dye was applied by a continuous velvet band.
Several hundred women performed the exacting task at the Pathé workshop in Vincennes. Similar techniques were applied by Gaumont, Oskar Meßter and the Cinemacoloris process invented by Segundo de Chomón.”
Barbara Flückiger
Timeline of Historical Film Colors

Les fleurs animées
R: Gaston Velle. K: Segundo de Chomón. P: Pathé Frères. Fr 1906

>>> George A. Smith’s Colour Experiments
>>> The Colours of Pathé
>>> Alice Guy: Hand Colored Films, 1900
>>> The Tableau System of Presentation