London in Colour, 1927 & 2013

London in 1927 & 2013 from Simon Smith on Vimeo.

Simon Smith says:
During the 1920s, cinematographer Claude Friese-Greene travelled across the UK with his new colour film camera. His trip ended in London, with some of his most stunning images, and these were recently revived and restored by the BFI, and shared across social media and video websites.
Since February I have attempted to capture every one of his shots, standing in his footsteps, and using modern equivalents of his camera and lenses. This has been a personal study, that has revealed how little London has changed

mrsimonsmith.com

There have been lots of enquiries about the music ... It's Pachelbel's "Canon in D Major", and this recording came from this brilliant website ...

 incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html

Credit to ...
Canon in D Major, Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0

creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

Also, the BFI manage the rights to the restored versions of Claude Friese-Greene's "The Open Road", of which the London shots are a segment.
http://vimeo.com/81368735

The original film was a big hit in London, when the BFI  re-released it on the web. This new film gives an added layer of interest and is well worth a squint

London in 1927, in colour

London in 1927 from Tim Sparke on Vimeo.

What has changed and what hasn't? Petticoat Lane Market is still crowded, but now black African faces and East Asians also frequent it. Particularly Africans from all over London, for whom the market has some atmosphere that reminds them of West Africa in particular

http://www.flickr.com/photos/regimepix/8175921108/  photo by David G Mills

But the film also shows the Pool of London, that part of the Thames between London Bridge and Tower Bridge, busy with commercial traffic and barges. Alas, it is all gone and converted warehouses are now multi-million pound flats....

http://www.panoramio.com/photo/4227840 Photo by Morganshi