Means and method for color photography printing

Claim 1

In a process of color photography using a process wherein the negative is used to produce a print while illuminated with radiation containing the ranges of color components sufficient to provide the colors required for the printing processes, and wherein the illumination time of the negative by light within a particular color component range is determined and terminated by insertion in the illumination path of a filter having an approximately complementary range to such particular range, and wherein a means corresponding to each particular range is actuable, responsive to a control signal to operate the complementary filter to terminate illumination by radiation within said range, the process of: illuminating such negative during the preparation of a test print, sensing the intensity of light transmitted through a selected area of said negative, said area being small relative to the area of said negative, controlling the time of operation of the filters in accord with the sensed intensity to operate said complementary filters to provide the component ranges in said printing illumination over time intervals determined by the corresponding intensity, and of duration having an inverse relationship to the sensed intensity, recording the time of illumination for each component range, in machine readable form, thereafter, illuminating said negative to produce a final print, using substantially the same quality of illumination as used in the making of the test print, automatically reading said recorded illumination times and operating said filters in accord with said mechanically read recorded times.