Chofetz Chaim Pictures
Behind The Scenes
In 2016, I had the privilege to work on the now-famous image of the Chofetz Chaim, R' Yisrael Meir Kagan זצ"ל. Below is an overview of what I did and how I did it.
I obtained the picture using the video below discovered in early 2015. It shows many leading rabbis and dignitaries arriving at the first Knessia Gedolah of Agudas Yisroel in Vienna in 1923 .
(Video © University of South Carolina – Moving Image Research Collections).
The Chofetz Chaim can be seen from 0:56-1:08. Click the arrow at the top right of the video to enlarge and download. This is the highest quality video available. (Better quality than the YouTube video at this link)
I obtained the picture using the video below discovered in early 2015. It shows many leading rabbis and dignitaries arriving at the first Knessia Gedolah of Agudas Yisroel in Vienna in 1923 .
(Video © University of South Carolina – Moving Image Research Collections).
The Chofetz Chaim can be seen from 0:56-1:08. Click the arrow at the top right of the video to enlarge and download. This is the highest quality video available. (Better quality than the YouTube video at this link)
Using Photoshop, I captured the still image below of the moment the Chofetz Chaim ZT"L looks up at the camera.
I then used Photoshop again to colorize part of the image. I tried to determine the color of clothing based on the shades of black and gray (not an exact science). This is the best image resolution possible since it came from the old video still.
The version below was made for the Chofetz Chaim Heritage Foundation and includes the colorized portion and a larger portion of the original image.
Below are a two other versions I made- one with the entourage in the background blurred and one with the entourage blurred in black and white.
|
|
Finally, I worked with an artist to create the 3 illustrations below. These illustrations provide a more artistic version of the image and they are much higher resolution than the pictures, so they can be enlarged to very large sizes. To order professional prints of any of the images on this page (see all options here), please contact us using the Contact Us page.
|
|
|
Interesting note: We studied the original video footage and images and discovered that the "eye whites" initially seen under the Chofetz Chaim's pupils are actually his lower eyelids. So in that sense, we believe the illustrations are actually a more accurate depiction of the Chofetz Chaim.
Articles related to the video of the Chofetz Chaim:
- http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/189399/chofetz-chaim-footage
- https://cross-currents.com/2015/02/25/the-chofetz-chaim-video-the-rosetta-stone/www.tabletmag.com/jewish-arts-and-culture/189399/chofetz-chaim-footage
- https://www.vosizneias.com/196113/2015/02/27/brooklyn-ny-williamsburg-chasidic-historian-instrumental-in-locating-chofetz-chaim-footage/
