They didn't have an actual color film for a camera (that wasn't developed until 1935), but there were several fairly successful methods of processing monochrome film for color since the 1850's. Some of the most beautifully clear and true to nature early color photos I've seen were from Russia in the 1910 - 1914 period. These photos looked as if they had been taken in the 1950's with Kodachrome film in a professional camera.

Pathe' had a method to colorize monochrome pictures with a gel-stencil after-processing in the 1890's that was used in both still and motion pictures, and Kinemicolor used a three RGB type filter projection system to make "color" movies from black and white movies since 1905.

Haele