>>Oddly, German photographic technology was more advanced than that in the west.
Not odd at all. Color photography requires advanced film chemistry compared to B&W. The Germans were leaders in the chemical industry starting in the 19th Century. In the early part of the 20th Century, IG Farben is a key name, which company begat Agfa, BASF, and Bayer.
Film was just an area they led the world in.
Nonetheless, the Krauts were not the vanguard in color photography.
The Russians had them beat by a world war or two.
E.g.:
 Young Russian peasant women in front of traditional wooden house, in a rural area along the Sheksna River near the small town of Kirillov. Early color photograph from Russia, created by Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii as part of his work to document the Russian Empire from 1909 to 1915. |
Once the SHTF, those names were all of interest to the Alien Property Custodian.