That's the bit I don't find quite clear. Were these taken as colour pics or are they Photoshoped?
They were taken as colour photographs. Three separate sheets of glass, colour filtered. They have been put back together using digital techniques, but from the original colour separations. So there is no guessing of the colours – they are the real thing.
It was always issues of film that caused old colour photos and movies to be washed out, not the picture taking itself. The exact vividness of colour in the ones we see is a bit of a choice of the person doing the digital process, but all chemical based photos are like that anyway.
Old photos going back to the Crimean War are very clear, provided the target is not moving. (In a couple of the pictures it is clear that the colour plates have slipped slightly, so the colours don't align very well.)