CONTENTS OF
THE BOOK.

The purpose of this book is to place
in the hands of every Photographer instructive
articles on essential processes and
manipulations, by eminent writers who
have given such subjects their especial
study, and who have borne in mind that
whilst the experienced Amateur and the
Professional may each find much to learn
from a comparatively elementary description
of methods and means, it is the Beginner
who stands in greatest need of help.

In the mind of every photographer
the name of Barnet is inseparable from a
great Photographic Industry, and now it is intended that the
name shall be associated with a good and useful book, which
is called the Barnet Book of Photography, and it is
left to the reader to say if the fulfilment of its purpose and
the manner of its doing are such as to justify its existence.

To all who are interested in photography, who love it for
itself and for its productions, and who desire to improve their
own practice of its many processes and applications, this Book
is respectfully dedicated.

Barnet, Herts.
ELLIOTT & SON.
April, 1898.

COPYRIGHT.NEGATIVE BY W. L. F. WASTELL.

A Famous Pike Stream.

Contact Print on

Barnet Platino-Matt Bromide Paper.

Alpine Photography.

Writing in London
on a day in winter
with a murky sky and sloshy
streets, the title of Alpine
Photography is verily refreshing.
It brings back
days of sunlight and joyous
experiment, and as we write
the soul stirring scenery is
before us called up by photographs
taken under varying
conditions of comfort and
discomfort. That there is
something different in Alpine
photography to photography
in our own country, we are
bound to believe, since a
special article is demanded
for it.

The first question invariably
asked is as to the
nature of the outfit required. We should here like
to divide our reply into two divisions. The one concerning
the mountaineer, and the other the ordinary
tourist. For the former we have no doubt in our minds
that a hand camera to take ¼ plate or 5 × 4 pictures is10
the most convenient form of camera to take. It is not
our business to advertise any person’s wares and we shall
content ourselves by saying that personally we prefer a
camera which has separate slides and does not possess a
magazine, more particularly when glass plates are to be
used, though a form of Kodak is not to be despised.
But perhaps we are prejudiced in favour of glass plates,
for they are simple to manipulate and have no cockles nor
other drawbacks which the careless photographer may
have to encounter. Probably the most useful lens to
employ is a doublet of which the focal length is about a
quarter more than the width of the plate, since it includes
a fair angle and the margins of the photographs are
not likely to be markedly different in general density
to the centre, as is the case when wide-angle lenses
are employed. In England a lens which will cover
with a large stop, say f/8, is a desideratum, but
in the Alps it is very rarely that such a large ratio
of aperture to focal length is required. As a rule
for ordinary plates a lens has to be stopped down to f/16
to give a negative in say ¹/₅₀th of a second. Nevertheless
where orthochromatic plates are to be employed it is
very necessary to have a lens which will cover a plate
satisfactorily with f/8 in order to use a colour screen
for producing orthochromatic effects, since the loss of
photographic light caused by the screen can only be
compensated for by such an aperture even when the
shutter is slowed down. The reader is therefore recommended
on the whole to furnish himself with one of the
modern lenses which work at f/8, though he must
remember that the larger the aperture employed the more
the margins and centre of the picture will suffer from
unequal exposure. With some hand cameras there is a
means of attachment to a stand, but a stand on a
mountain is difficult to use and moreover has on more11
than one occasion been proved dangerous to carry. The
mountaineer if he desires to give a time—and not an
instantaneous—exposure on his excursion, would do well
to have a small clip ready to attach to the head of his ice
axe. The axe will form a sufficiently stable stand for
the more prolonged, but still short, exposure that he may
be required to give on some particular subjects such as
a photograph at sunrise or near sunset.

Photographers in England are rarely afflicted with
breathlessness through exertion, but it is different in
mountaineering. A mountaineer may keep his wind,
but it would be rare to find that his heart was beating
equably after some spurt of exertion, such as rock
climbing. It is often after some such exertion that
he comes upon some view which he may wish to
record on his photographic plate. The usual method
of holding the hand camera would under such
circumstances prove a failure so far as sharpness of
image is concerned. Pressed against his “middle” or
“upper” chest, the beatings of the heart will record
themselves on the photograph. Under such circumstances
resort must be had to some form of support on
which to rest his camera. After many years’ experience,
the writer has come to the conclusion that there is no
support superior to the ice axe. It is not necessary to
cause it to stand upright in the ground, ice, or snow,
though this should be done if possible. It will suffice to
rest the point on the rock, and place the camera on the
axe head, with the pick parallel to the body. We then
have a firm support in one direction, and the hands,
which are not affected by the automatic motion of the
heart, can be trusted to keep it steady in the other
direction. Photographs taken with a good lens, and
with such a stand, will bear enlarging up to 22 inches, at
least. It is because these photographs will bear12
enlarging that a small plate is recommended to the
mountaineer. There is not a large proportion of
Alpine views taken on the mountain side of which one
would care to have anything but a memorandum, and it
is such a size as that recommended which gives such a
memento, and which, if desired, allows a more formidable
size to be acquired at home, where we may suppose
there are all the conveniences that a photographic
laboratory affords. The writer has had experience on
mountains with cameras varying from 12 × 10 to
the ¼ plate size. When younger and more inclined
to waste a few valuable minutes of daylight in
putting up a camera stand, the 12 × 10 gave pictures
which we often lamented having taken, whilst in his
more mature years, a snap-shot has never been regretted.
The cameras which require stands, require one porter at
least to carry them, for although the late Mr. Donkin
carried his own 7½ × 5 camera up the highest peaks, it is
few men, who, even if they had the energy or the
physique that he had, would imitate his example.
A porter means an extra expense in fees, and an extra
mouth to feed, and very likely entails slowness in a
climb through having an additional man upon the rope.
A quarter plate or a 5 × 4 camera the owner, however,
can himself carry; but the best form of attaching it to
his body has been a difficult task to evolve. Many and
many different attachments have been tried. One thing
is quite certain, and that is, the camera should be in a
stout case, but it cannot be carried over the shoulders by
a strap as we can do in comparatively level countries.
Let anyone try to come down a rock with the camera
slung over his shoulders, and he will soon find it
dangling in front of his stomach, or swinging like a
pendulum, and threatening to displace him from what
at best may be a treacherous handhold. The method13
of attachment we adopt now, will be readily seen from
the diagram.

The shoulder strap is utilized, but a ring is attached
to the back of the case as shown, and a strap or piece of
whipcord comes over the strap as shown. The two
shoulders are in AA and the case is carried as a knapsack.
The length of the cord or strap BB is so adjusted,
as is also the length of the shoulder strap, that the
camera lies against the small of the back, and that it
will not swing away from the body. At one time the
ring was placed in front of the case, but the result was
merely to cause the top of the case to rest against the
back. The plan shown above has answered under
almost every variety of circumstances, and the weight
is inconsiderable. (A friend has his camera attached to
the bottom of a small “rücksac” and this answers,
but as the writer does not carry his own provisions or
change of garments he has not adopted this plan). A
long day’s march may be undertaken if this contrivance
be employed, and the weight is scarcely felt.

For those who have not had extensive practice with
hand cameras, a view finder is, if not a necessity, at all
events, a great help. On the whole, perhaps the best form
is that in which a miniature view falls on a ground glass.
It must be recollected, however, that each view finder is14
adapted for some particular focal length of lens. The
view in the finder and on the plate should be compared,
and if the former is more extensive, the surplus ground
glass should be covered up with a black mask.

If it be determined to take a camera with its stand,
very few directions are required beyond those which
apply to ordinary view work on the plains. It may
perhaps be as well to mention that a camera stand placed
on ice or snow, is not immovable until the iron shoes of
the legs attain the temperature of the surrounding snow
or ice. An exposure of a few seconds will often show an
image which has moved on the plate.

The next point that we may call attention to is the
plate to be employed. With a hand camera there is
no absolute necessity to have the most rapid plate,
as far as exposure is concerned, but in mountain
work it must be recollected that there are very great
contrasts to represent on the print. “The slower the
plate the steeper the gradation” is almost axiomatic,
and it must be recollected that only a certain amount
of opacity will print if the deepest shadows only are
to be kept of the greatest black obtainable in a print.
It is evident that the greater the range of light and
shade that is obtained of a printable density, the more
true to nature the picture will be. For this reason a
quick plate with a moderate gradation is to be preferred—as
being most generally useful—but it should be a plate
which is absolutely free from fog, and it should also be
of as fine a grain as possible, the size of which has something
to do with development. This is still more true when
a camera stand and hand exposures are made. With a
slow plate with feebler intensities of light, which must be
the case when the lens is stopped down to admit of hand
exposures, the gradation becomes more steep than if a
fairly bright light be employed. A quick plate does not15
suffer in the same way, however small the stop may be.
It has already been stated that isochromatic plates may
be employed with a hand camera. For ice and snow
views there is not much to commend their employment,
unless to give a deeper shade to the sky and to the vast
crevasses which so often form part of the foreground.
The darker sky allows faint clouds to be visible in a
print when they otherwise would be absent. Pictorially
thus the isochromatic plate has something to recommend
it. Celluloid films have often been substituted for plates
by the writer, and excellent photographs have been
obtained on them when they were fairly rapid. There
is not much to be said in their favour as regards weight, for
in most cameras the support for them weighs nearly as
much as the glass plate. There is also a disadvantage
in developing them, for they are not so easily manipulated
as a rigid body. For convenience in travelling, however,
they are to be highly commended. A gross of cut films
do not weigh so much as a dozen plates and occupy much
less space in the baggage. The question of the use of a
Kodak camera with its roller slide, has not been brought
forward, not because excellent results cannot be obtained
with it, but simply because the writer prefers to use
plates and films which can be got at any time for the
purpose of development.

For travelling on the continent, and to one’s
mountain destination, experience has shown that a small
hamper is the safest receptacle of all the necessary kit.
A hamper which will contain two camera cases side by
side is really sufficient; but it should be a little greater
in depth. It may be thought that two cameras are to
be taken, but such is not the intention. If a zinc trough
be made of the size of one camera case it will contain all
the developing apparatus necessary, the lantern, and the
plates or films, and all the few etceteras which go to16
make one happy. (A screwdriver, a file, and some
extra screws, and gummed paper and white blotting
paper cut to the size of the plates should be enough for
the etceteras). The hamper may be arranged so that the
camera and view finder may be taken out without any
derangement of the rest of the articles in it. The
developing bottles and cups, with the dishes, may be
similarly extracted. This prevents undue trouble in
unpacking and packing. One grand thing to remember
is, pack well but not distressingly tightly, in other words
don’t employ an expert packer if you wish for comfort.
Have the hamper a size too large rather than a size too
small. Also be it remembered that it is useless to
stopper the bottles with all sorts of devices at home, and
have to pack in an ordinary manner when once the
contents of the hamper have been brought into use.
Have your bottles covered with an indiarubber cap
which can easily be removed and replaced; of course
we are assuming that development is to take place
during one’s travels, and not to be left over for home.
Personally we think that a speedy development after
a view is taken will give the best picture. It may
often happen that an undeveloped sensitive plate or
film will suffer by its travels. There will or may be
scratches and what not, which would be absent if the
negative is finished at the time. The outfit for
development which need only be taken is as follows:
four developing dishes, bottles or cartridges of the dry
developer, ammonia diluted to half its strength in a glass
stoppered bottle (if in a wooden case, as for medicine
bottles, it will be a further protection), a couple of tins
of hyposulphite pounded up before the journey, carried
in small tins (such tins as the half-plate platinum
paper comes in are very convenient), two or three empty
six ounce medicine bottles with good corks, a two or four17
ounce measure, a washing rack with a trough (there is
a folding rack in the market which answers admirably;
it has v shaped grooves which never damage the edges of
the film, and one rack will take twenty-two glasses back
to back). A zinc trough can be made to cover
the plates with water when in the rack, a lantern
(by preference a paper folding one), a dusting brush,
a couple of dusters, and blotting paper cut into
squares the size of the plates, with which to
pack them—it is useful also to have spare pieces of
blotting paper to place beneath the plates when drying,
also a piece of mackintosh to place on the wash stand
during developing operations—an empty pint wine bottle
will be got at any hotel and in this the hyposulphite can
be dissolved. The list looks formidable but the whole
can be readily packed in the hamper of the size given.
It will be seen that no intensifying solutions are
enumerated amongst the requisites. A negative is better
strengthened in the quiet of one’s dark-room at home.

HOMEWARDS.
KARL GREGER.

Now we must give a hint or two as to the exposures
required. We will suppose that on the plates to be
used a satisfactory negative of an open English landscape,
on a bright June day with fleecy clouds in the
sky, can be secured with an aperture of f/11 in ¹/₂₅th of
a second. If that be so, then on an equally fine day in
July or August, at an altitude of about 6000 feet, the
same kind of view should theoretically be secured in ¹/₅₀th
second, and a stop of f/16—that is, the photographic light is
about four times as strong. It must, however, be
recollected that at this altitude, and particularly near
mid-day, the shadows are not illuminated to the same
degree from the sky. The darker blue sky shows that
the light which at a low altitude goes to make a pale
blue sky is to be found in the direct rays of the sun,
and not scattered to give a luminous sky. As the18
shadows are principally illuminated by the light from the
sky, it follows that the shadows will be darker at a high
than at a low altitude, for this reason amongst others,
the exposure should not be curtailed to the amount given
above. If the aperture be reduced to f/16 it is probable
that the exposure of ¹/₂₅th second will be not more than
sufficient to give. For our own part we prefer to give
longer and to expose well for the deep shadows, trusting
to development to give us properly “gradated”
pictures. As the sun goes down toward the horizon, the
shadows get more illumined from local reflection, and it
is scarcely necessary to alter the exposure until considerably
nearer sunset than at home, when the exposure must
be considerably prolonged. For views in which
there is little but ice and snow, the exposure
should be very much curtailed. There is so
little contrast that if the exposure be at all
prolonged the picture will be inevitably flat. The
shadows are illumined by an immense quantity of light
reflected from the white surface, and the difficulty is to
get sufficient contrast. The writer well remembers one
set of beautiful views, taken from the top of a mountain
some 10,000 feet high, where the eye could see nothing
but snow-fields and ice and swirling masses of clouds.
The day was not bright, but to get a satisfactory picture a
stop of f/32 was necessary with only an exposure of ¹/₇₀th
of a second. Plates given an exposure of ¹/₂₅th second
with a stop f/16 showed little besides a plain white mass.
It would be difficult to give hints for every kind of view.
The judgment of the operator must be brought into play
and no actinometer will be of much use under the varied
conditions which are the rule, not the exception.

Now as to development. The “one-solution” given
by the metol and amidol cartridges are the most readily
prepared, and in five times out of six will scarcely be19
bettered, but for the sixth time may fail, because of their
“rigidity.” For these exceptional negatives, solutions of
an oxidizing agent such as pyrogallol, of a restrainer
(bromide), and of an accelerator are to be recommended.
For the latter, the carbonate (not the bicarbonate) of
potash is much to be recommended, though some prefer
ammonia. Two formulæ are given, either of which will
be found extremely useful. When the exposure has
been prolonged enough for details in deep shadows to
be brought out, it will generally happen that over-exposure
has been given to the high-lights, and it is to
keep these in the printing state that care is required.
In the old collodion dry plate days, it was very usual to
bring out a complete phantom image of a subject before
any density was given to it. When this was properly
out, the intensifier of silver nitrate and pyrogallol was
applied, and the picture gradually brought up to printing
density. It was usually full of detail in the high-lights
and shadows, all of which would be found in the finished
print. Such is the same procedure which we
recommend, strive to get out an image of feeble density
but full of detail, and then give the density.

The plate should first of all be thoroughly soaked in
a solution of the alkali which can be used, and then a
few drops of the pyrogallol solution be dropped into the
developing cup with an equal number of drops of the
restrainer. The alkaline solution is then returned to the
cup and again poured into the dish and over the plate.
By degrees the required phantom image will make its
appearance, and now bromide and pyrogallol are added
until it is evidently complete. The plate is then washed
in water, a final wash being given in a very weak
solution of acetic acid or citric and water. After a final
rinse with water the plate is treated with the pyrogallol
solution and restrainer in the proportion recommended20
for the ordinary development of the plate, omitting the
alkali. The density will begin to appear, and when it
flags, a little alkali is added (a few drops at a time) to the
solution. Keep the image fairly feeble at above half the
proper printing density, and fix. The plate should then
be kept for intensification, preferably by Mr. Chapman
Jones’s, when a mercury solution is applied, and then a
ferrous oxalate to reduce the latter to the metallic state.
It will be found if this procedure is adopted, that the
negative is built up with a greater range of light
gradation than by bringing it out by a one-solution
method of development. If one wishes to exercise
artistic treatment, then in the preliminary stage more
importance can be given to any desired part by
applying a camel’s hair brush soaked in normal pyrogallol
solution with its restrainer. The prominence thus
gained will be kept in the subsequent operations.
When applying the brush care must be taken that the
image blends as it were with the rest of the picture.
No abrupt increase of density must be permitted, as if
it be, the result will be anything but satisfactory.

The following is an ammonia-pyro developer, with
which the writer usually works.

(Of course, should the ammonia be taken half strength
allowance must be made for the dilution.)

(When travelling it is very convenient to have the
bromide weighed out into 20 grain packets.)

21

When the view has strong contrasts and the plate
has been exposed for the shadows take of A 30 minims
and 2 ounces of water and soak the plate in it as given
above. Then add to the cup, of B 2 drams, of S 1
dram, and about quarter grain of P. Pour back the
solution of ammonia from the dish, and then apply the
mixture till all detail appears, and proceed as indicated
above. A saturated solution of potassium carbonate
may be substituted for the ammonia solution.

Before closing this chapter it may be of use to the
reader to tabulate the number of thicknesses of atmospheres
through which light has to travel at different
altitudes of the sun at sea level.

If sunlight outside the atmosphere be represented
by 1 and say ¹/₁₀th be cut off by 1 atmosphere, then after
transmission through 2 atmospheres only .81 will reach the
spectator, and if through 3 only .729. For any atmosphere
the diminution will be ¹/₁₀th, that is, it will be .9^x
where x is the number of atmospheres.

If we ascend the factor varies, there are less thicknesses
of atmosphere to go through and we get the
following table.

22

This table and the preceding one will enable a
calculation to be made as to the exposure to be given.
Thus at sea level with a photographic brightness of
sun of 639,000 candles when nearly overhead, it will at
5° above the horizon only have a photographic brightness
of about 1000. At about 9000 feet high the photographic
brightness would when the sun is overhead be
about 800,000 candles, and at 5° it would have a value
of 350,000, showing the greater penetration through the
thinner atmosphere.

W. de W. Abney, C.B., F.R.S., etc., etc.

Negative Making.

DEVELOPMENT, INTENSIFICATION,
REDUCING, Etc.

When a sensitive
plate has been
properly exposed under
ordinary conditions, there
is no visible change. The
action of light produces
what is known as a latent
image or developable image,
and in order to convert
this into a visible image
with sufficient opacity to
be useful for printing purposes,
it must be developed.
In the operation of development,
the plate is treated
with some solution that
will act on the exposed
parts of the sensitive film
and reduce the silver salts
contained therein to metallic
silver, in quantity proportional
to the amount of
light-action, whilst at the same time it produces no
appreciable change in those parts of the film on which24
light has acted the least or not at all, and which correspond
to the darkest shadows of the object that has been
photographed. The solution used for this purpose is
called the developer.

DEVELOPERS—GENERAL.

The substances that can be employed as photographic
developers are now somewhat numerous, but
the most useful for negative making are pyrogallic acid
(also known as pyrogallol, or for brevity as pyro.), ortol,
metol, and hydroquinone (also known as quinol).
Ferrous oxalate is likewise used in special circumstances,
but not for general work. An ordinary developer as
mixed for use contains:—

The composition of a developer has to be so
arranged that, whilst reasonably rapid in its action, it is
not so rapid as to be beyond control, and does not
produce “general fog” by acting on those parts of the
film that have not been acted on by light.

AMONG THE ALPS.
CAPT. W. DE W. ABNEY, C.B., F.R.S. Etc.

DEVELOPMENT—GENERAL OPERATIONS
AND PHENOMENA.

A developer is usually compounded immediately
before use by mixing two or more solutions, and in
order to ensure uniform action it is essential that the
constituents should be thoroughly mixed before the
liquid is applied to the plate. If the measuring or
mixing vessel is large enough, this can be done by
agitating the liquid; if not, the liquid may be poured
once or twice from one vessel to another.

The quantity of developer necessary for a plate of
a given size depends in some degree upon the size and
character of the dish that is used, and is smallest when
the bottom of the dish is quite flat and has no ridges or
grooves. It is false economy to use too small a quantity,
and it may be taken that for a quarter plate 1½ oz., for
a half plate 2½ or 3 oz., and for a whole plate 4 oz. of
developer should be used.

Ebonite, xylonite, or papier maché dishes are the
best for all operations connected with negative making,26
since they are not so liable as porcelain or earthenware
to break a plate if it is allowed to drop into them.

When applying the developer to the plate it is
important to cover the whole surface of the plate rapidly
and in such a manner as to avoid the formation of air
bubbles, and the best way is to begin to pour on the
developer at one corner of the developing dish and
whilst pouring somewhat quickly move the vessel
rapidly but steadily along the edge of the dish to the
other corner. If there should be any froth or air bubbles
on the surface of the developer, the last portions should
not be poured out of the vessel into the dish, and then
the risk of air bubbles forming on the surface of the
plate will be lessened.

Sometimes after the developer has been poured on
and the plate seems to be uniformly wetted, the liquid
will recede from one corner or one edge of the plate and
the part thus left uncovered will appear as a patch of
lower opacity when the negative is finished. This
happens either because the dish is not standing level on
the table or because the bottom of the dish is not flat;
sometimes it happens because too small a quantity of
developer has been used.

After the plate has been covered by the developer
the dish should be carefully rocked from time to time,
and, for reasons that will be explained presently, the
time required for the first appearance of the image and
the manner in which the different parts of the image
follow one another, should be carefully observed.

If the plate has been correctly exposed, the brightest
parts of the image will appear (as black, of course,) in
about a minute, more or less, according to the temperature,
composition of the developer, and character of the
plate, and the other parts will follow steadily in the
order of their brightness, after which the image as a27
whole will continue to gain vigour or opacity up to a
certain limit. The essential point is that the principal
details in the deepest shadows of the subject shall
appear and acquire a distinct printable opacity, before
the highest lights become so opaque that the details in
them are no longer distinguishable. Whether this condition
is realisable or not depends very largely on the
exposure that the plate has received.

If the image appears in considerably less than a
minute and the different parts follow one another very
quickly, the plate has been over-exposed, and the degree
of over-exposure is indicated by the rapidity with which
the image appears. In this connection it ought,
however, to be stated that with metol and certain other
developers, even when the plate has been correctly
exposed, the different parts of the image appear almost
simultaneously, though the first appearance may not
begin until about a minute after the developer has been
applied to the plate. It follows that with these
developers it is difficult to recognise over-exposure, but
it so happens that they are not suitable developers to
use when there is any probability that the plates have
been over-exposed. On the other hand, if the image is
slow in appearing and the brightest parts of the subject
are not followed in due course by the middle tones, the
plate has been under-exposed, and there is considerable
danger that the high-lights may become quite opaque
before any details have appeared in the shadows, or
even, in extreme cases, in the lower middle tones, that
is to say, in those parts that are next in darkness to the
shadows.

When it is desired, as it frequently is, to alter the
composition of the developer during development, the
substance or substances to be added should be put into
the measuring or mixing glass, the developer poured out28
of the dish into the glass, and the well-mixed liquid
poured over the plate as before. Any attempt to add
substances to the developer whilst it is in contact with
the plate will probably result in uneven action.

It should be borne in mind that temperature has an
important influence on development, the time required
for the first appearance of the image and for the completion
of development being, as a rule, less the higher
the temperature. Further, if the developing solutions
are very cold, it is often almost impossible to obtain
sufficient opacity.

Perhaps the most difficult thing in connection with
development is to know when to stop the process, that
is to say, when the image has acquired sufficient opacity,
or “density,” as it is often called. After all the required
detail has become visible, the plate from time to time is
lifted carefully out of the developer, allowed to drain for
a moment or two, and then held between the developing
lamp and the eye; the opacity of the image, especially
in the highest lights and deepest shadows, being
carefully scrutinised. The appearance of the image as
seen when looking at the back of the plate, is also
carefully observed.

For this purpose it is very much better that the
light of the developing lamp should pass through transparent
glass (ruby or deep orange) so that the flame
itself is distinctly visible, instead of through ground glass
or a coloured translucent fabric. Further, the flame of
the lamp, whether gas or oil, should always be turned
up to the same height, for it is clear that if the brightness
of the flame used for making the examination is not
fairly constant, all sorts of variable results will be
obtained. For this reason it is much better to judge
the opacity of negatives by artificial light than by
daylight, the intensity of the latter being so variable.29
A paraffin lamp with a circular wick and a deep ruby
chimney with a metal cap at the top, answers admirably.

No general rules can be laid down; the appearance
of the properly developed image depends on the thickness
of the film, the granularity of the silver salt, the presence
or absence of silver iodide, and the composition of the
emulsion used. Experience only is of value, and the
best way to secure uniformly satisfactory results, is to
keep as far as possible to one brand of plates. With
some plates, for example, very little of the image should
appear at the back of the plate, with others the greater
part of the image must be distinctly visible there.

Sometimes, especially when using small sizes of
plates, it is not easy to tell whether all the necessary
detail in the shadows has been brought out, and this is
an important matter, for if the small negatives are to be
used for making enlarged negatives or prints, or lantern
slides, there should be very little clear glass indeed even
in the deepest shadows of the subject. As a rule it may
be said that when every part of the image is at least
gray the maximum possible amount of detail has been
brought out. If the greyness begins to spread to the
margins of the plate where it has been protected by the
rebate of the dark slide, general fog is being produced,
and, as a rule, little will be gained, but much may be
lost, by continuing the development for any considerable
time after this is observed. When development is
completed the developer is poured off, the plate is well
rinsed under the tap or in two or three changes of water,
and is then ready for fixing.

DEVELOPMENT WITH PYRO-AMMONIA.

This method of development has the advantage that
the constituents can be kept in concentrated solutions,
considerable modifications in the composition of the30
developer can be made very readily and the negatives
obtained are of excellent printing quality. On the other
hand it cannot be satisfactorily employed with certain
brands of rapid plates, because with them it has a
tendency to produce general fog, and with some other
plates, especially when they are old, it has a tendency to
produce what is known as green fog.

Three solutions are prepared:—

For each ounce of developer, take 20 minims of
reducer, 20 minims of restrainer and 40 minims of
accelerator, and make up to 1 oz. with water. With
some plates 60 minims of accelerator and 30 minims of
restrainer may be used, but any greater proportion of
accelerator has considerable tendency to produce general
fog. On the other hand the proportion of restrainer can
often be increased with advantage since, unless the
amount added is very large, its chief effect is to prevent
general fog; 30 minims of restrainer to 40 minims of
accelerator, or 40 minims of accelerator to 60 minims of
restrainer are proportions that can be recommended.
Too low a proportion of bromide should be carefully
avoided.

31

It is very important to ascertain, by careful trial
with each brand of plates that is to be used, what is the
maximum proportion of ammonia that can safely be
added, and what proportion of bromide to ammonia is
necessary in order to prevent general fog. As a rule,
the more rapid the plates the smaller is the quantity of
ammonia that can be used with safety.

By far the best plan is to keep development well
under control by adding only part of the accelerator at
the beginning of development and adding the rest as
circumstances require.

For each ounce of developer take 20 minims of
pyro solution and make up to the required bulk with
water. In another measure mix for each ounce of
developer 40 minims of bromide solution and 60 minims
of ammonia solution, and regard this as the maximum
quantity that can be added with that bulk of developer.
Now to the diluted pyro solution add about a quarter
or one-third of the ammonia and bromide solution, pour
this mixture on the plate and observe what happens.

If the mode of appearance of the image indicates
that the plate has been correctly exposed, about half the
remaining ammonia and bromide mixture may be added
to the developer at once, and the action allowed to continue,
with occasional rocking of the dish. If development
proceeds satisfactorily and, in particular, if the
chief details in the shadows begin to appear before the
highest lights have become too opaque, it is not necessary
nor advisable to add the last portion of the ammonia
and bromide mixture, since the tendency to general fog
and green fog is reduced when the proportion of ammonia
is kept as low as possible. On the other hand, if
the development flags and the appearance of shadow
detail is a little tardy, the rest of the ammonia and
bromide mixture must be added.

32

If the plate seems to be over-exposed, no more of
the ammonia and bromide mixture should be added for
some time, until it is seen whether the quantity already
in the developer will suffice to complete development.
If it seems that the over-exposure has been considerable,
a further quantity of pyro solution (10 to 20 minims per
oz.) and also of bromide solution (10, 20, or 30 minims
per oz.) may be added with advantage. Development
is then allowed to continue and the negative is examined
from time to time; if it is seen that the opacity does
not increase, or if sufficient detail in the deep shadows
does not appear, further small quantities of the ammonia
and bromide mixture may be added cautiously until the
required result is obtained, waiting a little while to see
the result of each small addition before adding more.

Teasels

By Carine Cadby.

When the plate behaves as if under-exposed, dilute
the developer at once with half the quantity or an equal
quantity of water, according to the degree of under-exposure
indicated, and add the whole of the ammonia
and bromide mixture. These modifications should check
the rate at which the high-lights of the subject gain
opacity, whilst accelerating the appearance of the
middle tones and shadows. Should this effect not be
produced, further quantities of ammonia and bromide
mixture may be added or, in extreme cases, ammonia
alone, and the developer may be still more diluted with
water.

If any considerable parts of the image still show no
detail, local development with a brush may be tried as a
last resource. A soft camel’s hair brush, preferably
mounted in quill, is used. Some of the ammonia and
bromide mixture is placed in a vessel and diluted with
two or three times its volume of water. One corner or
edge of the plate is raised so that the part to be treated
is lifted out of the developer, the diluted ammonia and33
bromide mixture is applied rapidly with the brush, and
the plate is allowed to drop gently back into the
developer. The treatment may be repeated if necessary.

Should all these devices
fail, the plate is hopelessly
under-exposed.

Sometimes, when working
with a diluted developer as
just described, it happens that
although all the necessary
detail has been brought out,
the image gains in opacity very
slowly. Provided that all the
required detail is visible, small
quantities of pyro solution
may be added in order to gain
opacity more quickly.

PYRO-SODA DEVELOPMENT.

When sodium carbonate
is used as the alkali in place
of ammonia the developer acts
somewhat more slowly and is
less liable to produce fog, especially
with very rapid plates,
and there is very little tendency
to produce green fog. On the
other hand, variations are not
so easily made in the composition
of the developer.
Some people find the absence
of the smell of ammonia a
decided advantage.

34

For use mix equal parts of dilute pyro solution and
soda solution and pour over the plate.

If the exposure has been correct the image will
begin to appear in about a minute, and development is
then allowed to go on with occasional rocking of the
dish, until the negative is sufficiently opaque.

If the plate behaves as if it were under-exposed, at
once dilute the developer with an equal bulk of water
and pour it back over the plate. If the high-lights
continue to increase in opacity, but the rest of the image
does not appear, add some more of the soda solution
with or without some more water. Should parts of the
plate still remain blank, apply some of the soda solution
to them with the aid of a brush as described under
pyro-ammonia (page 32).

If the rapid appearance of the image indicates that
the plate is over-exposed, at once pour off the developer
into a measure or mixing glass and rinse the plate well
with water. Add to the developer a small quantity of
potassium bromide solution (1 in 10 of water) which
should be kept at hand for this purpose. A small
quantity of pyro stock solution may also be added. The35
developer is then poured over the plate again. When
the over-exposure seems to have been considerable, the
amount of potassium bromide added may amount to 4
grains (or 40 minims of the 1 in 10 solution) per ounce
of the developer, but this proportion should not be
exceeded; even small quantities of bromide in the
pyro-soda developer have a marked influence in retarding
development.

When there is reason to suspect over-exposure, not
more than half the soda solution should be added at the
beginning of development, and the rest may be added or
not, as the case may require.

Mix equal parts of ortol solution and soda solution.

This developer behaves in much the same way as
pyro-soda and gives very similar results. It has the
advantage, however, that it does not stain the fingers,
and has practically no tendency to produce either fog or
stain on the plates. Moreover the same quantity of
solution can be used for several plates; when the action
becomes perceptibly slower or weaker, part of the old
solution is poured away and an equal quantity of freshly
mixed ortol and soda solutions is added.

The chief differences to be observed are (1) that the
different parts of the image follow one another more
rapidly than with pyro-soda, even though the plate may
have been correctly exposed, and (2) the colour of the
reduced silver is somewhat bluer than with pyro-soda,36
and therefore in order to obtain the same degree of
printing opacity, as distinct from visual opacity, development
must be carried a little further.

Apart from these differences, what has been said of
pyro-soda holds good for ortol soda and need not be
repeated.

Mix two parts of hydroquinone solution with one
part of alkali solution and one part of water, or, if a
more energetic developer is wanted, mix equal volumes
of the hydroquinone and alkali solutions. Hydroquinone
is not an advantageous developer for general
purposes, but it is useful when negatives are required
showing strong contrast between the highest lights and
the deepest shadows, and especially when it is important
that there should be no deposit at all in the deepest
shadows. This is the case, for example, when copying
line engravings, pen and ink drawings and similar
subjects.

DEVELOPMENT WITH FERROUS OXALATE.

This method of development also is not well
adapted for general work, but it is invaluable for certain
purposes. The reduced silver has a pure grey-black
colour and there is exceedingly little tendency to
produce fog of any kind. On the other hand, the37
developer admits of little modification in its composition
and therefore the exposure must be fairly correct. It is
also important to avoid contamination with even minute
quantities of hypo, since this substance very readily
causes stains.

About three-quarters of the total quantity of water is
mixed with a small quantity (not more than 50 minims
per 10 ozs., or one part per 100) of sulphuric acid, and
the ferrous sulphate (proto-sulphate of iron) which must
be in clear pale green crystals without any yellowish
incrustation, is dissolved in it with the aid of a gentle
heat. After the solution has cooled, it is made up to
the specified volume with water. This solution alters
when exposed to air, and should, therefore, be kept in
small (2 oz.) bottles, filled up to the neck and tightly
corked.

For use take four parts of oxalate solution and one
part of ferrous sulphate solution, pouring the latter into
the former and not vice versa. In order to obtain slower
action with a rather softer image and a slightly browner
deposit, the developer may be diluted with an equal
volume of water. Slower action, with slightly increased
printing contrasts, and clearer shadows, results from
an increase in the proportion of bromide.

FIXING.

After development is finished, the dark-coloured
reduced silver that forms the image remains mixed with
a considerable quantity of semi-opaque, yellowish38
unaltered silver bromide, which would not only interfere
with the printing, but would also gradually darken
when exposed to light. The negative must therefore be
“fixed” by dissolving out the unaltered silver bromide,
and this is accomplished by immersing the plate in a
fairly strong solution of sodium thiosulphate (formerly
called sodium hyposulphite) commonly known as
“hypo.” The usual strength of the fixing is as follows:

A solution of double this strength is, however, not
unfrequently used, and acts more rapidly, especially in
cold weather.

The developed plate, after being well rinsed with
water, is placed in the fixing bath and allowed to remain
in it with frequent rocking until the silver bromide has
all been dissolved out of the film. This is ascertained
by lifting the plate out of the dish and looking at the
back by reflected light, the plate being held in front of
something dark. It is not difficult to see whether the
silver bromide has all disappeared or not, but in order
to ensure complete fixing the plate must not be taken
out of the bath as soon as this has happened, but
should be left in for a few minutes longer, the dish
being rocked so that the dissolved silver salt may
diffuse out of the film into the fixing bath.

When removed from the fixing bath the plate
should be allowed to drain into the bath for a few
moments and should then be washed for five or ten
minutes in running water under the tap. It is best to
put the plate in a dish standing on the sink and have a
piece of flexible indiarubber tubing reaching from the
tap to within a couple of inches or so of the top of
the dish, so that the water may not splash too much.39
After washing in this way, the plate is placed in a
grooved zinc rack, which is immersed in a tank (preferably
of zinc), containing sufficient water to completely
cover the plates, and here it remains until the whole
batch of plates in hand has been developed and they
can all receive their final washing together. The plates
stand upright in the rack, and the entrance and exit of
the water must be so arranged that the water enters at
the bottom and overflows at the top, or, what is perhaps
better, enters at the top and is drawn off from the
bottom, the waste pipe opening at the bottom of the
tank and being bent and carried upwards until its
mouth is at the level at which the water is to stand in
the tank.

When running water is not available the plates
may be washed in dishes. After being well rinsed
to remove the adhering hypo solution, the plate is
covered with water (about 3½ oz. for a half plate or 5 oz.
for a whole plate) and allowed to remain with frequent
rocking for five or six minutes. The water is then well
drained off, a second quantity added and allowed to
remain for the same time as before, with frequent
rocking, when it is poured off in its turn. Treatment in
this way with six successive quantities of water will
remove all the hypo, provided that the film has not been
treated with alum.

Another plan, rather less troublesome, but also less
expeditious, is to place the rack containing the plates in
a tank not much more than big enough to hold it,
taking care that there is not less than two inches
between the lower edges of the plates and the bottom of
the tank. After standing for some time the rack and
the plates are slowly and carefully lifted out and
allowed to drain, the tank emptied and filled with fresh
water, and the rack and plates then replaced. Eight or40
ten successive quantities of water applied in this way
should remove all the hypo, but if there is any doubt on
this point the plates, after they are supposed to be
washed and have been removed from the tank, should
be allowed to drain into a measuring glass or into a dish,
the contents of which are afterwards transferred to a
measuring glass and mixed with a small quantity of a
solution of silver nitrate. If the plates are really completely
washed nothing will happen, or at most a white
precipitate will be produced which will remain white if
not exposed to daylight. If, on the other hand, the
plates still retain hypo, the silver nitrate will produce a
precipitate which will gradually become orange and
eventually dark brown. Should this happen, the
washing must be continued.

Drying.—If the negatives are allowed to dry in the
rack in which they were washed, the process is slow,
and sometimes if the washing has not been complete,
the middle portions of the negatives, which dry last, are
less opaque than the rest. An excellent method of
drying negatives rapidly and in such a way that no dust
can fall on the film, is to drive nails (preferably of copper)
into a wall or a board fixed against the wall, at distances
apart depending on the size of the plates. Each plate41
then rests, with the film downwards, between a pair of
nails, the lower corner of the plate resting against the
wall, as shown on previous page.

WINTER TIME ON THE ALPS.
CAPT. W. DE W. ABNEY, C.B., F.R.S. Etc.

Alum Bath.—It is frequently recommended that
all plates should be immersed in a strong solution of
alum, for the purpose of preventing “frilling” by
hardening the film. Its use is, however, attended with
the great disadvantage that liquids diffuse into and out
of a film so treated with much greater difficulty than in
the case of an ordinary film, and consequently if the
film is alumed between development and fixing, the
fixing is not only much slower, but the washing after
fixing requires a very much longer time. If, therefore,
the alum bath is used at all, it should not be applied
until after the film has been well washed after fixing.
The following solution may be used:—

If a strong solution of alum is applied to the plate for a
long time, the film may become so thoroughly hardened
that it partially loses its adhesiveness, and there is a
possibility that it will begin to peel from the glass
after the negatives have been stored for some time in a
dry place. The solution given above is quite strong
enough and plates need not be immersed in it for more
than five minutes, after which they must, of course, be
again well washed. The hardening of the film, if not
carried too far, no doubt makes it less liable to be
injured by abrasion and the like.

Frilling.—It sometimes happens that during the
various operations of development, fixing and washing,
the film begins to leave the plate and rise in puckers
along the edges. This is known as “frilling,” and in
bad cases it may spread until a large part of the film42
has detached itself from the glass. It is due to excessive
or irregular absorption of water by the gelatine, and at
one time was commonly met with, but it rarely occurs
with the dry plates of the present day. It is most likely
to arise if there is any considerable difference of
temperature between the various liquids and the wash-water,
or during very hot weather when all the liquids
are much warmer than usual.

When frilling does occur, the plate must be treated
carefully, so as to avoid tearing the film, but unless it is
very bad and shows a tendency to spread, all the
operations, including washing after fixing, should be
completed before any special measures are taken to
remedy the defect. On the other hand, if the frilling
spreads rapidly, the plate should be carefully rinsed two
or three times with water and placed for five minutes
in the alum bath, with occasional gentle rocking, after
which it is again well washed to remove the alum, and
the various operations are completed. There is one
exception to the procedure just indicated; if the frilling
becomes bad while the plate is being fixed or during
washing after fixing, the alum must not be applied until
the fixing and the washing after fixing are completed.
If something must be done in these circumstances, the
plate, after draining, but without any previous washing,
may be placed for about ten minutes in a saturated
solution of common salt. It can afterwards be put
back into the fixing bath, also without any intermediate
washing, and the remainder of the process carried
through.

Although the methods just described will check the
frilling, they will not remove its effects. For this
purpose the plate after its final washing is allowed to
drain thoroughly and is then immersed in methylated
alcohol, preferably of the old kind, though the new kind43
can be made to do. The alcohol abstracts water from
the film, which consequently shrinks to its original size
and can be pressed back with the fingers into its proper
position on the plate. Should the film be opalescent it
should be removed from the first quantity of alcohol and
placed in a second quantity, after which it should be set
up to dry. The plates should not remain too long in
the alcohol or the gelatine will contract too much.

DEFECTS IN NEGATIVES.

A perfect negative presupposes a perfect plate,
correct exposure, and correct development stopped at
exactly the right time. It is almost unnecessary to say
that all these conditions are rarely satisfied, and consequently
most negatives fall more or less short of
perfection. The defects may be broadly grouped under
two heads, namely, those due to imperfections existing
in the film before exposure, and those due to defects or
errors in the way in which the plate has been treated.
It will be more convenient to deal with the latter, and
larger, group first, but there is really no hard and fast
division between them.

The Negative is Thin, or in other words, whilst
showing good gradation, and sufficient relative contrast
between the different parts, is as a whole lacking in
opacity or printing strength, and gives prints that are
deficient in vigour and contrasts. The plate has been
removed from the developer too soon, and the remedy
is to intensify the image (see p. 51). Sometimes the
want of opacity is due to the fact that the developer
was too cold.

The Negative is too Dense or Opaque and
consequently although showing good contrasts and
gradations, takes a long time to print, especially on dull
days. The developer has been too energetic, or44
development has been continued too long; the remedy
is to reduce the image (see p. 50).

The Image is “Flat,” or shows comparatively
little contrast between the highest lights and the
deepest shadows. This may, of course, be due to the
absence of contrasts in the subject photographed; it is
commonly due to over-exposure; it may be caused by
using a developer containing too little reducer, or
restrainer, or both, and too much alkali; sometimes it
arises from a defect in the quality of the emulsion, or
from the fact that the plate has been coated with an
abnormally thin film of emulsion.

The Image is “Hard,” or shows excessive
contrasts between lights and shadows, and is defective
in the range of its half-tones. This is probably due
to under-exposure, but may have been aggravated by
the use of a developer containing too much bromide
or too little alkali. Local reduction (see p. 50) may
partially remedy the defect.

Fog.—A more or less marked grey deposit of
reduced silver extends over the whole surface of the
image. It may be due to over-exposure, in which case
the edges of the plate that have been protected by the
rebate of the dark slide usually remain clear. It may
also be caused by using a developer containing too
much alkali, or too little restrainer, or both, or by the
plate having been exposed to actinic light outside the
camera, including the light from the dark-room lamp if
the glass or coloured fabric used as the screening
material is not efficient. In any of these cases the
defect would be observable up to the extreme edges of
the film.

The character of the dark-room light should be
tested by exposing one half of a plate to it at a distance
of say nine or twelve inches for five or ten minutes, the45
other half of the plate being protected by some opaque
substance. The best plan is to put the plate into a
dark slide and draw out the shutter half-way. After
exposure the plate is treated with a developer in the
usual manner, and it can then be seen whether or no
the light has exerted any action on the plate.

Slight general fog may as a rule be neglected, but
if the amount of fog is at all considerable the plate
should be treated with a reducer, and afterwards the
image can, if necessary, be intensified.

Green Fog.—The surface of the film shows a
peculiar brilliant green or yellowish-green lustrous
appearance, generally in patches, when examined by
reflected light, but is more or less distinctly pink when
the plate is looked through. This effect is rarely
observed except when pyro-ammonia has been used as
the developer, and it most frequently occurs with old
plates, especially if development has been long continued
or has been forced by the addition of comparatively
large quantities of ammonia.

If the green fog is only slight it does not affect the
prints made from the negative, but in bad cases the
prints have a patchy appearance and are less deeply
printed at those points where the green fog is worst.
Two methods are available for the removal of green fog.

In one of these the plate, after being fixed and
washed, is placed in a hypo solution of half the strength
of the ordinary fixing bath, and to this hypo solution is
added a very small quantity of a solution of potassium
ferricyanide, and the mixture is allowed to act on the
plate for some time, the dish being rocked occasionally.
The green fog will gradually disappear and some more
of the ferricyanide may be added, if necessary, to secure
this end, but it is important to keep the proportion of
ferricyanide as low as possible, otherwise the image46
itself will be reduced. For this reason, if it is seen or
suspected that the green fog is likely to be bad, development
should be carried a little farther than usual in
order to allow for the slight reduction that accompanies
the removal of the green fog.

The other plan is to immerse the plate in a dilute
solution of ferric chloride (perchloride of iron) until the
green fog has been completely bleached, then wash,
first in a dilute solution of oxalic acid and afterwards in
water, and finally treat with a developer, preferably
ferrous oxalate. The green fog is converted into a
very fine grey deposit which is almost invisible and
has no appreciable effect on the printing qualities of
the negative.

Black Spots may be due to particles of dirt that have
been allowed to lodge on the film during one or other
of the operations, or during drying. They may also be
due to particles in the emulsion, and in the latter case
are generally round and sharply defined.

Black Marks of the nature of irregular streaks,
looking, so to speak, like black scratches, are generally
due to mechanical abrasion of the film. Pressure
produces a developable image similar to that produced
by the action of light.

Black Bands, indistinct or nebulous at the edges, are
sometimes caused during the coating of the plate with
the emulsion, in which case they, as a rule, extend all
the way along or across the plate. More commonly they
are due to defects in the hinges of the dark slides, which
may produce the bands either by allowing light to pass
through, or by giving off exhalations that affect the
plates if they are allowed to remain in the dark slide for
a long time. If the bands are due to the hinges, they
will, of course, correspond with them in position, and if
the hinge is double, in the distance between them.

47

Transparent Bands, or bands showing less opacity
than the rest of the image, are sometimes caused by
exhalations from the material forming the hinges of the
dark slides.

Transparent Spots if small (“pinholes”), are generally
due to the presence of particles of dust on the surface
of the plate when it was exposed. Prevention lies, of
course, in carefully dusting the plate and the dark slide
with a soft, clean, dry camel’s hair brush, before putting
the former into the latter. If the spots are larger and
circular, they are due either to the formation of air
bubbles on the surface of the plate during development,
or to the presence in the film of insensitive particles.

Uneven Opacity or Density, varying gradually
from one end or side of the plate to the opposite end or
side, is due to uneven coating of the plate. If there is a
distinctly defined patch, less opaque than the rest, the
plate was not properly covered by the developing solution.

Stains.—A uniform stain, of a yellowish or brown
colour, is produced when the pyro developer contains
too small a proportion of sulphite or is allowed to act for
a very long time. Such a stain is rarely observed with
the other developers mentioned above. The pyro stain
can be more or less completely removed by immersing
the plate for some time, with repeated rocking, in the
alum solution given above, 1 drachm of sulphuric acid
being added to every 10 ounces. The plate must afterwards
be well washed in soft water. Similar stains in
patches may be caused by using dirty dishes or a developer
that has become turbid by being frequently used.

Deep Yellow-Orange or Brown Stains, appearing
gradually in patches or all over the negative, some
time after it has been fixed, and washed, and dried, are
due either to imperfect fixing or to incomplete washing
after fixing. There is no practicable remedy.

48

Dock
By Carine Cadby.

Halation.—When the subject photographed includes
some part much more brightly lighted than
the rest, such as a window in an interior subject, the
details of the bright part are not
only lost, but the image of it
seems to spread in all directions,
obliterating the details of the surrounding
portions. The effect is
especially noticeable when the
subject includes dark parts which
necessitate a somewhat long exposure.
A window at the end of
a long dimly lighted interior, or
dark trees against a bright sky
are cases in point. The effect is
really due to the fact that the
sensitive film is not perfectly
opaque, and some of the incident
light passes through the film and
is reflected from the back surface
of the glass on to the under side
of the film, producing a blurred
image superposed, as it were, on
the normal image formed at the
surface of the film by the action of
the direct light. The effect is
known as “halation.” It is prevented
by having a perfectly
opaque film, which is a condition
difficult to realize in practice, and
which, moreover, introduces certain
other disadvantages. It is
also prevented by coating the back
of the plate with some substance
that will absorb the rays that have49
passed through the film, and so prevent their being
reflected back against the under side of the film. The
substance used must either be opaque or must have a
deep orange, brown, or red colour, and it must have the
same refractive index as the glass, otherwise the reflection
will not be prevented. For practical convenience it
must also be easily applied and easily removed. Many
substances have been recommended but nothing is so
good as caramel, prepared by the action of heat on sugar.
In order to get the mixture to dry completely after it
has been applied, a somewhat troublesome process of
purification is necessary, but caramel specially prepared
for the purpose can now be obtained from dealers in
photographic materials. The caramel (which is a solid
substance) is dissolved in just enough water to make a
thick syrup, which is carefully applied to the back of the
plates in a thin layer by means of a flat brush.

If the caramel does not dry properly the solution
may be thoroughly mixed with about one quarter (or
more) of its weight of very finely powdered burnt sienna
or burnt umber, “ground in water.”

After being coated, the plates require some time to
dry, and must, of course, be carefully protected from
light. If the dark-room is thoroughly dark, the plates
may be put up to dry in the same manner as negatives
(see page 40), but if the dark-room is not suitable, some
sort of drying box must be used.

After exposure and before development the backing
is removed with a damp sponge; if caramel only is used
in a form completely soluble in water, it need not be
removed unless a developer is being used that is to be
applied to several plates in succession.

REDUCTION.

When a negative is too opaque or dense it must be
reduced by dissolving away part of the silver that forms50
the image. The same process is also applied for the
removal of general fog, sometimes with a view to
subsequent intensification.

The simplest solution to use for this purpose is
known as the Howard Farmer reducer and is a solution
of hypo mixed with a small quantity of potassium
ferricyanide (red prussiate of potash).

The negative which, if it has been previously dried,
must be soaked in water for some time until it is
thoroughly and uniformly wetted, is placed in some
fresh hypo solution (the ordinary fixing-bath solution
diluted with an equal volume of water) to which a small
quantity of the ferricyanide solution has been added, and
the dish is rocked repeatedly to ensure uniform action.
The rapidity of the reducing action depends on the
proportion of ferricyanide solution added, and it is very
important not to add too much, otherwise the process
gets out of control and reduction goes too far. The
image should be carefully watched and the plate
removed from the solution and rapidly washed before
the apparent reduction is quite as great as it is intended
to be. It is much better to stop too soon than too late,
because if it is found that a little further reduction is
necessary, the plate can be again immersed in the hypo
and ferricyanide.

The ferricyanide reducer can be applied locally for
reducing high-lights, halated windows, etc., and this is
often very valuable, especially in the case of under-exposed
negatives. A small quantity of hypo and
ferricyanide solution is mixed in a measuring glass or
some other suitable vessel. The plate is immersed in51
plain hypo solution in a white dish for a short time and
is then raised by one corner or one edge until the part
to be reduced is above the solution. The mixture of
hypo and ferricyanide is carefully applied with a camel’s
hair brush to the parts that are too opaque, and after a
few moments the plate is allowed to slip back into the
hypo solution and the dish is rocked. If the reduction
is not sufficient, the same proceeding is gone through as
often as necessary. The reducer should not be allowed
to act too long before putting the plate back into
the hypo, otherwise the reduction may spread further
than is desired. Further, the reducer must not be too
strong (i.e., contain too much ferricyanide), otherwise it
will produce brownish stains and the action may be too
energetic.

The other reducer is known as Belitzski’s reducer,
and is made up as follows:—

The constituents must be dissolved in water in the
order given. The solution can be used at once and it
keeps fairly well if protected from light, in well corked
bottles filled up to the neck.

INTENSIFICATION.

Intensification is a process in which the opacity of
the image is increased by adding some fresh matter,
metallic or otherwise, to the reduced silver that
constitutes the developed image.

The usual plan is to bleach the image by means of
a solution of mercuric chloride (mercury perchloride or52
corrosive sublimate), which converts the dark-coloured
silver into a white mixture of silver chloride and
mercurous chloride, and this is subsequently treated
with some re-agent which will reconvert the image into a
dark product of greater opacity than the original.

It is absolutely essential to successful intensification
that the negative be completely fixed and completely
washed after fixing, for any trace of hypo left in the
film will give rise to brown stains. It is also important,
in order to prevent stains of another sort and to secure
uniform action, that the mercuric chloride solution be
mixed with a small quantity of hydrochloric acid. Too
much acid will cause frilling. If the negative has been
dried it must be immersed in water for, as a rule, not
less than half-an-hour, in order that it may be thoroughly
and uniformly wetted.

When uniform intensification is required the negative is
allowed to remain in this solution until it is completely
bleached. If, however, it is desired to intensify the
shadows more than the high-lights, the plate should be
removed from the solution as soon as the shadows have
bleached, and should be rapidly washed in order to stop
the action on the more opaque parts of the image.

In either case the negative must be thoroughly
washed after bleaching, and the water used must be
soft water. Hard water tends to produce a precipitate
of the mercury salt in the film, which may subsequently
lead to stain or fog.

Perhaps the best plan of all, when constant results
are desired, is to treat the bleached negative with the
ferrous oxalate developer, which will gradually convert
the white image into a black one, after which the plate53
is thoroughly washed and dried. It is recommended
that the first water used for washing should be slightly
acidified with oxalic acid.

Instead of using ferrous oxalate the bleached plate
may be treated with a weak solution of ortol or metol
to which some sodium carbonate (soda crystals) solution
has been added, but no sulphite. After the image has
blackened completely the plate is washed.

With any of these methods if the first intensification
is not sufficient, the plate may be again bleached
with the mercury solution and the process repeated.

An old method, frequently used, is to treat the
bleached plate with dilute ammonia, which converts the
white image into a dark brown one of very considerable
printing opacity. The results are often very good, but
are somewhat uncertain, since the precise effect obtained
depends on the strength of the ammonia solution and
the time during which it is allowed to act. With
somewhat strong ammonia, allowed to act for a fairly
long time, part of the intensification first produced is
removed. This affects the shadows more strongly than
the lights and the result is to increase the contrast of
the negative, which is very useful for certain purposes.

The negatives intensified with mercury solution
followed by ammonia are more liable to spontaneous
change and deterioration than those intensified with
mercury solution followed by one of the developers.
The latter, in fact, if properly washed, may safely be
regarded as permanent.

Uranium Intensifier.—A very considerable
degree of intensification can be obtained by the use of
the uranium intensifier, which is very different in its
mode of action, and is a little uncertain in its results.
A solution containing potassium ferricyanide and a
uranium salt, generally the nitrate, is applied to the54
negative, and a deposit of a deep orange-red colour is
formed upon the silver image and very greatly increases
its printing opacity. The great difficulty is to prevent
this deposit forming on the whole of the film, and it is
absolutely necessary that every trace of hypo should be
washed out of the film. The addition of acetic acid to
the solution not only promotes uniformity of action, but
also helps to keep the shadows of the image clear.

The negative is placed in this solution and allowed
to remain with occasional rocking until the degree of
intensification is sufficient, which can only be learnt by
experience. If it is seen that the deposit is beginning
to form on the clear parts of the negative, the plate
should be at once removed. After intensification the
plates are well washed. If the water is “hard” the
intensification will be slightly reduced during washing,
and this is often useful in removing a slight stain
over the whole of the plate. Treatment with water
containing a small quantity of ammonia or sodium
carbonate removes the whole of the deposit, but leaves
the original image slightly reduced and also partially
altered in composition.

VARNISHING.

A negative after been thoroughly dried may be used
for printing without any further treatment, especially if
only a few prints are required and the ordinary ready55
sensitized papers or emulsion papers are used. It is,
however, better to protect the negative from mechanical
as well as chemical injury by means of a film of hard
varnish or collodion.

Many excellent negative varnishes can now be
purchased, and the general mode of application is the
same. The negative must be thoroughly dry, and in
order to secure this and to make the varnish flow more
easily, the negative is very carefully heated in front of
a fire or over a small stove until it is just warm, but not
hot. The negative is best supported by means
of a pneumatic holder held in the left hand, and
a fairly large pool of varnish (the exact amount
can only be learnt by experience) is poured on the
plate somewhat towards the right-hand top corner,
and by carefully tilting the plate it is made to run first
to the nearest corner, then along the edge to the further
left-hand corner down to the nearer left-hand corner,
and back to the right-hand bottom corner, from which
it is poured into a bottle. The plate is gently rocked
whilst it drains into the bottle, and as soon as the varnish
ceases to drop the plate is again carefully warmed until
the back of it is just too hot for the back of the hand to
bear, after which it is placed in a rack to cool.

It is necessary that the varnish should be quite
clear and free from any solid particles, and if necessary
it must be filtered through a plug of cotton wool
moistened with alcohol and placed in the apex of a glass
funnel which is resting in the neck of a clean and dry
bottle. Since dust may fall into the varnish whilst it is
on the negative, it is the best plan to pour the excess of
varnish off the negative into a second bottle instead of
back into the first, out of which it was poured. To put
it in another way, one bottle should be kept for the clear
varnish, and a second bottle for the varnish poured off56
the plate. When the second bottle is full, its contents
are filtered into the first bottle for use again.

Instead of varnish, a film of collodion, toughened
by the addition of a few drops of castor oil, and known
as “leather” collodion, may be used. The collodion is
applied to the plate in the same way as varnish except
that the plate is not warmed.

C. H. Bothamley.

Lenses.

Photographs of
flat objects such
as leaves, lace, drawings,
etc., can be made by
simply putting the object
on the sensitive surface
and exposing the arrangement
to light. But this
method will not serve if
the photograph is wanted
of any other size than
the original, nor with
solid objects of any size,
except perhaps in the production
of full-size profiles
of faces. It is therefore
quite the exception in
photography to “print”
directly from the object itself,
and the only alternative
is to produce an image
on the sensitive surface.

All illuminated objects reflect light and so become
for practical purposes sources of light, just as the moon
shines, as we say, although it only shines because it is
shone upon by the sun. The simplest source of light58
to consider is a point of light, and if we can get a dot of
light on a white surface from a point of light we have at
once an image of that point of light. The smaller the
dot the sharper or more perfect is the image, the larger
the dot the more diffused or fuzzy is the image. It is
impossible by any known means to get the dot so small
that it is an actual point, that would be absolute perfection,
and on the other hand there is no size of the dot
at which it can be definitely said that it ceases to be an
image. Every point of an illuminated object is a point
of light, and fine definition consists in keeping these points
separate in the image. So far as the dots overlap they
are confused. Confusion, or diffusion, or fuzziness is
sometimes desirable, as for example in a portrait, which
may be excellent although it is impossible to distinguish
in the picture the individual hairs on the person’s head.

Fig. 1.

The simplest means for getting an image is a small
hole in an opaque screen. In fig. 1, two points of light,
A and B, shine through the hole in the screen S and
produce two dots of light, a and b, on the surface T.
The two pencils of light do not practically interfere with
each other although they pass through the same small
hole, nor would any greater number; so that an illuminated
object, which may be regarded as consisting of an
infinite number of points of light, would give an image
on the surface T. The disadvantages of a small hole,
or “pinhole,” for the production of images are (1) it59
must be so small that it lets very little light through and
therefore gives a very feeble image, (2) that it can never
give a sharp image. The first disadvantage is obvious.
With regard to the second, a little consideration will
show that the image of a point must be larger than the
hole itself, it is always larger though it may have a
central brighter part that is smaller. If the hole is
reduced in size beyond a certain limit, it gives an
increased spreading of light on the surface, so that a
sharp image can never be produced.

Fig. 2.

Now the function of a lens is to obviate these drawbacks
as far as possible; namely, to let more light
through and form a brighter image, and to give sharper
definition. In figure 2, the lens L collects all the light
that falls upon it from the point B, and condenses it to
the point b on the surface T. The light from the point
A that falls on the lens is also condensed and would be
brought to a point or “focus” at a beyond the surface T,
but on the surface the light forms a patch of considerable
size. Suppose that the lens is thirty times the
diameter of the pinhole its area is 900 times as large,
and the light that falls upon it is 900 times as much as
the light that passes through the hole. Such an
enormous gain of light is worth so much that photographers
willingly put up with the very many imperfections
of lenses for the sake of it, and if to this gain
there is added the superior definition that is possible,
it will be seen that lenses are indispensable to the
photographer. To take a Daguerreotype portrait with60
a pinhole might have required several days if not weeks
exposure of the plate and therefore would have been
impossible, so that the gain in brightness of image is a
great deal more than a mere convenience.

It will be observed in figure 1 that both points of
light, A and B produce images on the surface T,
although they are at different distances from it, but in
fig. 2, although the effect of the lens is to concentrate
the light from both points to two other points, one of
these is beyond the surface T. This is a disadvantage
inherent in lenses. They have so many other imperfections
or “aberrations” that it is desirable to consider
these separately. The reader should bear in mind that
the one aim of opticians in perfecting lenses is to concentrate
as much light as possible from each point in
the object to a corresponding point, or as small as
possible a dot, in the image, and the image should be
flat because the plates used in photography are flat.

Fig. 3.

Spherical Aberration.—The surfaces of lenses are
always ground to spherical curves, and this fact makes
it impossible for a single lens, such as that shown in
figure 2, to bring to a point all the light that falls upon
it from a point. If a pencil of light passes through a
piece of glass with sloping sides it is bent or “refracted”
towards the thicker part of the glass, and the greater
the angle of inclination of the two sides the more is it
refracted from its original path. In figure 3 it is clear
that the two sides of the lens shown in section are
inclined to each other at a continually increasing angle61
as they approach each other at the edges of the lens.
The refracting effect of the lens increases from the
centre outwards, and it increases to a greater extent
than is necessary to bring the incident light to a point.
The focus of the pencils of light that pass through the
edges of the lens is nearer to the lens than the focus of
the pencils that pass through its central part. In the
figure two foci are shown, a and b, but of course, in fact,
intermediate parts of the lens produce intermediate foci,
and what should be a point in the image, is spread out
into a line on the axis of the lens, and all along this line
is surrounded with the light that either is coming to
a focus or that has come to a focus and has spread out
again. On a screen placed at b there would be a point
of light surrounded by a halo, while at a, nearer the
lens, the central focus or point is surrounded by a
brighter or more condensed light, and the appearance is
of a circular patch of light with a brighter boundary.
This is positive spherical aberration. Negative
spherical aberration is due to over correction, the focus
of the light passing through the margins being furthest
from the lens, and the appearances on a screen are of
course reversed.

Chromatic Aberration.—When light is refracted, that
is bent out of its original path by a single piece of glass,
it is not refracted as a whole, but each constituent
behaves as if none other were present. Ordinary white
light or daylight is a mixture of many coloured lights as
seen in the rainbow, and when refracted, the blue is
bent more than the green, the green more than the
yellow, and the yellow more than the red. So that
using a single lens the focus of the blue light is nearer
the lens than the focus of the red light and the others
come in between. In figure 4 this is represented in an
exaggerated degree to make it more distinct. It will be62
observed that a screen placed at the focus of the blue
light will show a reddish margin and if removed further
from the lens the margin or halo will be bluish.

Fig. 4.

These two aberrations, spherical and chromatic were
the principal faults that opticians had to deal with,
because they affect the whole of the image, even the
very central parts. But in photography it is necessary
to get an image of a very large size as compared with
the focal length of the lens, and there are some faults
that only begin to show themselves at a little distance
from the centre of the image and increase as the distance
from the centre is greater. These aberrations were,
practically speaking, incurable until a few years ago, but
as recent optical advances have provided kinds of glass
by the use of which they may be eliminated, or nearly
so, they have become of practical importance. They
are astigmatism and curvature of field.

Astigmatism and Curvature of Field.—If a diagram of
suitable size is made with a series of concentric circles
and radial lines upon it, and the centre of it is arranged
exactly opposite the centre of the lens, and in a line with
the centre of the focussing screen, the screen and diagram
being parallel, then if the lens suffers from astigmatism
it will be found impossible to get the outer circles and
the radial lines where they cross them simultaneously
focussed. Where this difficulty begins the astigmatism
begins, and the greater the difference there is between
the focal planes of the radial lines and the circles, the63
greater is the astigmatism. It will probably be found
with any of the older types of lenses that neither is in
focus at the same time that the centre of the diagram is,
but that the screen must be racked in; this is due to
curvature of field, and the difference between the curvature
of field for the circles and the radial lines is due to
astigmatism. In the older lenses a flatter field could
only be obtained by the introduction of astigmatism, but
now by the employment of the new glasses made at
Jena, it is possible to practically eliminate astigmatism,
and still keep the field flat.

Fig. 5.

The Development of Photographic Lenses.—When photography
was first practised the best lenses available were
those made for use as telescope objectives, and they had
to be used with a small diaphragm to get good definition
over a sufficient field. With the slow processes
then in vogue a more rapid lens was much desired, and
Voigtlander introduced a “portrait” lens constructed
according to the results of the calculations of Professor
Petzval. This portrait lens is still very largely used,
and figure 5 will serve to show its general character
and will be a guide to the putting of one together
correctly if it has been taken to pieces for cleaning. A
rapid lens such as this could not cover a sufficiently large
field for landscape work, so that single lenses were still
used for work in which rapidity was not of very great
importance. Single lenses were improved, and other
kinds of lenses were introduced from time to time, but it64
was not till 1866 that the “rapid rectilinears” or “rapid
aplanats,” called later “rapid symmetricals,” and by
innumerable other names according to the fancies of the
makers, were introduced. Probably no lens has been
made in such large numbers as this.

At about the same time, Dallmeyer introduced his
portrait lens in which the position of the convex and
concave elements of the back combination is reversed,
the concave lens being outside, and this gives the photographer
the opportunity of screwing it back a little, and
so introducing a measurable amount of spherical aberration
which has the effect of modifying the otherwise
exceedingly fine definition at the centre of the field, and
giving a greater depth of definition.

In 1881, Messrs. Abbe & Schott began a series of
experiments in the manufacture of optical glasses, and
they were so successful in making new and useful
varieties, that an optical glass factory was eventually
established at Jena, by Schott & Co. By the use of
these newer glasses the limitations that had previously
restricted opticians were removed, and it became possible
to correct astigmatism and secure a flat field at the same
time. Zeiss of Jena, towards the end of 1890, introduced
his first series of “anastigmats.” The “concentric”
lens of Ross was introduced in 1892, a lens which
probably remains unsurpassed for flatness of field and
freedom from astigmatism; but as spherical aberration
is present to a notable degree, an aperture of about f/22
is the largest that gives sharp definition. The “double
anastigmat” of Goerz of Berlin was put on the market
in 1893. It is a symmetrical lens, and in this different from
the Zeiss anastigmats that preceded it. It consists of
two similar combinations, each of three lenses cemented
together. The unsurpassed qualities of this lens stimulated
other opticians to seek to rival it, and there65
appeared similar lenses with four and even five lenses in
each combination, besides other lenses that are more or
less a copy of the double anastigmat. One of the most
notable of these is the “satz-anastigmat” of Zeiss, each
combination consisting of four lenses cemented together
and forming an excellent single lens. These combinations
are interchangeable in the same mount so that
with, for example, one mount and three lenses, six
different focal lengths can be obtained, as the lenses
may be used singly or any two together as a doublet.

The “Cooke” lens is remarkable for the simple
means by which the various corrections are made,
consisting as it does of only three single lenses separated
from each other. Obviously it must be used entire.
These lenses do not cover so large a plate in proportion to
their focal lengths as most of the other anastigmats, but
perform excellently over the plates for which they are
constructed.

The “stigmatic” of Dallmeyer is the latest lens
of general utility. It gives good definition to the
margin of the circle of light that it transmits, reduction
of aperture being necessary, when its full field is
employed, to get equality of illumination rather than to
improve the marginal definition. Its two combinations
are different, and either may be used alone as a single
lens, giving focal lengths of approximately one-and-a-half
and twice the focal length of the whole lens.

The “planar” of Zeiss introduced just as we write,
is a symmetrical doublet characterized by a very large
aperture, from f/3.6 to f/4 up to 10 inches in focal length,
and a little smaller above that. It is therefore comparable
with portrait lenses. Although it is symmetrical, a
single combination cannot with advantage be used
alone as a single lens. Telephotographic lenses are
subsequently referred to.

66

The one aim of opticians in improving photographic
lenses has been to get good definition all over a comparatively
large flat surface without having to use small
apertures. A defining power on the axis of the lens,
that is, at the centre of the field, far exceeding what can
be taken practical advantage of in ordinary photography,
has long been possible. But until recently, the defining
power always rapidly deteriorated as the distance from
the centre was increased. But to judge of the quality
of a lens, or to compare one lens with another, there are
other matters that must be understood, and these we
shall proceed to consider. Focal length, aperture and
image angle are the chief details concerning lenses,
granting that the aberrations referred to above are
satisfactorily corrected.

Focal length.—The focal length or focal distance of
a thin lens is the distance between it and the point to
which it converges parallel rays. The rays of light are
parallel when they issue from an object at an infinite
distance. For ordinary practical purposes, any object,
that is not nearer than a thousand focal lengths of the
lens may be regarded as at an infinite distance, that is
the image of an object so far off, and the image of the sun
or stars (which are situated at the nearest approach to an
infinitely great distance that we know of) would if separately
focussed give an inappreciably small difference of
position of the focussing screen. But no photographic
lens is very thin. The measurement from the back
surface of the lens to the screen, when focussed on a
distant object, is called the “back focus,” but this is of
no use whatever except as to the determining of the
camera length necessary. The “equivalent focal length”
is the focal length (or focal distance) of a thin lens that
would give the same effect, so far as focal length is
concerned, as the lens in question. When the simple67
expression “focal length” is used, it always refers to the
equivalent focal length. The single word “focus”
is sometimes used erroneously instead of “focal
length.”

The focal length of all lenses (except to a very small
extent, with single or so-called “landscape” lenses) is proportional
to the linear dimension of the image that it gives
under similar conditions. For example, a lens of 6
inches focal length will give just the same amount of
subject on a quarter plate that a lens of 12 inches focal
length will give on a whole plate, because the linear
measurement of the whole plate is exactly double that
of the quarter plate. The easiest way to compare the
focal lengths of two lenses, is to focus both on a fairly
distant object or view, and to measure in the image the
distance between two fixed points in both cases. The
proportion between these measurements is the proportion
between the focal lengths of the lenses. By this method
the focal length of any lens can easily be determined
if one has a lens of known focal length.

If a lens is first focussed on a distant object, and
the focussing screen is then moved back until the image
of any object is of the same size as the object, the
distance travelled by the focussing screen is exactly the
focal length of the lens. It is however exceedingly
difficult to get at the same time an image of an exactly
predetermined size, and to secure the very best definition,
so that it is more convenient to get the image as near as
it happens to come to the size of the object and then to
allow for the difference, as then nothing interferes with
the operation of focussing. The best near object to
use is an accurately divided scale, and the details
wanted in addition to those mentioned above are the
comparative lengths of the image and the object. To
get these, two fine marks are made on the focussing68
screen, and the distance between these is the length of
the image. The scale is focussed with critical exactness
and so that it falls over these marks, then the
amount of the scale represented between the marks can
be measured, and the divisions counted for the length of
the object. The distance over which the focussing
screen was moved between the two focussings is
to be multiplied by the length of the object and divided
by the length of the image, and the result is the focal
length of the lens.

Aperture.—The “aperture” of a lens is the diameter
of the cylinder of light that it can receive and transmit.
If the diaphragm is in front of the lens, the hole in
the diaphragm is the aperture, but if the diaphragm
is behind a part of the lens, so that the incident light
passes through a lens first, the hole in the diaphragm
is not the “aperture,” the “aperture” is larger because
the lens condenses the light before it gets to the
diaphragm. The aperture of any lens can be measured
by focussing a distant object, then replacing the focussing
screen by a sheet of cardboard with a pinhole in the
middle of it. In a dark-room a light must be placed
behind the pinhole, and a bit of ground glass held
in front of the lens. A disc of light will be seen
on the ground glass and the diameter of this is the
diameter of the aperture, or simply, the “aperture,”
with the diaphragm employed.

Rapidity.—The rapidity of a lens depends almost
wholly on its focal length and aperture. The thickness
of the glass makes a little difference, and at every surface
in contact with air there is loss by reflection, but these
and analogous matters are of comparatively little importance,
and as they are uncertain and cannot be determined
it is customary to refer rapidity to the focal length and
aperture only. The aperture found, that is, the diameter69
of the effective incident cylinder of parallel rays, should
be divided into the focal length, and the diaphragm
corresponding to the aperture should then be marked
with a fractional expression indicating the proportion of
aperture to focal length. Thus if the aperture is one
eighth the focal length, it is marked f/8, if a sixteenth
f/16, and so on. All lenses with the same aperture as so
marked may be regarded as of equal rapidity whatever
their focal lengths may be. Now the more rapid a lens
is the shorter the exposure that it is necessary to give
for any subject, and the exposure required is proportional
to the square of the figure in the expressions as given
above. Namely 8 and 16 squared give 64 and 256 which
are as one to four, the proportional exposures required.
Or we may say that 8 to 16 are as 1 to 2 and square
these and get 1 to 4 the proportional exposures.

Fig. 6.

The best way to mark stops is, for example, f/8 and
f/16, as these expressions are universally understood, but
some persons think that the relative rapidities or
intensities are better, others prefer to express the relative
exposure necessary, and every system of numbering on
these plans has a unit which is merely empirical, not one
of them adopting the only true or scientific unit of f/1.

Zeiss has recently changed his unit from f/100 to f/50.
Dallmeyer marks some of his lenses now with the practical
expression. The following table may be of service to
those who happen to have lenses with their diaphragms
marked on any of these empirical systems.

70

Image Angle.—The image angle represents what is
called covering power. It may be expressed in terms of
the focal length, and doubtless this is the best method, but
it is not customary. It may be expressed as an angle,
the angle formed when a line is drawn from each
extremity of a line equal to the diameter of the circle
covered, and caused to meet at a point distant from the
base line equal to the focal length of the lens. The
angle where the two lines meet is the image angle. But
generally the covering power is expressed more roughly,
as the ordinary size of the plate that sufficiently good
definition can be obtained on.

Tele-Photographic Lenses.—If a negative (or dispersing
or concave) lens is introduced between the
ordinary lens and the plate, the equivalent focal length
of the arrangement is greater than that of the ordinary
lens alone, but the length of camera necessary is not71
proportionately great. It is possible therefore to obtain
an image of a size that would otherwise require a lens
of long focal length and a corresponding and perhaps
impossible length of camera. But this is not the only
advantage, for if the ordinary lens and the negative lens
are separable to a variable extent, the amount of
magnification of the image, or increase in the equivalent
focal length of the optical system, is adjustable at will.
For further details concerning tele-photographic lenses
and their use, reference should be made to Mr. Dallmeyer’s
pamphlet on the subject.

There are two other subjects connected with the
production of images by photographic lenses that must
be referred to, though neither of them is of great
importance if we exclude the use of hand cameras
(which are separately treated of) and bear in mind the
ordinary practice of to-day. These are depth of definition
and the distortion due to the use of single lenses.

Depth of Definition.—It has already been shown that
the action of the lens is to bring to a point in the image
all the light that falls upon it from the corresponding
point of the object. Now it is clear from fig. 2 that,
if different parts of the object are at different distances
from the lens, and this must be the case with solid
objects, these different parts cannot be in focus
at the same time. Still it is possible to get them so
nearly in focus that the result is serviceable, and the
ordinary method of doing this is to examine the image
on the ground glass, and if the whole subject is not
sharp enough, to reduce the size of the aperture. Depth
of definition is increased by using a lens of shorter focal
length or by reducing the aperture. If a large aperture
has to be used, the focal length must be short if much
depth of definition is wanted, or conversely, if the focal
length must be long the aperture must be small. It72
follows that very rapid lenses that have a very long
focus are of no use, for in portraiture, for example, this
combination of properties would lead to the ear in the
image being fuzzy if the eye was sharp.

If a lens were perfect and had a flat field, the depth
of definition would depend only on the aperture and
focal length. But if the lens gives inferior definition
towards the edges of the field, it is quite obvious that
there must be less depth of definition there, if a
minimum of defining power is accepted. The definition
at its best may be inferior to the minimum accepted and
then obviously there is no depth. Depth of definition
therefore at the centre of the plate depends entirely on
the focal length and aperture, but away from the centre
it depends also on the quality of the lens, and is much
greater in a flat field anastigmat than in a lens of an
older type. But depth of definition is not a quality
apart, it depends entirely upon other factors, and it is
better in examining a lens to determine these factors
separately rather than to lump them together as depth.

Distortion produced by single lenses is due to the
fact that the diaphragm is either in front of or behind them.
If the diaphragm is in front, the image is drawn towards
the centre of the plate to an extent that increases as the
margin of the field is approached. A line along one side
of the plate has its ends drawn in to a greater amount
than its centre, because they are further from the middle
of the plate, and therefore it becomes curved like the
side of a barrel, and this effect is called barrel-shaped
distortion. If the diaphragm is behind the lens, the
displacement is outwards, also increasing towards the
edges of the field, and a straight line at the edge of the
plate becomes curved so that it is convex towards the
centre of the plate. This is known as hour-glass distortion.
Both these effects are illustrated (and exaggerated73
for clearness’ sake) in fig. 6, the central square representing
the true figure. This “curvilinear distortion” is
absent in all cases in the middle of the plate and generally
for a considerable area, and if single lenses of only
long focal length are used, say of a focal length equal to
at least one and a half times the length of the largest side
of the plate, it may be neglected. Wide-angle single
lenses should never be used except on a suitably small
plate, so that the above conditions hold. The nearer
the diaphragm is to the lens the less is the distortion,
and some of the most modern single lenses have the
diaphragm so near that the photographer is even more
safe in the use of them.

MELTON MEADOWS.
A. HORSLEY HINTON.

The Comparison and Use of Lenses.—The optician
when he tests lenses looks for each fault individually,
but this the ordinary photographer is hardly able to do,
nor is it particularly desirable for him, because if a lens
is inferior it matters little to him why it is so. On the
other hand occasion may arise when he wants to identify
a fault, then the information already given will probably
be sufficient to enable him to do so, if to it is added that
a small pinhole with a flame behind it is a convenient
point of light, and that if the image of this luminous
point is examined with a good eyepiece, without the
focussing screen, at various parts of the field, the
character of the defect may be discovered.

The main things that the photographer needs to
look to in judging of a lens or comparing it with another,
are (1) that it works to focus, (2) the quality of its
defining power especially towards the edges of the plate.
There must also be taken into account the focal length
and aperture, and if both these are not the same in the
lenses to be compared they should be nearly the same,
and the proportion that the aperture bears to the focal
length should be exactly the same. A special diaphragm74
may have to be cut out of card for one of them. The
best test object that is always at hand is a newspaper
pinned flat against a flat wall. The camera must not
be moved during the work. Each lens is very carefully
focussed and a negative made, using the same aperture,
time of development, and in all ways similar treatment
for both. If the focal lengths are different, the images
will be of correspondingly different sizes, and then the
same detail must be compared, not the definition at the
same distance from the centre.

All good lenses work to focus, but some of the
cheaper ones do not. To test this, any series of small
objects arranged side by side, but at distances varying
by intervals of say two inches from the camera, is photographed
after carefully focussing on the middle one. If any
other than the middle one is the best defined, the lens is
at fault. But in this, as in all similar tests, it must be
remembered that ordinary dry plates are not quite flat, and
the error of the plate may make an appreciable difference.

The use of lenses comprises the whole art of working
with the camera, it is therefore not our province to say
much about it. But so far as lenses themselves are
concerned it may be remarked that, if a lens has a round
field, it may be advantageous to tip up the lens with
regard to the plate when only a part of the plate is being
used, as for example sometimes in taking a landscape.
But in using the modern flat field lenses special care
should be taken to keep the lens and plate exactly true
to each other, the plate exactly at right angles to the
lens axis. The image and plate must coincide or definition
will suffer. If the image is rounded and the plate
flat, then in any case the result is only a compromise,
but to take full advantage of the larger apertures when
the field is flat, much more care than has been usual
must be devoted to this matter.

75

Simple uncorrected lenses such as spectacle lenses or
“monocles,” suffer from the defects that have already been
described, and are valued on this account by some
workers because they give blurred or “soft” images.
With a small enough diaphragm they will give good
definition, and generally it may be stated that reducing
the aperture lessens the effect of any fault that a lens
may possess. To get the best definition that a simple
lens will give, the plate must be brought nearer the lens
after focussing by about one-fiftieth of the focal length
of the lens, so that it may be brought from the best focus
of visual light into the best focus of the photographically
active light. If the object photographed is nearer to the
lens than about one hundred times its focal length, the
amount of movement after focussing must be increased.
If four focal lengths distant, the correction is nearly
one-thirtieth of the focal length, at three focal lengths
distant, nearly one-twentieth, and at two focal lengths,
about a thirteenth.

Pinholes give an image that for all practical purposes
may be said to be equally blurred or “soft” over the
whole plate. Much has been written about pinholes and
their use, but it is not definitely known yet whether the
exposure should be longer or shorter than the exposure
required when a lens is used, allowing, of course, for the
smallness of the aperture. The following short table
and exposure rules from the writer’s “Science and
Practice of Photography,” will probably prove useful:—

All the above figures are in inches. Whatever pinhole
and at whatever distance, estimate the exposure for a lens76
at f/16, f/22, f/32, f/45, or f/64, as the case may be, and
multiply it by the square of the number of inches that the
plate is distant from the pinhole. But if the distance is
as given above for any hole, it is sufficient to expose for
as many minutes as the plate is inches distant from the
hole, for a subject that would require one second with
an aperture of f/16.

Chapman Jones.

Portraiture.

The photographer who
may be expert at
landscape or architectural
work, will find himself at
a loss when he essays
portraiture. For apart from
the art of managing the
sitter (a most important
element in producing a
successful result), he will
soon find that the kind of
plate that is suitable for
outdoor work does not
answer well for portraits,
unless the developer is
greatly modified, for quite
a different kind of negative
is required. As a general
rule it is advisable to use
very rapid plates for portrait
work; and in this
respect, at the present day
we are much better supplied than even five or six years
ago, and with an extra-rapid plate it is possible to secure a
fully exposed negative in half a second, in weather and
under lighting that was quite impossible ten years ago.78
The best expression and pose are generally secured
when the sitter is unaware of the actual moment of
exposure; and for this purpose a silent shutter working
inside the camera is best. The sitter should never be
asked to keep still unless, in groups, and when circumstances
necessitate a long exposure; and nowadays an
exposure of five or six seconds is a long one. Every
effort should be made to put the sitter quite at ease.

A head-rest should not be used unless absolutely
necessary, and few photographers are aware how easily
it can be dispensed with, and fail to realize how strong an
objection nearly every sitter has to it. It is far better to
have an occasional plate spoilt by working without the
rest than to make every sitter uncomfortable by its use.
In fact some portrait negatives are actually improved by
a slight movement. In a special kind of lighting when
the face is in shadow relieved against a light background,
a slight movement which produces the effect of diffusion
of focus greatly improves the result.

Great care must be exercised in choosing the background
even when it is only plain or graduated, and it is
well worth exposing three or four plates on the same
sitter, in the same position and lighting, and with the same
exposure, but with different backgrounds, and then
carefully comparing the resulting prints. Even if only
one background is at hand its depth can be varied by
placing it nearer or farther from the source of light.
The background must also be selected to suit the
lighting of the sitter, as a background of medium tint
suitable for what is called “ordinary lighting” would be
quite unsuitable for “Rembrandt” effects, or where
strong contrasts of light and shade are used, when part
of the face is in dark shadow. For such effects a dark
background is usually best, as it gives luminosity to the
shadow side of the face. But such dark grounds are79
not suitable for “ordinary lighting” where the face
should be full of delicate half-tone, all of which would be
killed by the strength of the dark background.

For the Rembrandt effects a much longer exposure
is necessary as less light is reflected from the face on to
the sensitive plate; they will often need twice or three
times as much as for ordinary portraits.

When pictorial backgrounds or accessories are used
it must be remembered that the object of the photograph
is to secure a portrait of the sitter, not to show what a
large stock of accessories the photographer possesses. It
is best to use as few accessories as possible; I have
heard a lady complain bitterly of a well-known photographer,
who having posed her in a very difficult position,
kept her waiting for five minutes while he arranged a
screen, a palm, a footstool, a tiger-skin, etc., so that she
felt positively ill before the exposure was made. The
sitter should not be kept waiting in the pose to be photographed
any longer than is absolutely necessary. If
accessories must be used they should be simple and
suitable.

When portraits have to be taken in ordinary rooms
it is advisable to get a friend or assistant to experiment
upon, if possible beforehand. Even a few minutes spent
in studying the possibilities of light and arrangement of
furniture will save a great deal of worry when making
the actual exposures, and nothing upsets nervous
sitters more than having all kinds of experiments and
arrangements made with them. But it is sometimes
well worth wasting a few plates on exposures which the
photographer thinks will be useless, in order to give the
sitter time to get accustomed to the room; it must not be
done in a fussy, irritating way, but rather to show that
it is not such a very dreadful operation and really
“doesn’t hurt.” This plan often works well with80
nervous children, who soon become accustomed to the
room and the photographer. There is a great deal to be
said in favour of the maxim “leave your sitters alone.”
The photographer must cultivate quick observation so
that he sees at once a good pose, and secures it; and
here again quick plates are essential, as many of the
most charming poses are caught unexpectedly. It has
been well said that the best poses the photographer
secures are those he observes, not those he creates. But a
spontaneous pose may not be quite perfect and a slight
alteration may be easily made without disturbing the
rest of the figure. It will generally be found that a pose
that takes a great deal of arranging is not a success.

When taking portraits in an ordinary room it is
usual to place the sitter near the window, so that one
side of the face is strongly lighted and the other in deep
shadow, and then use a white reflector to light up the
shadow side. It is often better, when the window is a
large one, to place the sitter farther back in the room
almost facing the window, and put the camera near the
middle of the window looking into the room; a softer
lighting will then be secured. For outdoor portraits a
shady corner is best, and if possible, one where the side
light is much subdued on one side; a light head-shade
may be used with advantage. A large grey rug out of
focus makes a good background; a blanket is too light.

A portrait lens is best for the work; but if the
photographer does not possess one, he need not despair
of producing good work. A rapid rectilinear lens used
at a large aperture will answer the purpose well; it
should always be used at full aperture, partly for the
sake of quickness in exposure, and partly to prevent
accessories and parts of the dress appearing too sharp
and competing in importance with the face. Subordination
of parts is one of the essentials of a picture; and if81
we examine a good portrait we shall find that probably
no part of the photograph is quite sharp except the eyes
and face. Otherwise the less important details are apt
to obtrude themselves on our notice. A stop will
generally be necessary, however, with a portrait lens if a
full or three-quarter length is to be taken, and it will be
found that heads only (as a rule) can be taken at
full aperture. Just as good work, however, can be done
with a rapid rectilinear as with a lens specially made for
portraits, except where rapid exposures are to be made;
but it is necessary to use one of fairly long focus. A
rapid rectilinear lens used for landscape work on a half
plate would be much too short in focus for giving good
portraits on the same sized plate, for in order to get the
figure large enough it is necessary to place the camera
so near the sitter as to produce distortion. For portraits
on a half plate a lens of at least nine inches focus should
be used and for a whole plate not less than sixteen or
eighteen inches, and longer if possible.

The swing back of the camera will be found useful
in portrait work for getting parts of the figures into
focus that are either too far behind or too far in front of
the plane of the face. For instance, a full-length figure
leaning back in a chair will have the feet out of focus
when the face is sharp if the back of the camera is
vertical, and this applies with even greater force to groups.
A side swing too is useful, but is not absolutely
necessary. Even in bust portraits the swing back is
useful in getting the shoulders in focus when using a
large aperture, for although it is well not to have the
whole of the figure in perfect focus all over, it is not
advisable to have the face sharp and the rest so out of
focus as to be blurred.

The development of a portrait plate should be
different from that of a landscape, because a different82
kind of negative is required. A rapid plate developed so
as to give a soft delicate image is best; and a developer
containing more alkali and less density giver is good, and
it may be considerably diluted with advantage. The
image should appear within ten seconds of pouring on
the developer, and the negative will generally be
developed to sufficient density in from two to three
minutes. With a good average rapid plate the image
should show fairly well on the back of the plate, but
this and the time of development will vary so much with
different developers, and with the taste of each photographer
that no hard and fast rule can be laid down.

Developers that give a brown deposit, or that stain
the film will require shorter development than those of
the newer developing agents that give a cold black
colour to the negative; another fact to be borne in mind is
that the image formed by these latter appears to lose
more density in fixing than when pyrogallic acid is used.

A perfect portrait negative should have no clear
glass shadows, and no part should be so dense as to give
white in the finished print, and some negatives which
give the best results may have a decided veiled appearance
in the shadows.

The temperature of the developer is another
important point; in very cold weather the developer
should be kept warm, or if in concentrated solutions may
be diluted with warm water. In cases of known under-exposure
the developer may be used quite hot with
advantage. A convincing experiment can be made by
cutting an exposed plate in two and developing one half
with icy cold developer and the other half with warm. The
difference is really remarkable. If the developer has
been used hot enough to make the gelatine of the plate
feel “slimy” an alum bath is necessary, unless the
fixing bath contains chrome alum.

83

For normal exposures take 3 parts No. 1 and 1 part
No. 2; to each ounce of mixed developer add 40 minims
of No. 3.

Equal parts of each, for soft negatives dilute with water.
To restrain for over-exposure use potassium, not
ammonium bromide. Unless an acid fixing bath is
used the negatives are rather green in colour.

Use 1 part A, 1 part B, and 1 part of water.

The question of retouching is a difficult one. There
is no doubt that a certain amount of it is necessary on
nearly all portrait negatives and even on those of84
children. But it is equally certain that the great
majority of portrait negatives are over-retouched, so
much so that their value both as portraits and pictures is
nearly destroyed. Yet a certain amount is necessary
even for pictorial effect, and perhaps still more when the
question of likeness is considered. For as a rule the
untouched negative is no more a true likeness than the
over-retouched one. The truth lies somewhere between
the two. Even if isochromatic plates are used the little
differences of colour in the face, and the incipient wrinkles
are exaggerated in an unpleasant way. Under-exposed
negatives will show these defects in a very marked
manner, full exposure will greatly reduce them. Large
heavy patches of shadow may be lightened by coating
the back of the negative with matt varnish, and when it
is quite hard “hatching” upon it with a soft lead.
Harsh lights may be reduced by scraping away the matt
varnish with the point of a knife. In some cases the
matt varnish may be stained with a little aurine or
uranine. Exaggerated lines and small shadows must be
worked upon from the front and a retouching desk is
necessary. The film of the negative will not take the
pencil without some preparation. The best surface is
obtained by spreading a little retouching medium with
the tip of the finger on the part to be touched. A thin
film of soft resin is left upon the plate which takes pencil
marks readily. A hard lead, No. 4 Faber or Hardtmuth,
should be used. The loose leads used in what are called
the “ever-pointed holders” are most convenient. The
point must be very long and fine, like a large darning
needle, and is best made by rubbing the lead on
a piece of fine glass-paper. The pencil must be
held very lightly and the lines touched away with
short light strokes, a heavy stroke only rubs the
medium up.

85

The little shadow at the end of the mouth often has
to be reduced, often at the risk of spoiling the shape of
the lips, but sitters will insist upon it being done, and
say “You have made my mouth much too large.”
Freckled faces are perhaps the most difficult to retouch,
as it is well nigh impossible to remove the black patches
caused by the freckles without at the same time
destroying the modelling of the face. Yet it must be
done, for probably the most severe stickler for truth
would not insist on the black blotches that freckles
produce in a photograph.

A great deal can be done to improve a hard negative
as soon as it leaves the fixing bath, by applying a mixture
of hypo solution and a solution of ferricyanide (not ferro)
of potash with a piece of cotton wool to the dense parts.
The proportions for this reducing bath are as follows:—To
each ounce of the ordinary hyposulphite of soda
fixing bath add a few drops of a 10% solution of ferricyanide
of potassium or red prussiate of potash, making
the whole about the colour of pale brandy. By adding
more of the ferricyanide solution the reducing action is
quicker, but there is a greater liability to stain the film.
The work should be done over a sink with a tap of
running water at hand. The solution should be of a
deep lemon colour (it is almost impossible to give exact
quantities), and after a short application must be
washed off under the tap, and the negative may then
be examined, and the reducer applied again and again
till the desired reduction is obtained. It is advisable
to make a few trials on spoilt plates. For if any
really good work is to be done there will be plenty
of rejected negatives. Probably, of all the plates exposed
on portraits by first-rate professional photographers,
not more than one-fourth ever get as far as the printing-frame.

86

Moral: Do not be chary of exposing plates, they
are cheap enough now. Don’t feel, “Oh! this will be
good enough. I won’t do another.” On the other hand
don’t expose carelessly and recklessly and say, “It will
all come right in developing.” Good work is not done
that way. Use every opportunity of seeing good work.
Study the work of great portrait painters, but don’t
neglect the photographers. Go to all the exhibitions of
pictures and photographs within reach.

Don’t be satisfied with what you have done, but
make a resolve to do something better next time.
Remember, what is worth doing at all is worth doing
well.

Harold Baker.

Off Boulogne.A. Horsley Hinton.

Pictorial Photography.

Unlike the subjects
of the other articles
in this book, in pictorial
photography we are not
brought to consider one of
the many processes which
go to make up the photographic
craft, but merely
a special and exceptional
application of any and all
means known to the photographer.

The particular end to
which this application is
made will be explained as
far as the limits of space
will permit, and some of
the methods of such application
will be described.
Beyond this I have no
intention of going. I do
not present pictorial photography
as a branch of photography especially worthy
of study—I am not concerned in making converts. It
is for the photographer who has already formed a desire88
to give his attention to the pictorial side of photography
and who is seeking help, that this chapter is designed.

First let us come to a mutual understanding as to
the term Pictorial Photography. Picture-making by
photography would perhaps be a simpler phrase, but
that to my mind the word “picture-making” is too
similar in idea to boot-making, lace-making, etc., all of
which imply a mechanical manufacturing, whereas a
picture—a real picture—like a musical composition, a
poem or a beautiful thought, grows or is evolved rather
than made to order.

Art photography would be a better term, but that
in photography the word “art” has been so often
coupled with things the very antithesis of artistic and
might hence be misleading, moreover the photographer
will show discretion rather than weakness if he be not
too hasty to claim for photography a position among the
arts, and whilst its claims to that dignity remain as yet in
dispute, we may be content with “Pictorial Photography”
as a less assuming title, yet one which will sufficiently
differentiate between what we may call the ordinary
photographic production and—— Well, what?

That is the first thing I have to try and explain.

Look at the illustrations in this book on pages 72,
136, and 120, and, making due allowance for some loss of
quality due to reproduction by a “half-tone” block, try
to imagine what the originals were like. Then say if
they please you. If you say no, you do not care for
them, they do not appeal to you, you do not mind if you
never saw anything of the kind again from this day
henceforth; very well, doubtless there are other things
in the world in which you can find pleasure, but so far
as my present subject is concerned, here you and I part
company. These illustrations are more or less successful
reproductions of pictorial work, and if you do not like89
them, making as I have said due allowance for their
being reproduced and reduced, then it is certain you do
not want to hear anything about them, and it is not my
intention to persuade you, so please pass on and make
room for those who do care for these things and wish to
learn all they can concerning them, or at most stand
aside and peradventure some stray word dropped unintentionally
may quicken your interest and discover in
you a sympathy of which you were previously unconscious.

MISS LILY HANBURY—A PORTRAIT.
HAROLD BAKER.

Referring now again to the illustrations which in
the absence of anything else we take as fairly typical of
pictorial photographs and assuming that one or the other,
if not all, do please some of my readers, I will ask them
to endeavour to analyse their feelings when confronting
such productions.

Take now an ordinary commercial photographic view
such as one may purchase from any seaside stationer,
and compare the sensations awakened by each. In the
case of the topographical view we feel some satisfaction
at being able to recognise a familiar spot, or the view
reminds us of some other place, or it may be quaint
buildings, or rugged mountains, or miles of foliage, or
what not inspire curiosity or interest because we know
the photograph to be a true record of facts, that is to
say we accept the photograph in lieu of the actual
presence of the objects represented, and experience nearly
the same feelings as we should were we to visit the
spot represented. We know that the wonderful, curious,
or unusual things portrayed have an existence, otherwise
we could not have a photograph of them.

In all such cases our interest and value of the
photograph would vastly diminish, were it possible for a
photograph of this kind to be made simply by the photographer’s
hand and imagination without any original at all.

90

You look at a photograph of this or that sea-side
place and remark, “Ah, yes, that’s dear old Yarmouth,
many a time, etc., etc.,” or else, “Dear me, I wonder
what place that is, it’s so like——” such and such a
town, or it may be you enquire “Where’s that?” and
you express or think to yourself you would like to go
and visit the spot. These and kindred sensations are
those kindled by the average photograph, but there is
yet another, for you may be impelled to exclaim, “How
wonderfully clear and bright that photograph is,”
“What a good photograph.” In this case you are
interested purely in the execution as an example of clever
manipulation and skilful craftsmanship.

Now, compare such feelings as these with those
stirred by an example of good pictorial work. In the
first place your esteem for it, if you value it at all, is
quite as great whether you know the place where it was
made or not. If it pleases you, that pleasure is not
dependent upon the fact that it does represent some
place. In the case of paintings and drawings as often
as not they do not pretend to represent any place at all,
but are pure fiction, yet we do not value them the less.
To what then is the pleasure we feel when looking at a
good picture due? Is it not that a picture stirs up, that
is, creates pleasant or beautiful thoughts and ideas—by
pleasant I do not mean necessarily merry or joyous ones,
for some hearts feel profounder pleasure in the grandeur
of storm or the majesty of the mountain than in
the sweet wilderness of flowery wastes, but notice
that such beautiful ideas are created by the picture.
You were thinking of something totally different before
you came upon the landscape picture which instantly
made you feel the glowing light, the stirring breeze, and
hear the rustling corn and noisy brook, and yet it cannot
be said it is because we recognise these things in the91
picture that we receive these impressions, at least it is
not the kind of recognition which takes place when we
see a photograph of Brighton Pier or Haddon Hall.

Notice, it is not the exact and faithful portrayal of
objects that creates the emotions instanced, for if you
closely observe the manner in which a good painting is
done you will find that rude splashes of paint, broad
brush strokes, and the like stand for foliage or water, or
corn stalks as the case may be, when we know that had
the painter desired he could have produced his likeness of
nature with a good deal more of the precise detail and
fidelity to outlines which photography excels in, had he
wished. But if the painter or other pictorial artist needs
not to trouble about accuracy to details to secure the
effect aimed at he must be faithful to general facts.
There is a great difference between not recognising
things or having no particular wish to do so, and feeling
conscious that a portrayal is so utterly unlike anything
in our past experience of nature that we should not
recognise the objects even if we were acquainted with
them. To take an extreme case—our enjoyment of the
effect and sentiment of a beautiful landscape picture is
not enhanced by our being able to recognise whether the
trees are oaks or elms, but it would be distinctly disturbed
if the palm trees were represented as growing on
the slopes of a Welsh mountain. Innumerable examples
and instances might be given to show that the artist,
whatsoever his medium, be it colour or monochrome,
may depart from truth, or may be indifferent to precise
details, only so far as he avoids palpable untruth.

Why is this?

When we look at a powerful and impressive picture
we feel at once the sentiment, our emotions are at once
stirred, subsequently we recognise objects and facts
portrayed, but only when we begin to look for them or92
think about them; but a gross exaggeration or a very
obvious error strikes us at once before we begin to
receive sentiments and ideas, and that error or exaggeration
once seen is never lost sight of, and whole enjoyment
of the picture is hopelessly marred.

Now, from the foregoing (for want of space I am
aware that the argument is incomplete, and must therefore
ask the student to think the matter out and grasp
the side issues by reading between the lines) we may
formulate the broad definition that a picture does not
depend for its excellence on the faithful representation
of objects, and is not chiefly valuable on account of our
immediate recognition of things portrayed, yet on the
other hand it must not let us feel that there is obvious
inaccuracy.

Here then we have two opposite positions in both
of which the mere objects employed to build up the
picture are subordinated to the effect or impression of the
picture. In one case the spectator must not be allowed
to feel that the representation is wrong, in the other
success will not directly depend on the representation
being very right, neither startling rightness or truth nor
the obvious wrongness or untruth should thrust the
objects composing the picture upon the beholder’s
attention, he should be left free to receive the expression
or sentiment of it.

I hope the reader is following me in this line of
thought closely. I am aware that it may seem dry and
uninteresting, but I see no other way of placing the
student in a proper position at the outset than by
explaining the essential elements of pictorial work, and
I will make this introductory part as brief as possible.

Reverting now to our argument, I have in other
words suggested that obvious violation of truth will
prevent the sentiment or effect of the picture from being93
paramount, and now I will submit that an excess of
accuracy to detail is equally detrimental to the success
of a picture as a picture.

If by now the reader is prepared to admit that the
chief purpose of a picture is the feelings, emotions, ideas
which it suggests or creates, and not the facts it portrays,
he will be able to go further and perceive that in a landscape,
for instance, cottages, trees, or what not are introduced,
not for their own intrinsic interest but as vehicles
of light and shade, which go to express the picture’s
sentiments.

If we stand before a good picture with closed eyes
and suddenly open them, our first impression (precluding
any question of colour) is that of masses of light and
shade pleasingly and harmoniously arranged; if we retreat
to such a distance that the objects constituting those
lights and shades are unrecognisable the balance and
pleasing arrangement should still be felt, and our
æsthetic sense is satisfied, although we do not see fully
of what the picture is composed. This is the quality
which is termed breadth and which is admittedly of very
great value.

If on the other hand the shadow masses are filled
with innumerable details, and are thus broken up into
tiny lights and shadows they no longer exist as broad
masses of dark, but if before retreating as proposed from
the picture, the lights or shadows appear so blank as to
prompt particular investigation, and upon examination
we find detail absent which we know must have been
present, then we encounter an instance of untruth and
exaggeration which is obvious and which disturbs our
appreciation of other fine qualities. Thus we require
sufficient detail to avoid giving the idea that detail is left out.

The delineation of sharp outlines and redundance of
detail is not wrong in itself, but it is usually inexpedient94
when considered with respect to the effect to be produced,
similarly the suppression of sharp focus both as
regards outlines and details has no artistic merit of itself
except as it assists the picture to impress the beholder
first with the general effect.

The painter and photographer start from two
opposite standpoints. The painter, or draughtsman,
starts with nothing but blank paper, and having built up
his picture and produced his desired effect he elaborates
no further; the photographer with his more or less
mechanically produced facsimile starts from the opposite
extreme with a transcendentally elaborate image, from
which he will require to eliminate all such excess of
truth as is likely to force the mere facts of the view upon
the beholder’s attention.

Photography, so faultlessly complete in its delineation,
gives us more than the pictorial worker needs for
the expression of an idea, and this is why I would
remind the student that pictorial photography is not
photography in the full sense of the word, but the
application of some of its powers, just as much as we
need and no more, to a definite end.

As just hinted the purpose of a picture is to express
ideas, hence I will fall back on a kind of definition
which I have used on a previous occasion that a picture
is the portrayal of visible concrete things for the expression
of abstract ideas.

To give an example by way of exposition we may
look upon a picture and be made to feel by it the calm
and luminous atmosphere of evening; we feel at once
the restfulness, and almost feel the warmth of the humid
air, giving place to the chill gathering mists of night;
but the same objects, the same tangible materials,
paper, pigment, metallic salts, etc., in another picture
give us the sense of angry turbulent storm or perhaps95
bright joyous sunshine frolicking with the fresh breezes
on the hill-tops. These are abstract ideas expressed or
created by the manner in which concrete things,
commonplace facts, are portrayed and rendered.

Finally, let me enunciate that a very excellent
photograph may not necessarily be a good picture,
because it may contain more than is required for the
expression of its idea, and the surplus will overwhelm
it; again, a good pictorial photograph may be but a poor
photograph, because if we claim the right to apply
photographic means to pictorial ends, we may find it
convenient to leave out the very qualities which the
scientific or technical expert considers most precious.

And now I think we may proceed to more practical
matters.

COMPOSITION AND SELECTION.

In all matters from which the eye expects to derive
pleasure, symmetry of design seems essential. In the
formation of the letters that we write, in personal attire,
in the decoration of our homes, in buildings, and practically
in everything which is not of a purely utilitarian
character, a sense of proportion and a symmetrical disposition
of parts is observed. Hence it is no source of
surprise that in a picture which as much as anything
should aim at pleasing the eye, design, otherwise
Composition, is with Expression a co-essential.

In a purely decorative production this natural
desire of design is the only thing to be observed, but in
a picture which may be decorative, but must be something
more, we have expression as well to consider. If
decoration alone were to be regarded, something like
fixed rules might perhaps be tyrannically laid down, but
in a picture the implicit observance of rules of composition
would be certain to make itself seen in the result,96
and the undue obtrusiveness of a code of rules would be
as inimical to the supremacy of ideas and feelings, as the
excessive prominence of fact would be, which has already
been described.

Hence the difficulty in prescribing any definite
course for the beginner, because whilst to most instinctive
artistic temperaments a certain knowledge of or
feeling for composition is natural, so soon as this is reduced
to definite rule and given to another, the, as it were,
secondhand use, is nearly certain to betray itself by its
misapplication. I would ask therefore that any suggestions
given here on the subject of composition should
be taken as one takes lessons in the rudiments of a
language, which rudiments we violate and forget so soon
as we have become proficient enough to speak it. Such
rules in composition should be observed only so far as to avoid
the appearance of having infringed or ignored them.

The rules of composition which may be found to
apply in one of the pictorial arts must necessarily apply
equally in the others, and so therefore to pictorial photography
which at least aspires to be considered an art.
If on a sheet of paper a rectangular space is given us
wherein to draw the likeness of anything, the most
natural course to pursue would be to draw that figure in
the centre or thereabouts, and if then we are asked to
add the likeness of two or three more objects we should
naturally place these near the first object. Thus should
we compose a group of objects which draw the attention
to the middle of the picture or space.

Suppose we are asked to draw the picture of a
church tower we should probably comply with the
request somewhat as shown in fig. 1. Next we will
suppose we are asked to add a cottage, some trees, and
a path to the church, we should, if possessed of some
sense of symmetry and order, coupled with average97
intelligence, make the additions somewhat as in fig. 2.
It would surely be an unusual thing to follow instead
the course suggested by figs. 3 and 4.

In figs. 1 and 2 we have instinctively placed the
primary object in or near the centre, and the others near
and around it, and the result strikes one at once as being
better composed, that is, more symmetrical, than in fig.
4, in which amongst other things one is not sure which
object to regard as the principal one, and one also feels
that but for the boundaries of the picture left and right
we might have seen a good deal more beyond, which
would have added to the interest of the picture.

In this we have one of the first rules in composition,
namely, that the principal object should be near the
centre, and the next important near to, and as it were
supporting it, and no object likely to attract the eye
should be so near the edge of the picture as to make us
instantly conscious of the boundaries and wish to see
more beyond.

98

But now if in compliance with the supposed request
we had made our drawing as in fig. 5, might it not at
once be felt by the observer that we had put the objects
in a central position intentionally, which is equivalent to
saying that we had allowed our endeavour to observe the
rule just laid down to betray itself. Fig. 2 is preferable
as being only just sufficiently symmetrical to avoid being
unsymmetrical, which is an example of what has already
been said about the necessity of observing rules of composition
just so far as to escape the appearance of having
broken them.

Fig. 5.Fig. 6.

If this rule is right as regards voluntarily drawing a
picture, it is equally so in the case of a photograph, but
instead of deliberately placing things in such and such
positions, we attain the same end by moving the camera
and selecting our point of view so that the objects come
into the positions desired.

Now suppose then, we have done this, but in doing it
we are quite unable to prevent other objects coming into
the field of view and occupying undesirable places near
the margins of the picture, as for instance in fig. 6.
Here we are brought to consider another rule or principle
in composition, namely, that there must be one and99
only one chief object in the picture, whereas in fig. 6,
apart from the gate and tree on the one side and the
windmill on the other attracting attention to the margins
of the picture, these same objects arrest the attention
quite as much as the church, and we feel the eye
wandering about from one to the other and missing
the sensation of centralization and rest which fig. 2
gives.

If we were drawing or painting we should put in
what we want and then stop, we should omit or ignore
what we did not require, but in photography our powers
in this direction are limited, and hence we must as far as
possible select those views, and only accept such, as
comply with what we feel to be right.

The angle of view included by different lenses is an
auxiliary not to be neglected, for by substituting a
narrower angle lens, that is, one of longer focus, we may
cut off or leave out undesirable objects which the shorter
focus lens might include. Then again, when the print
is finished we can after careful consideration cut off what
would have been better left out, for it will be better to
have a picture half the size well composed, than double
the number of inches with a distracting and unsatisfactory
arrangement of objects, hence with many most
successful workers it is no uncommon thing to take
quite a small portion of a negative, and either print it as
it is or else enlarge it up to the desired size, but mere
size will reckon as nothing as compared with pleasing
composition.

If it is inexpedient to let the principal object or
group of objects occupy the exact centre of the picture,
measured from left to right, it is equally so if the centre
be measured from top to bottom, and hence we may
formulate the rule (to be broken perhaps later when we
are strong enough to be independent of guiding) that the100
horizon should not be allowed to come midway between
the top and the base of the picture.

Fig. 7.

Remembering now that, as set forth in the earlier
part of this article, a picture should appeal to our feelings
and stir our emotions, it may be pointed out that in
most ordinary things, and certainly in the arts, the most101
powerful things are those which possess one dominant
idea or feature, as in a piece of music the refrain keeps
recurring, a preacher takes a text, in a story there is one
hero, and so forth, and in point of composition fig. 7 is
better than fig. 8, although the view is less comprehensive.

Fig. 8.

It may not, however, always be easy for the
beginner to determine what is the chief object which
should occupy the central position, or which object or
group to choose in a landscape.

Fig. 9.

Fig. 10.

This brings us to speak of another important matter,
and that is the right disposition of lines which form the
view or the selection of view so that the lines formed by
the component parts shall fall in a desirable manner.
The various objects in any view tend to form or suggest
lines, thus in fig. 9 the outline of the trees, the bank102
along the shore, the clouds, and the boats suggest the
lines shown in the diagram, fig. 10, which lines all run
the same way, but in fig. 11 we have a similar view in
which the lines suggested counterbalance each other,
and not only so, but by their convergence they carry the
eye to a spot near the centre, and so make the boat,
although not very large nor conspicuous, the one and
principal object (see diagram fig. 12).

Fig. 11.

Fig. 12.

For the sake of training one’s perceptions look at
any good pictures, and in your mind resolve them into
line diagrams and see how these lines fall, and in considering
any landscape or other subject to be photographed
make up your mind as to what lines are
suggested, and then select your point of view so that103
these lines balance or are symmetrical in arrangement,
and also that they converge towards some point well
within the picture, and near the centre of it.

Fig. 13.

Fig. 14.

But in fig. 13 we have a subject in part well composed,
but the composition is spoilt because of the line
formed by the road and fence, which seem to cut the
picture in two, whereas could we have chosen the same
subject from a point of view giving such an arrangement
as fig. 14, a difference is at once felt and a more pleasing
effect gained.

104

Fig. 15.

Fig. 16.

Lines which seem to separate us from the picture
and cut off one part from another must be carefully
avoided, and an endeavour to find something which will,
as it were, lead the eye into the picture, should be
diligently sought for, and indeed a subject, however it
may interest us, must often be abandoned if it lacks those
things which go to make pleasing composition, remembering
as we should always do that in pictorial work the
fact that objects are curious, or interesting, or pretty, has
nothing to do with the case, but that they are only to
be valued according as they act as media for expressing105
pleasing ideas, beautiful thoughts and sentiments, which
they will not do if some part creates a feeling of unpleasing
arrangement or design. If a scene does not
compose well, we should as pictorial workers feel no
desire to reproduce it. But you may say “Cannot we
often by changing our point of view get an otherwise ill-composed
subject to compose well?” Most decidedly,
that is precisely what we should do, but it is no longer
the same subject or view.

And now let me say that it is often surprising how
much alteration may be made by changing our position.
Figs. 15 and 16 are together an instance of this, the
outline here given being made from a pencil sketch made
on the spot, whilst figs. 17 and 18 are examples of
the desirable change brought about by watching and
waiting for a change in the position of light and the
condition of the river’s tide.

         


Fig. 17.Fig. 18.

Where the beginner most often fails is in taking
things as they are without pausing to consider whether106
they might not be improved, and if so in what way, and
then patiently searching to see if such better way can be
found.

Pictorial success will as often as not depend on the
exercise of fastidious taste, which is satisfied with
nothing but the very best, and not quite content even
then.

A great deal more might usefully be said with
reference to the composition of lines if space would
permit, but this general reference may be given as a
sort of summing up.

If the disposition of the lines constitutes such a
perfectly symmetrical design that it is at once
recognised as symmetrical, then it is wrong, because the
artifice by which pleasing composition is attained is
betrayed, and we feel the thing to be artificial. If, on
the other hand, the lines fall so as to make the beholder
conscious of their presence, as, for instance, cutting off
a portion of the subject or presenting a one-sided
appearance, again it is wrong. In neither case should the
lines or the objects suggesting them be felt at all until sought
for, neither as being very right or very wrong.

In art it is a maxim that the means by which the
thing is done should not proclaim itself, and hence it
must apply to pictorial photography, which is an effort
after the artistic. A composition should please without
our quite knowing why, and without our being able to
see the machinery, as it were, by which our pleasurable
sensations are set in motion.

But whilst it is convenient to speak of lines in the
landscape, it is only a manner of speaking, for, as we
know very well, photography, unlike pen drawing, has to
do with “tones,” that is, masses of light and shade. Now
the general rules suggested as regards the arrangement
of lines, apply in much the same way if we regard a107
picture (as we should do) as consisting of masses of
light and shade.

If when standing before a picture we close the eyes
and then suddenly open them, our attention is certain to
be drawn to the highest light or the deepest shadow,
and hence, as a general rule, whichever of these is the
strongest to attract attention, that should be in or near
the principal object (indeed it will make of itself the
principal object), and should therefore be well removed
from the margins of the picture.

Refer back to fig. 8, in which the light patch of sky,
the light in the water and the two clusters of light rushes,
all form competing points of attraction, and if these
are too near the margins, they remind us of those
margins, hence the improvement in effect when these
are cut away or left out.

But disposing of the highest light and deepest
dark does not finish the matter. There is a certain
relative degree of lightness and darkness between everything
in nature. Moreover, colours have to be interpreted
by certain degrees of light and shade according
to the distance objects are away from us, and according
to the amount of light falling on them.

Such relative lightness and darkness is called “tone.”
The word used in this sense has nothing to do with
“tone” as applied to the colour of a print, which colour
we change by a process we call “toning,” and upon
the correct rendering of relative tones so much of the effect
of a picture depends, and so much of its emotional qualities.

Generally speaking, although there are often exceptions,
the further an object is from us the grayer it
seems. White becomes less white, and dark objects
grow less dark, until in the distance both, under ordinary
circumstances, come almost to the same “tone,” and we
see the distance only as a gray hazy mass.

108

If for a subject we have a figure of a woman by a
stream of water and we make an under-exposed negative
of it, or develop the negative to too great a density, we
shall very likely have a print in which the water and the
woman’s apron and cap come very much whiter with
regard to the rest of the subject than ever they appear
in nature, whilst the distance will very likely come too
dark. Here we show a disregard for the correct rendering
of relative tones and the effect is hard and harsh, unlike
nature. We must therefore endeavour, both in exposure
and development and printing, to preserve relative tones
exactly as they are in nature, and constant study and
observation of nature should be carried on in order that
the eye may be trained to know how things come
relatively in nature, and so be able to decide at a glance
if the photograph is good.

Ultimate success, by the way, often depends less on
knowing what to take and how to take it than on a well-trained
judgment which knows what is good or bad
when we have taken it.

Whilst the mere lines or forms of objects may
impart some amount of feeling and sentiment to a scene,
inasmuch as there is restfulness and repose in the long
horizontal lines of the river-side pastures, something
rhythmical in the sinuous curves of the winding stream,
or vigour and variety in the irregular forms of the rugged
cliffs and so on, yet the ideas and feelings which the picture
will promote depend more on the lights and shades, and
the masses contrasting or merging each with each.

But Nature does not always present herself in
pleasingly arranged masses, and is consequently at such
times commonplace and unpicturesque in the literal
sense of the word. At such times she will not attract
the pictorial worker any more than she will when perchance
the lines and groupings are unsuitable.

109

The landscape which basks under the full blaze of
sun, glittering throughout every inch with a myriad
twinkling lights and sharp details, awakens no feeling
akin to those which probably everyone feels when in the
twilight of evening plane after plane recedes as one
broad flat tint behind the other. Under the bright light
of day we may wonder at the richness and plenty upon
the earth, we may rejoice in that there are so many
curious and pretty things to look at, but these are like the
feelings inspired by reading a book on natural history,
rather than the emotions created by the perusal of a
poem, or listening to sweet music.

Compare for a moment the two photographs, fig. 19
and fig. 20.

Fig. 19.

The first is by no means an extreme case of the
ordinary photograph, and notice that although the composition
is fairly good as far as grouping goes, there is
an absence of any quality which might make one feel
anything outside the bare recognition of the facts110
depicted, but the second, if it be good at all, must
depend for admiration on a certain amount of sentiment
which it suggests or creates. You will notice that in the
first there is no sense of distance, and although a
church tower, behind the masts of the boats, is half a
mile or so away it does not possess the “tone” and
veiling of atmosphere which would make it appear
distant. Every part of the view seems equally near, or
nearly so; the eye wanders over the whole, alighting on
details here and there which interest and amuse, yet
there is an absence of just that breadth which is
noticeably present in the second example.

Fig. 20.

Now let it be distinctly understood that detail, its
omission or suppression, and its introduction or sharp
delineation, is not a question of lens focus only, or even
chiefly, but it is largely a question of light. Imagine the
photograph, fig. 19, with the greater part of the detail111
taken out so that the quay, the houses, the shore, etc.
were just broad masses of lighter or darker tone, should
we not then get a composition which would be less
disturbing, more compact, more concentrated in interest?
Is not this the case in fig. 20, in which detail is almost
entirely absent? And yet detail could not have been
truthfully introduced in this photograph, because with
the light in the position it is, and in the misty evening
air, no detail was there to reproduce; it was the fact that
objects ranged themselves in masses one against the
other, leaving room for imagination and creating ideas
that determined its selection and its consequent portrayal.

In many cases a clear and sharp delineation of
details will perhaps be desirable, not, however, for the
sake of showing detail, but just so far as the production
of the effect may require; on the other hand, just the
full amount of detail that a lens will give is by no means
always wanted.

Lenses were not invented for pictorial purposes, and therefore
there is no reason for concluding that what the lens
gives is necessarily right, for remember that we started
with the distinct understanding that we were merely
applying to a certain purpose just so much of the photographic
process as we considered we needed; because I
have the means of travelling at sixty miles an hour there
is no reason why I should not apply the same means of
locomotion to coaching a pedestrian at a tenth of that
speed if I choose. It may be said that in the two
photographs referred to the comparison is not a fair one,
because so much depends on the sky. Granted that
much in the second example does depend on the sky,
which is an essential part of the picture, and indeed one
cause of its very existence, but in the other (fig. 19) the
presence of clouds would not improve the pictorial faults
to which reference has been made. As a mere record or112
portrayal of Old Woodbridge Quay, the absence of
clouds is as much a characteristic of its particular species,
as the clouds in the second one are inseparable from its
existence.

So, but little more than half hinting at the principles
involved in the due suppression of unnecessary details, and
the elimination of undesirable objects in order to obtain
breadth, and having said but little as to the preservation
of correct relative values or tones, I must pass on.

Every corner of nature’s broad expanse is, as it
were, enveloped in atmosphere, and invisible as we are
commonly in the habit of considering it to be, it affects
to a greater or less degree everything we see, and the
visible atmosphere is often responsible for some of
nature’s most beautiful and most appealing aspects.
Obviously then we cannot afford to leave out so
important a contributory to picturesque effect, and it is
on this account rather than on account of sharp or un-sharp
detail that the question of stops and lens apertures
comes in.

Look at the image of a landscape on a moderately
hazy day, as it appears on the ground-glass focussing
screen of your camera, using the lens at full aperture—then
quickly insert f/32, and notice the difference. Not
alone have objects near at hand and more remote become
more sharply or more equally defined, but you may also
notice that objects are more brilliant, and that a sense of
atmosphere has been cut out.

Compare if you will two photographs, the one made
respectively with full aperture of f/6 or f/8 and the other
made with f/32 or f/45, and provided that in the first case
we have not actual blurring to the extent of destroying
form and structure, does not the first remind you more of
nature? I do not say it is so instructive, so surprising,
so dainty, or of such exquisite finish, but is it not more113
reminiscent of the effects we remember to have seen and
felt in nature. It is not the function of this article to say
to what optical laws this difference is due, and yet
the student may expect to receive something by way
of practical working instructions.

My recommendation is then to use a single landscape
lens or the single combination of a doublet, and in
starting to use the full aperture.

With this it may be that when the foreground is
moderately sharp, trees more remote are so ill defined as
to appear as a collection of little blots and irregular
patches. Whilst sharp detail in all places may not be
productive of pictorial effect, yet the extreme opposite
will be displeasing in another way, and it will be best to
secure just so much definition and no more as shall save the
representation from appearing to have been wilfully put
out of focus—once let the destruction of detail be obvious
and we betray the artifice by which we are working,
which is just what we should avoid.

In the case just supposed then, we may now introduce
the first stop, simultaneously racking the lens in a
little until we get middle distance without unpleasantly
obvious blurring. The foreground may be a little out of
focus, and in practice I find it is rather helpful to general
effect if detail is sacrificed more in the foreground than
in the middle distance.

This I believe is contrary to the teaching of many,
but my feeling is that with a sharply defined foreground
the eye is attracted and the interest so far arrested, that
it is difficult to travel further and enter into the poetry
and sentiment of the scene beyond.

Wide-angle lenses have a double disadvantage,
shared in part by so-called rapid rectilinear doublet
lenses. In the first place they flatten the view, bringing
distant planes to appear as near as the nearer ones, and114
by including a comparatively wide angle they bring into
the plane of the foreground, objects so near that they
appear out of proportion, and hence proportions are false
when judged as the observer must judge by the standard
of visual perspective.

A long-focus, narrow-angle lens necessitates a
camera which racks out to a considerable length, and
probably a greater extension than any camera in the
ordinary way can give, would be an advantage on some
occasions.

Passing reference has been made to the interpretation
of colours in nature in their true relative value of
black and white.

If we have a subject in which brilliant orange-coloured
rushes in autumn are seen as glowing bright
against a background of dark blue water, and the rushes
made still more golden of hue by the ruddy rays of a
sinking sun, a difficult case is before us.

Such a case I remember very well in the south of
Devonshire, close to what is known as Slapton Ley.
It was late afternoon in November, and from over
the rounded hills behind me to the westward, the
declining sun sent warm red rays on to the belt of
faded reeds which stretched out into the expanse
of the still land-locked water of the Ley—a great sheet
of fresh water which placidly lay under the shelter of
the bank of shingle which alone separated it from the
ever-restless sea—placidly listening to the ceaseless
voices of sea music, and at this particular hour reflecting
the sky deep blue and of almost leaden hue—just above
the bank rose the full moon, orange in tint, on a background
of blue-green sky—the yellow reeds, kindled into
glowing amber tints by the sun’s rays, flamed out from
the deep blue water—yellow the shingle bank against
the blue water and green-blue sky, deeper yellow the115
moon as it rose from out the sea. So grand a scheme
of colour that by its side the essays of the most daring
painter might well seem feeble, so exquisite a poem that
the intrusion of the photographer, analysing the values
and tones and calculating his powers of reproduction
seemed like sacrilege. In the main it was yellow, orange-yellow,
and red standing out as luminous against the deep
blue of water and only a little less blue sky. It was
gorgeous non-actinic colour appearing as light against a
highly actinic but darker colour. The consequence of an
indiscreet exposure with an ordinary plate might be
anticipated to produce dark rushes against a pale grey
background of water, and so probably the very effect we
were minded to secure, reversed and dissipated.

This is an extreme case, perhaps, but throughout
the whole range of nature the contrasting and blending
of adjacent colours is so subtle a thing that I should feel
one were throwing away at least a possible advantage
by not using colour-corrected or isochromatic plates on
nearly every occasion, and in order to get the full
advantage of isochromatic plates, I should consider the
addition of a yellow screen an essential.

The rapidity of one’s plates, isochromatic or otherwise,
must be governed entirely by the nature of the
subject, as also to some degree must be development
and subsequent printing.

In every case I would endeavour to get a comparatively
thin negative, with even the portions representing
deepest shadows slightly veiled. “Clear glass shadows”
is an enormity and an outrage both of science and art;
equally are solid high-lights to be shunned. With
modern printing methods it needs much less than actual
opacity in the negative to produce white paper, and if
the picture requires any part of it at all to appear as
quite white, no subject will need more than the very116
smallest region to be so. A general softness and very
subtle gradation, with a total absence of “sparkle” and
brilliancy in the negative, will yield by at least most
processes the most suggestive print, bearing in mind
that delicate gradations suggest atmosphere, and atmosphere
is one of nature’s most precious qualities.

Whilst plain salted papers sensitized with silver
present possibilities not yet sufficiently exploited, yet
until such time that something more entirely satisfactory
in all respects is given us in silver papers, platinotype
and carbon, and perhaps also gum bichromate will be the
processes most suitable for our purpose. Personally,
platinotype has been the favoured medium, being, as I
believe, more ductile and more amenable to various
methods of control than is generally recognised.

And leaving much more of importance unsaid than
space limits admit of my saying, I must leave it.

A. Horsley Hinton.

Architectural Photography.

To the majority
amateurs, the photographing
of architectural
subjects presents considerable,
and in many cases
apparently insurmountable
difficulties. Undoubtedly
there are difficulties to be
grappled with, but they are
neither so formidable nor so
numerous, but that any
ordinary photographer with
the average amount of common
sense can master them
be he so minded.

Unfortunately there are
a great many who take up
photography as an amusement
to whom the slightest
departure from the ordinary
routine presents a difficulty.
It is however to the amateur
photographer who desires to be able to portray architecture,
be it either of our cathedrals, churches, historic
mansions, or places of personal interest, and at the same118
time wishes to be able to do the subjects fair justice, that
it is hoped the following particulars may be of some
service.

To the beginner taking up this or indeed any branch
of photography, size is of course a great consideration
either from the weight carrying or pecuniary point of
view. Another reason is the fact that young photographic
workers have an idea that the smaller the plate, the
easier the working. Sound though this reasoning may
appear, nevertheless it is not entirely correct.

As a matter of fact all things being taken into consideration
the larger the plate up to 12 × 10 or 15 × 12
employed the more rapidly will the worker progress.

Large plates, especially in architectural work, tend
to make the operator more careful and conscientious when
out with the camera; and even more so when in the
developing room. So much more can be done with a
large plate than with a small one; the use of a large
plate moreover checks the common failing so prevalent
among amateurs of rushing work and recklessly using
plates.

Taking all things into consideration, I would strongly
recommend the whole plate or 10 × 8 camera to the
student taking up this branch of our art.

In selecting a camera purchase a front extending
one with bellows only slightly tapering. See that it has
both rising and cross movement to the front, and also
that the amount of movement in each case is a not too
restricted one. Makers, unfortunately, do not give
sufficient attention to this matter, the usual rise allowed
being very slight whereas it should be at least equal
to one-third of the longest way of the plate; even more
than this is advantageous if it can be obtained. By
the rise I mean the amount of upward movement that
can be obtained, the lens being in the centre before starting.

119

The cross-front should have a movement of about
one-quarter of the length of the plate each way.

It may be useful to know that a little more rise can
be obtained by the placing of the lens above the centre
of the cross-front; reference to the photograph of camera
will explain this matter more fully.

The swing-back should be a practical one, working
from the centre, and capable of being swung either to or
from the lens.

In many of the cheaper front extension cameras it is
not possible to use the swing-back when tilting the
camera down, only when tilting upwards. The swing-front,
although not an absolute necessity, is undoubtedly
a movement possessing great advantages, especially
when the front is raised rather high, and one is using a
lens of limited covering power. This movement
should be acquired if possible.

The camera should possess double extension, focussing
by rackwork, and having a reversing back so made
that it will fit on all ways; it is then possible to draw
the slide shutter out in any position.

In selecting a tripod stand purchase one of the kind
known as the sliding leg variety, two-fold is better than
three, giving greater sliding power. The top of stand
should be as large as possible; this is preferable to a
turntable, as this piece of workmanship is seldom rigid
after a little use, and some difficulty is experienced when
trying to spread the legs out rather wide. A two-fold
Ashford stand is as good as any on the market.

The blocks herewith illustrate the kind of camera
used by myself, and with the exception of the turntable,
which is not a great success, it answers all requirements.

In the selecting of suitable lenses a great deal will
depend upon the inclination of the purchaser and the
depth of his pocket.

120

There is such a great variety upon the market at
the present time, that to the young photographer the
buying of the right lenses is somewhat a difficult
problem.

          

The Zeiss series are undoubtedly the finest obtainable
and for architectural work are unrivalled, possessing
great covering power, good marginal definition, and in
fact very fine definition all over the plate. The lenses
of this series, although quite new, have met with great
favour amongst architectural workers.

They work at an aperture of f/18, but I understand
that they can be opened to f/16 and numbered on the f
system. As regards their relative working capabilities
they give about the same picture at f/32 that the
majority of wide-angle lenses give at f/64.

The Goerz anastigmats are also another very fine
series but do not give anything like the covering power
of the last mentioned, and moreover are nearly double
the price. Their special merit is that one can work121
at f/8 or f/11, and get a picture sharp up to the edges.
Taylor, Taylor & Hobson also make a good wide-angle
lens, possessing great covering power and at a moderately
low price. With one of their nine inch lenses I have
covered a plate 12 × 10 inches.

“GATHER THE ROSES WHILE YE MAY,
OLD TIME IS STILL A-FLYING.”
ALEX. KEIGHLEY.

For a whole-plate camera, a useful battery would be
a 5 inches, 7½ inches, 9 inches and 12 inches; for 10 × 8,
7 inches, 9 inches, 10½ inches and 14 inches. The three
last in each case are the most useful.

Having selected the lenses, another very important
point and one not to be decided hastily is the question of
levels. Four are required, two circular and two ordinary.
They are placed as follows: Fix the circular levels, one
on the baseboard near the front of the camera, the other
on the top of the back part of camera. The other two
should be placed one on the side of the back part and the
other on the back of camera just under the reversing
back. Care must be taken to purchase slow moving
levels as some work so quickly that it is next to
impossible to level the camera with them, and as this
is one of the most important points in the whole business,
too much care cannot be taken in selecting and fixing the
right kind of level.

The focussing screen should be ruled as accompanying
diagram. This will divide the screen into inch
squares, working from the centre, and will considerably
assist the photographer in “sizing his subject up.”

122

One other thing required is a set of clamps for
binding the tripod legs together. These are, I believe,
made by George Mason, of Glasgow, but any dealer will
procure them for you.

The use of the right kind of plate constitutes a very
important factor in the production of a satisfactory
negative, particularly in this branch.

Owing to the greater difficulty experienced in developing
extra rapid plates, one generally sees the slower
variety recommended. No hard and fast rule can however
be laid down. To gain the best result, the plate
must be suited to the subject.

For instance, in a very dark interior in which heavy
black shadows predominate, many of them appearing
much darker than they really are owing to their close
proximity to a strong light, the quicker the plate used
the better. This tends to break down the harsh contrasts,
and at the same time the shadow detail is considerably
better rendered.

On the other hand, working in a light interior or one
which is flat owing possibly to the large amount of light
present, a slower plate can be used with advantage, and,
providing the exposure is sufficient the result will be all
that is wished for.

Exteriors, particularly those in sunshine, should be
photographed on a fairly quick plate. Slow plates,
although good, do not yield nearly such good negatives,
and unless very fully exposed give excessive hardness.

Taking this class of work all round, the quick plate
is the more useful of the two and is undoubtedly the best
for interior work, particularly such interiors as one meets
in our English cathedrals.

For all subjects possessing strong high-lights, such
as windows, stained or otherwise, rapid plates combined
with a suitable backing composition yield the best results,123
and I would impress upon the reader the fact that no
plate should ever be placed in a dark slide without being
covered at the back with a suitable composition for the
prevention of halation.

The value of this agent is distinctly demonstrated
by the accompanying illustrations, and I would point out
the fact that the negatives were both developed with the
utmost care. The unbacked plate was so developed as
to prevent the appearance of halation as much as possible,
and it will be noticed that all portions of the photograph,124
other than that where halation has occurred, are nearly as
good in the unbacked as in the backed one.

Having obtained all the apparatus and materials, a
very good subject to begin on and one giving good
opportunities for the exercise of the various movements
connected with the camera, etc., is a general view of the
choir in some cathedral or church near at hand.

Having erected the camera, the next thing is to decide
upon the most pleasing point of view.

Speaking from my own experience I would advise
the shifting of the camera either to the right or left, so
that the centre aisle is thrown slightly in perspective.
This tends to give a much better and decidedly more
pleasing effect to the resulting photograph. Of the two
sides, moving to the right seems to be the best. The
next item is the fixing of your ground line, this must be
so arranged that it is quite clear, not obstructed by
the backs of chairs, etc., which look very badly if left
standing. Personally, I have generally found it necessary
to move one or two rows of chairs so as to make the
ground line myself.

In adjusting the height of the camera from the
ground it is well never to exceed six feet. Five feet to
five feet six inches is the most useful height. This will
give a photograph in which the point of sight is the
same as that of the person actually viewing the subject.

The placing of the camera on step ladders, chairs,
or other supports, so as to overlook objects in the
immediate foreground is a practice to be condemned,
giving results very rarely pleasing and always bad from
the sightseer’s point of view.

Having settled upon the point of view and the lens
to be used, the student should then roughly focus the
image. Notice the amount of subject on the plate and
how much rise is required.

125

If having a camera such as described, the rise is
easily accomplished and the camera can then be truly
levelled up. Care should be taken over this as unless
you have the camera exactly level you cannot expect a
true picture. The bubbles of the levels should be exactly
in the centre, a little bit out will not do.

If it is found that the rising front fails to give the
amount of subject required, recourse must be made to
the swings, and it is here that the swing front triumphs
over the swing back.

126

To swing the back necessitates the shifting of the
camera and tripod stand, and at once throws all the
levels out of gear. Then comes re-focussing, etc. Sometimes
this will have to be gone through five or six times
before the desired amount of swing has been achieved.
Owing to the re-focussing required every time the camera
is moved it is very difficult, especially for the beginner,
to rightly estimate the amount of rise required.

With the swing front the desired amount of rise is
attained easily and quickly, and it can be worked with
the head still under the focussing cloth, which is a great
convenience. At the same time the baseboard and back
of camera always remain level.

After gaining the correct amount of rise the sides of
the subject should be considered. A golden rule to
remember in this class of work is when you show a
column, show the base of it, and always start the sides
of plate with either half or three-quarters of a column.
It looks very queer to see the bend of an arch wandering
away out of the side of the picture without any apparent
support. In arranging the sides it is usual to have a
preponderance of subject on the opposite side to which
the camera is, and to start that side with a column.
Sometimes the subject fails to fit the plate nicely, in that
case it is better to trim the print than to have uninteresting
features present.

Of course a great deal depends upon the personal
taste of the worker, what one man considers right
another will rebel against; so although I advocate the
use of columns to fill the sides of the plate it does not
follow that that is the one and only method of photographing
these subjects.

The student having carefully gone into these matters
and arranged the subjects to suit his own satisfaction the
question of what point to focus for arises, and indeed in127
very dark interiors the question of focussing anything at
all comes in. A method I use myself is to roughly
divide the distance from the camera to the farthest object
in half, and then to focus midway between the camera
and the middle of the subject. Then stop down the lens
until the most distant object is sharp. In practice I
have found this rule so good that I can recommend its
adoption for all subjects, and if carried out correctly will
always result in the production of crisp negatives.

Exposure is not a very difficult thing to overcome.
Arrange the focussing cloth well over the head, open the
lens out to its largest aperture and remain under the
cloth until you can see the image distinctly all over the
plate. Then without uncovering the head proceed to
slowly stop down until you can only just see the image
all over the plate. Now using a plate of the rapidity of
Barnet extra rapid, an exposure of ten minutes will yield
a satisfactory fully exposed negative.

The varying exposures for other plates and stops
are easily obtained. For instance you find the image
can just be seen all over at f/32 and you wish to use f/64
The exposure will be forty minutes.

After having used this method for over seven years,
and having invariably found it correct, I can unhesitatingly
recommend its adoption, and if used with a
little common sense the worker will seldom suffer from
his plates being either badly under or over-exposed.

In photographing side aisles, transepts, or long rows
of pillars, the worker is often troubled by the unnatural
way in which the floor runs up. This is more especially
noticeable when there are no prominent objects in the
immediate foreground. A considerable amount of this
can however be overcome by the lowering of the camera
to about three feet from the ground. It is here where
the sliding legs of the tripod stand become of service.

128

I would ask the student always to use the
longest focus lens possible, consistent with the effect
desired.

The use of extreme wide-angle lenses has had a
disastrous effect upon the public taste in respect to architectural
photography due principally to the abortions
one sees exposed for sale in the shop windows of our
cathedral cities.

It should be seldom necessary for the amateur to
use very wide-angle lenses. Of course, when it is a
question of getting a detailed photograph in a confined
situation a wide-angle lens is of great service. But it is
when you see the whole length of a cathedral photographed
on a whole plate with a five inch lens that the
fault is so noticeable.

In photographing exteriors great care should be
taken in the placing of the camera in a suitable spot.
Try and so arrange it that the short side of the building
does not run off too violently, indeed, it is often much
better to leave out a portion of the subject rather than
to cram the whole subject upon the plate.

General views are much better if photographed
when there is a little sunlight. This gives to the subject
a sharp, clean-cut appearance.

Details on the other hand are better if photographed
in a subdued light and slightly over-exposed.

In focussing very high subjects some difficulty will
be found in getting bottom and top in focus at the same
time, especially if the lens be strained by either altering
the back or front of the camera.

The best place to focus is a little way above the
centre of the screen, so that when stopped down the
bottom of the building is quite sharp. A slight softness
towards the top of the subject is scarcely noticeable in
the final print.

129

The exposure of exteriors varies between three
seconds at f/64 to ten minutes, and no correct guide can
possibly be given. To the beginner a Watkins’
exposure meter will here be of some service.

If people are continually passing and repassing stop
the lens down to f/64 and give as long an exposure as is
possible; this will as a rule completely obliterate them.
I have found that an exposure of from ten to twenty
seconds entirely destroys all trace of moving objects.

Another method of making an exposure where there
is much traffic past the building, and perhaps people
standing about whom you cannot very well ask to move,
is, to break the exposure as many times as possible.
Expose for two seconds, then wait until the traffic has
somewhat altered; then give another two seconds and so
on until finished. By this means I have been able to
photograph buildings in the centre of a crowded street or
thoroughfare without a trace of anybody showing.

It is often interesting for the student to be able to
successfully tackle the photographing of drawing-room,
ball-room, or other apartments either of his own or
friends’ houses.

This work is considerably more difficult than it
seems; and it is in such subjects that the taste of the
operator becomes manifest. A great deal depends upon
the point of view chosen and also upon the arrangement
of the furniture.

If a long room, the camera should be placed at one
end at about a quarter of the width of room away from
one side and from the end wall. Keep the camera
parallel with the sides of the room and use the sliding
front so as to obtain more of the opposite side of the
room. This will give the ceiling a true square appearance
and the side of the ceiling will not run off with an
unpleasing effect.

130

In some subjects it is perhaps necessary to include
one or more windows. This can of course be accomplished
by the aid of backed plates, but it is always
better to block those particular windows out. This is
usually done by covering the outside with black cloth or
brown paper or pulling the sun blinds down. To get
the effect of the windows you must remove the paper or
cloth at the end of the exposure for a few minutes, three
minutes being generally sufficient. By this means it is
possible to show the landscape as seen from the window.
Do not place your camera too high. Four feet to four
feet six inches is quite sufficient. If the camera is higher
you look over the immediate foreground objects, touching
the ground past them, which is undesirable.

In arranging the furniture be careful that round or
oval objects are not placed so that they appear on the
edges of the plate which gives them an exaggerated
appearance.

In exposing on all such interiors I would strongly
recommend a very full exposure, the object being to
flatten the subject. A great thing to study in this branch
of work is the careful lighting of your subject. This
can be largely varied by the use of the inside blinds, also
by the sun blinds found outside many windows. It is
not advisable to draw the blinds up to their fullest extent.
By so doing you accentuate your cast shadows thrown
by tables, chairs, etc. In fact, the softer the light in the
room coupled with a corresponding exposure, the better
the result. Another point to notice is that a comparatively
dull day is often the best for interior work, the light
being much softer and subdued. As a slight guide to
exposure I would suggest that an additional twenty-five
per cent. be added to that recommended for church work.

John H. Avery.

The Hand Camera and its use.

What is the best form
of hand camera?
How often this question is
asked, and yet how impossible
to give any definite reply,
the conditions of use, and
requirements of each worker
being so widely different.
One, desires a form of apparatus,
capable of being
closed up into the smallest
space, weighing but the least
possible number of ounces,
the necessary movements,
confined to touching a spring,
or pressing a button, and the
total cost not to exceed two
or three pounds, while
others do not care so much
as to its possessing these
qualities, if by a little increase
in bulk, weight, and cost,
it is capable of use in a less restricted manner, on
subjects of wide variety, and under such conditions of
light, and atmospheric effects, as, when shutter exposures
are being given, call for the maximum light passage to the
plate.

132

Assuming the camera to be intended exclusively
for use without a tripod, then it becomes not a difficult
matter to point out its essential features. First and
foremost, it should be characterized by simplicity in construction,
and every part be easily accessible, complicated
movements being rarely found necessary, except
perhaps, to raise the price of the instrument. When
being employed in the field, the camera and its working
parts ought not to need the slightest consideration, each
movement, whether they be few, or many, being made,
without requiring troublesome attention at the moment
when every thought should be devoted to the subject.

The component parts of an instrument, complete
and effective for this class of work, may be taken to be
a good lens capable of covering at f/8, a shutter, some
simple means of focussing, adequate finders, and the
means of carrying plates either in some form of magazine,
or ordinary dark slides.

Each system of holder for plates possesses its own
distinctive advantages, which are preferable, depending
entirely on individual needs, or tastes. Some admire one
method, and some the other.

When plates are carried in one of the many forms
of magazine which cameras are nowadays fitted with, it
is important when re-charging it, that care be taken to see
each sheath and plate is laid true in its place, as the slightest
irregularity at this point, means certain trouble when
changing a plate after exposure, indeed, perhaps
fifty per cent. of the misfortunes which occur
when out at work, from failure to act of the changing
arrangements, are directly caused by carelessness when laying
the plates in the magazine. Given reasonable care in this
matter, almost any of the modern automatic changing
methods, may be relied on to answer satisfactorily.
When however the slight additional bulk, weight, and it133
may be increase of cost is not objected to, then there
can be no denying separate dark slides possess many
and important advantages.

No need to fear a wasted day, caused by some plate
sticking, and rendering further work impossible, without
having recourse to a dark-room, which probably is miles
away; and again, one must not overlook the opportunity
they give of carrying plates of different degrees of sensitiveness,
a matter of service, when subjects to be dealt
with are varied, such as, say, clouds and water, landscapes
and figures. In the first case, when light is fairly good,
the ordinary speed plate will be found amply quick
enough during the daytime, and fifty per cent cheaper
in price. When open landscapes are being taken,
during summer time, medium rapid plates generally
will be quick enough, but many opportunities, for
pictorial work, arise under conditions of atmosphere
and light, in which to obtain fully exposed
negatives with a shutter, demands a plate of extreme
sensitiveness, and if for no other reason than that they
offer this opportunity of carrying a varied assortment
of plates, many workers prefer dark slides, to any form
of magazine.

There are advantages, and disadvantages, with both
systems, and it becomes simply a question for each
worker to consider which fulfills his requirements best.

The Lens.—Good work can be, and is done, with
cheap single lenses, but the opportunities offered are
considerably restricted, what is needed, being such a
lens as may be used at full aperture of f/8 or f/6, and
will then cover the plate from corner to corner, sharply.
This is necessary not only because the actinic quality of
light is not always over good, but that moving subjects
demand the shutter should be working with rapidity,
sometimes indeed with considerable speed: under which134
conditions two factors are absolutely essential, a large
working lens aperture, and a rapid plate. It is well,
therefore, to buy the best lens you can afford, it more than
pays in every way. For ¼-plate work, a rectilinear of 5,
or 5½ in. focus, working say at f/5.6, and with iris diaphragm,
by one of the best makers, will allow work being
done under any condition of weather, or other circumstances,
when shutter work is possible.

Finders.—Years ago, the question of whether finders
were necessary, or not, in a camera of this kind, was a
matter on which some at least expressed very different
opinions, from those now held by most workers. Further
experience has shown that when certainty in working
is desired, some kind of finder is an absolute necessity
as part of the working mechanism. It usually takes
the form of a small camera obscura, what is required being,
that it should not be too small, should give a perfectly
discernible image, and be so adjusted, that only so much
of it is shown, as will be projected on to the sensitive
plate, when the exposure is made. The reason of its importance
is that it enables the subject being arranged tastefully,
as well as ensuring that the whole of it is on the plate.

Where no attempt at pictorial work is intended,
and the important matter is simply that the object being
photographed should be in the centre of the plate, then it
is only necessary that the finder should show as wide an
angle of vision, or a little wider than the lens being
employed inside the camera. But when something
more is aimed at, viz.: Tasteful composition over the whole
plate, then it is necessary to block out on the finder all
excess of view, beyond what will be received on the
sensitive plate.

The Shutter.—What particular form may be best is
a matter of doubt, but whatever it be, exposure must
be possible without vibration, it should give greater135
exposure to the foreground than the sky, and ought to
allow of being regulated for exposures ranging from ¹/₄th of
a second up to perhaps ¹/₁₀₀th for ordinary work.

Where shutter work has to be done, which demands
anything less than ¹/₁₀₀th of a second, then special shutters
for the purpose are needed, but after having used hand
cameras of one form or another for the last nine or ten
years on such classes of subjects as are ordinarily dealt
with, the occasions on which any greater speed than
¹/₃₀th of a second has been called for have been
extremely rare. It may be said this would not allow of
taking subjects such as a close finish of a cycle race
and such like, which is quite true; did occasion arise for
so doing, then a shutter such as the focal plane would
be employed as a matter of course. But by far the
greater amount of work done with hand cameras would
be the better for receiving a longer exposure, better
because light action on the sensitive plate would be
more thorough, and far better because when slowly
moving objects, such as waves rolling shoreward, are
given ¹/₁₀th instead of ¹/₁₀₀th of a second, we get less of
“petrified naturo,” and a more natural appearance in the
resulting photographs. As a general rule it is well to
give the slowest exposure possible.

The Focussing Arrangements.—These need be only
very simple, and generally are done by scale to distances.
As a rule with the lens working at f/11, and the scale set
at 15 feet, it will be found that the depth of focus is sufficient
for most ordinary work, and any alteration in the
focussing seldom necessary, when dealing with subjects
where figures are included, that are not required to be
approached much closer than the distance mentioned.

So far as may be necessary for hand-camera work
simply, the instrument should be without complications,
is better for having a good rectilinear lens, needs a shutter136
easily adjusted for exposures ranging if possible, from a
¹/₄th of a second, up to say ¹/₁₀₀th, properly adjusted finders,
some means of quickly altering the focus of lens, one
or other method of carrying the plates or films, and for
purely hand-camera work, there is no need for any other
addition to it.

Passing away from the camera to its use, one is
faced immediately with the fact, that in spite of the
multitude of such instruments now in use, the general
average of results produced by its means are, in quality,
unmistakably below those done with a camera and tripod,
nor is the reason for this far to seek. In the latter case,
a plate of medium rapidity is generally employed, such
an exposure given, as makes no serious strain on the
developer used to bring the latent image fully out; the
action of light having been ample, and the plate not so
easily spoiled, as one of higher sensitiveness, there is not
that call for such skilful treatment, as where light action
on a highly delicate emulsion, has been but brief, and
needs to receive careful handling, before good, well-graded
negatives may be produced.

To use a hand camera is the simplest matter
imaginable, to properly employ it the most difficult—simple,
because of the facility with which plates may be
exposed, difficult, because to succeed, demands careful
practice, and a thorough understanding of photographic
manipulation. We must have learnt to see, and that
quickly, must have gained coolness and self-restraint,
and perhaps not the least qualification necessary is that of
being a good photographer. Whether content to produce
good straightforward representations of such scenes as
come before you, or more ambitious attempts at pictorial
work be made, they can both be done with the hand
camera quite as well, nay indeed, given sufficient
technical skill, and trained perception to see the beauty137
presented in line and mass, it is by no means clear
this form of implement does not offer greater facilities
for successful working, than the more complicated form
used with a tripod.

BIRCH AND BRACKEN.
W. THOMAS.

The choice of subject is only bounded by the
limits of exposure, speed of plate and actinic action of
light available. The first has already been touched
upon, when the lens, and shutter, were dealt with.

Plates have recently been so increased in speed,
that it becomes necessary to somewhat modify advice,
which a year or two ago, might have been perfectly
correct, viz., to work with the fastest plate procurable.
But there is this advantage now, as then, that if some
convenient form of actinometer be used to test the
light, we are able to judge at once, what speed
of plate will be necessary to deal with each subject
as it arises. There are several forms available,
amongst which, the one introduced by Watkins, made so
that it becomes a permanent part of the camera,
answers remarkably well, especially as it cannot be left
at home, without being noticed. In developing shutter-exposed
plates, if full exposure has been obtained, then
the ordinary modes of procedure suffice, so also when
over-exposure occurs, but by far the greater proportion
of failures one sees in this class of work, arise simply
from under-exposure. There seems so much charm in
driving a shutter at its highest speed, and at the same
time using the lens stopped down, to secure sharp
definition, the wonder is, not that failures flourish, but
that any good work is done at all.

With regard to particular developers there is
only this to be said. Whatever agent be employed, so
arrange that before density is obtained, all the detail you
require is first brought out; this simply means, if pyro is
being used, it is kept low, until the plate is ready to be138
treated for density, then a further addition of pyro and
bromide will generally suffice to rapidly finish off the
work.

When a batch of exposed plates is being dealt
with, a most certain method of negative making, will be
found in employing in one dish, either one or other of
the following one-solution developers:—

Any of the above developers will be found to
rapidly bring out all there is in the plate, and if over-exposure
is feared, they may all with advantage be
diluted, with an equal quantity of water, in order to slow
down their action.

In another dish, it is advisable to have the following
re-developer, to impart density to the plates, as they
become ready for that operation, or to successfully deal
with any, which are found to have been considerably
over-exposed, and upon which, the first developer is
acting too vigorously.

139

By employing two different developers in the
manner suggested, it becomes a simple matter to produce
good negatives, from plates having had all kinds
of exposures, some under, some over, and it may be
some which have had about the right exposure; in this
way one of the most fruitful causes of failure in the
production of hand-camera pictures, error in exposure
and development, is minimized, if not altogether done away
with.

There are sometimes occasions when out with a
hand camera, when subjects present themselves, offering
exceedingly good opportunities for securing pleasing
little pictures, but which require one, or two seconds’
exposure, to render them successfully. At such times it
may generally be arranged to rest the camera on a stone,
wall, or gate, or to hold it pressed against a tree, or
some other rigid support. As an example, the illustration
of a woodside with birch trees, facing page 136, may
be pointed to. In this instance, when out cycling, the
place and lighting on the tree trunks, struck us as
pleasing, and worth trying to secure a record of, even
though but a hand camera was being carried at the time.

Having dismounted, and found a point from where
it might be attempted, and where conveniently grew a
single tree, the lens was opened to (if recollection
does not deceive) f/11. Then the camera jammed
close to the tree trunk, and two seconds’ exposure given,
taking especial care that no movement took place.

The plate being in due time carefully developed,
and as far as possible contrasts kept down, the result
proved satisfactory enough.

140

It could more conveniently have been photographed,
of course, if a camera and tripod had been available,
but it is one of many such instances, where, when
shutter exposures only had been prepared for, occasions
arose, demanding longer exposures than were possible,
unless, some such temporary support be pressed into
use, as in this instance.

For successful work, see that the camera is simple,
its parts, of the best your pocket can afford. Give the
slowest exposures your subject will allow. Develop
for softly modelled negatives first, getting what density
is required afterwards. See that the camera is held
perfectly steady, during exposure, and don’t forget it is
simply a camera, and lens, and will require you
behind it, just the same as any other employed with a
tripod, and in conclusion bear always in mind, it is the
simplest form of camera work and the most difficult, making
the utmost demands on your skill, if high-class results
are to be the outcome of its use.

W. Thomas.

Lantern Slides.

A lantern Slide is
a transparent positive
on glass or other transparent
support, usually 3¼ inches
square, and is placed in the
lantern in such a way that
by suitable illumination and
optical arrangements the
image on the slide is made
to intercept some of the light
given off by the illuminant
from a screen, which without
the screen would be wholly
and evenly illuminated by
the light.

In viewing a paper print
we are really observing the
paper by reflected light, part
of our view being intercepted
by the image formed of pigment
or reduced metal; the
amount of light not being very great a very thin layer
of pigment is required to produce the appearance of
a sufficiently robust image. If the image alone or
with its vehicle be stripped from a good print on paper this142
image viewed by transmitted light will be found to be
extremely faint, far too faint to be of any use as a
“transparency,” and also too thin to be of any use as a
lantern slide. On the other hand, what we know as a
“transparency,” such as is often used for window
decoration, backed, perhaps, with ground glass, would
be found much too dense or robust for use as a lantern
slide. In density, then, a “slide,” as it shall hereafter
be called, comes between the image on a paper print and
that on a “transparency.” In “gradation,” or gamut
of tones, the slide ought to be superior to either the
paper print with its almost absolute clearness over large
areas, or the transparency with its dense shadows and
its comparatively heavy lights. In fact, in a good slide
we have every grade of deposit from perfect transparency
to nearly complete opacity. But the extremes must be
very sparingly present, and the transition from one tone
to another must be gradual, all intermediate notes
between highest and lowest should be represented.

Other qualities go to make the perfect slide; the
metallic or other deposit forming the image must be in
the utmost degree fine, no approach to “grain” must be
perceptible even under the highest magnification. The
colour, or “tone,” must be not only pleasant but
appropriate.

The loss of light in its journey from the illuminant
to our eyes is enormous; the disc on the screen is simply
a greatly magnified image of the light, and here is great
loss; add to this the interception of some light by the
opacity of the slide, and the fact that much more is lost
in reflection from the screen, and absorption by the
screen, and it is easy to realize that the image from the
screen reaching our eyes is vastly less bright than that
reaching the eye when, for instance, we examine a slide
in the hand by transmitted light. And loss of light143
means increase of contrast, so that a slide which would
seem about right in gradation in the hand would be
altogether soot-and-chalk as a screen-image. So too if
we have in the slide already shut out much light, by
making the slide foggy, or over dense, it is easy to see
that when the image reaches our eyes from the screen
this vicious opacity will be immensely increased in its
mischievous properties. The first style of slide gives
screen-images sometimes called “midsummer snow-scenes”;
the other slide is simply called “foggy.” Both
must be assiduously avoided.

It need hardly be said that the plates prepared by
some processes are more likely to yield good slides, such
as are described above, than plates prepared by other
processes; no one process can claim to possess in itself
superiority in all respects. Collodion, for instance, is
less apt to give foggy slides, and it is easier to intensify
than gelatine, but it is also more prone to give “hard”
images. Collodion is at its finest in the form of collodio-bromide
emulsion, which gives slides remarkable for
fineness of grain, for clearness, and for richness of tones;
but when we have to copy in the camera, the operation
with collodion emulsion is protracted, unless we have
bright daylight or a condensing arrangement, which with
large negatives is often out of the question. On the
whole it may be taken that gelatine-bromide emulsion is
the process to be recommended, not only on account of
its convenience and celerity, but in view of the many
inherent points of excellence that it possesses. In any
case, want of space will cause us to confine attention
here to that process, and any one mastering the use of
gelatine-bromide slide-plates will have nothing to fear
from competition with other processes in all-round work.
The writer has a leaning towards slide-plates as slow as
he can procure them, because slowness almost always144
goes hand in hand with fineness of grain and freedom
from fog.

There is one point of importance that should be
noted in working with gelatine for this purpose. Distilled
water should be used if possible for all solutions.
Tap water—especially hard water—is apt to produce
with the gelatine a certain amount of scum which, if
present in any appreciable degree, cannot fail to affect
the quality of the slides; but treatment with an acid
alum bath as described later has a very salutary effect
in removing any scum that may have formed during the
“liquid” operations.

In the mechanics of making a slide from a
negative we have only two methods to consider.
If the slide-image is to be the same size as the
negative, or a part of the negative, we print by contact,
that is, we put the negative and the slide-plate face to
face in contact, and we expose to light, the negative
being next to the light; this corresponds with making a
print on paper. But when we desire to make a slide
including all the subject of a negative larger than a slide-plate,
or, in fact, when we desire to alter the size of the
image at all, we copy the negative “in the camera.”
The simplest method of doing this is to fix up the negative
so that it is evenly lighted and make a photograph
of it in a camera; but the adjustments necessary for
such an operation would be found awkward, and so a
“reducing camera” of some kind is generally used.
Many such cameras are on the market, and consist of
devices for holding the negative in a suitable position
with regard to a small camera furnished with a lens and
a dark slide holding a lantern plate. Either the negative-holder
or the camera should have possible movement
in all directions vertical to the optical axis of the
whole, and in addition it is often desirable to have a145
certain amount of movement in other planes, in order to
correct certain optical defects that are sometimes found
in negatives. The writer has for many years used a
small camera with its front stuck into the front of a
large camera, one or other of these cameras has every
necessary movement. The device is figured here.

Whatever arrangement is used the end of the
apparatus bearing the negative is directed towards a
good and even light; and it is well to place about two
inches in front of the negative towards the light a piece
of finely ground glass for ordinary negatives; this glass
is with advantage omitted with extra dense negatives.

It goes without saying that the exposure, whether
we are working by contact or in the camera is of the
utmost importance; but it is not possible in an article
such as this to give even an approximate idea of the
exposure suitable under any concatenation of conditions.
The best clue to exposure is to be found in
development, and in results. It is necessary to know
what happens after normal exposure with a given
developer, and then if any variation is noticed to alter
the exposure. If a plate develops more rapidly than the
normal, it may fairly be deduced that the exposure has
been too long; but if we are dealing with a specially
contrasted negative it is better so. On the other hand,
when we are dealing with a thin negative, especially if
the scale of gradation is short, we require an exposure
less than what would under normal conditions lead to146
complete development in the normal time. And again
some plates require to be developed to a greater point
of apparent density than others; this is a matter of
experience. Briefly put, there is no royal road to good
slide-making, experience is necessary.

In actually making the exposures certain points
must be kept in mind. If we are copying in the camera
with daylight as illuminant it is very important to use
the light from the north; if we use other light we shall
be much put out on most occasions by awkward variations
of the brightness. A very large number of operations
are rendered nugatory by carelessness in this
matter. Even the most experienced worker will find it
impossible to expose plates with anything like accuracy
when he has to deal with direct sunshine at one time,
thin white clouds at another, and dark clouds at a third.
And in making exposures by contact the beginner must
be fairly accurate in judging the time of exposure and
the distance from the radiant. A good plan is to tie to
the gas jet a piece of cord having knots at convenient
intervals, such as at 9, 12, 18 and 24 inches, and in
making an exposure to use these knots as guides to the
distance; moreover, the law of “squares of distance”
must be remembered; the intensity of light varies
inversely as the square of distance from radiant to
receiver, provided, of course, no optical arrangement is
introduced to modify the path of the rays. Consequently,
for example, if ten seconds is found to be a
proper exposure at nine inches from the light, the
corresponding exposure at eighteen inches will not be
twenty, but forty seconds (9²=81. 18²=324). And as
it is sometimes awkward to hold the frame and attend
to a watch at the same time, a metronome, ticking
seconds, will be found convenient, or a clock with a
second hand may be placed where it can be seen during147
the exposure. A landscape slide without clouds, if the
horizon is in the picture, is usually considered a failure,
and has been dubbed “bald-headed.” Really good
workers often put clouds into slides by “combination
printing,” which in some cases is comparatively easy,
in others very difficult. If we are working by reduction
from a good-sized negative, with a fairly even horizon,
the difficulty is not great. The landscape part of the
negative is first exposed, the sky being masked if necessary,
and a cloud negative is then substituted for the
landscape negative, a part of the former being masked
to correspond with the landscape on the latter, and a
second exposure is made on the same slide-plate.
Admittedly in all cases this requires “some doing,” in
many cases it is extremely difficult. An easier, if less
“sportsmanlike,” method is to make the cloud slide on
a separate slide-plate, and to use the latter as a “cover-glass”
for the slide. The cloud may cover the whole of
the second slide, and that part of it not required may be
wiped out by means of a reducing solution, used with
a brush, such as the ferricyanide and hypo one described
later. This method will be found useful even in contact
slide making, but it also requires not only good taste in
the selection of the cloud, but some deftness in manipulation;
but the neat-handed beginner need not fear
to make the attempt.

DEVELOPMENT.

It has already been stated that judgment of exposure
is a matter of experience, and that results are the
best criterion; here follow some more explicit statements
on the same matter.

Whatever plate or developer is used, and whatever
the time occupied in complete development:

Ambitious slide-makers generally aim at warm-toned
slides for pictorial effect, and rightly. But
slides intended for scientific purposes are generally
better when cold in tone, the definition is usually better.
But whatever the aim, a good tone of one kind is preferable
to a poor one of another kind, and the beginner
should first make sure of getting a really good cold tone,
which is comparatively easy, and then try his “‘prentice
hand” on warm tones.

Warm tones are obtained by using greatly super-normal
exposures and greatly restrained developers;
and the danger probably lies in the fact that the long
exposures are apt to lead to fog, and the great restraint
to over-density in the shadows, the latter especially
when the exposure has not been quite long enough for
the developer used; herein probably lies the whole
secret of warm slide-making. If we aim at really warm
tones and use developers suited to such design, we must
on no account stint the exposure.

149

COLD TONE DEVELOPING SOLUTIONS.

The classical solution for cold tone slides is a solution
of ferrous oxalate in potassic oxalate. Of all developers
it is most free from fogging propensities. It is made
from so-called “saturated solutions” of proto-sulphate of
iron and potassium oxalate. Thus, into a bottle put a
quantity of iron proto-sulphate, and pour on about three
times its weight of water containing a dram of sulphuric
acid to each pint. Shake well, and keep always at about
60° Fahr.; some of the iron must always be visible in the150
bottle, if not, more is to be added. The crystals of iron
salt must be green and not rusty in colour. This is the
“iron solution.”

The “oxalate solution” is made by dissolving
potassium oxalate in about three times its weight of
water. This also must be kept at 60° Fahr., shaken
occasionally, and oxalate added if none is visible in the
bottle.

To make the ferrous oxalate solution we pour one
part of the iron solution into six parts of the oxalate, and
it is advisable to add to each ounce of developer at least
half a grain of potassium bromide; 5 minims of a 10%
solution, made by dissolving one ounce of the bromide in
about 9 ounces of water, and then making up to 10
ounces—all chemical.

In about four minutes or less this ought to fully
develop a properly exposed plate. If the development is
much shorter the slide is apt to have an unpleasant
greenish tone, a result that may also follow the use of an
inordinate amount of bromide in the developer. The
developing solution may be made in quantity greater
than is required for one plate, and may be used several
times if a little of the surplus and fresh solution is added
when the quantity in use becomes slow in action.

For really fine cold black tones the following
formula by Messrs. Elliott & Son will be found
admirable:—

The developing solution consists of equal parts of A
and B.

151

If either of the above developers is to be used, the
exposure is to be kept down as compared with the
exposure to be followed by developers intended for very
warm tones.

The two developers which follow next, require
about the same exposure as the two already formulated.
“Ortol” is a reducing agent quite lately introduced by
Mr. Hauff, of Feuerbach in Germany, and Mr. Hauff’s
agents in this country are Messrs. Fuerst Bros., of
London. “Ortol” gives the finest tones of the warm
black type that we have as yet come across, it is
singularly free from fogging propensity, and the tones do
not easily degenerate into the greens so apt to occur
after severe over-exposure with other “black” developers.
We suggest a simple formula:—

To make the developer, take one part of A, one of B,
and one of water, and to each ounce of the mixture add
one and a half or two grains of potassium bromide. The
development of a properly exposed slide will take two or
three minutes, and the result will probably be highly
appreciated.

The above is worthy to stand alone as representing
developers for warm black tones, but the following
works well. (Messrs. Elliott & Son.)

152

The developing solution consists of equal parts of A
and B, and the plate may be fully developed in about
two to three minutes.

It has already been stated that in order to obtain
really warm red or reddish tones by development, it is
necessary to give very long exposure, and to use a
developer very much restrained. It is further found
that carbonate of ammonia has a considerable effect in
reddening the developed image, and so we now come to
procedure based on these lines. Carbonate of ammonia
is found in commerce in the shape of “chunks” more or
less square. If one of these is pared with a knife—unless
the sample is quite fresh—the outside will be found to
be a soft amorphous powder, the inside a clear, very hard
crystal; the clear crystal is in development an
“accelerator,” though a very weak one, the outside
substance is a restrainer. Probably both the inside—sesquicarbonate—and
the outside—bicarbonate—are useful,
and the best plan is to make a ten per cent. solution
of the substance as obtained from a good chemist—not
druggist. Of this solution one grain of the salt is
represented by ten minims. If now we take an ounce of
A, and one of B of the last formula, and if we add to the
ounce of A 3 grains of ammonium bromide, and to the
ounce of B 3 grains of ammonium carbonate, and if we
have given a proper exposure and develop with equal
parts of the A and B modified as above, we shall get a
slide of rich chocolate colour; and if we double the
proportions of carbonate and bromide, and expose still
longer, we shall get a slide still ruddier in tone, even
to red. But there is always danger of fog, and of
clogged shadows, and this must be reckoned with.
There is a more certain and less dangerous way of
getting handsome tones, which shall be described
presently.

153

Gelatine slides are always fixed in hyposulphite of
soda, about one part by weight to six parts of water;
after this they must be well washed, say five minutes
under a good rose tap, or in many changes of water in a
dish for an hour, and every slide should be treated with
a saturated solution of potash alum, of which each pint
should contain a dram of hydrochloric acid.

Very many, if not most, slides are all the better for
just a touch of a “reducer” such as follows:—The
ordinary “hypo.” solution is weakened with about four
times its measure of water, and the plate is soaked for
a minute in this. A few drops of a ten per cent. solution
of potassium ferricyanide are put into the measure, and
the hypo. mixed with it, and the whole allowed to work
on the plate for a short time, carefully watched. Of course
a weak slide must not be thus treated, but it is often a
good plan to develop slides to such a point that they will
permit of this treatment.

On the other hand it is often advisable to keep a
slide thin in development, for instance, when the negative
wants pluck, and intensification is indicated; or when
we wish a good warm tone after a “black” developer
such as our metol formula: a good average treatment
is as follows:—

Take half an ounce each of ammonium chloride and
mercury bichloride and dissolve in 16 ounces of water,
soak the slide in this till it is bleached. Wash well and
treat with weak liquid ammonia, or a solution of soda
sulphite, or of metabisulphite of potash, or fresh lime
water. This will strengthen the slide and give it in most
cases a fine rich colour. It is important to let these
solutions act thoroughly, and not to stop the action half-way.
The writer considers this the best and safest way to
obtain warm tones, the reader may find out for himself which
of these solutions produces the tones he chiefly affects.

154

Crystal varnish is not wasted even on a gelatine
slide.

In conclusion, it must be realized that the screen-image
is a greatly enlarged edition of the slide-image;
any small defect on the slide is a huge one on the screen.
Consequently the slide-maker must sedulously cultivate
cleanliness and manipulative care.

Andrew Pringle.

Fishing Smacks.W. Thomas.

How to make Enlargements.

Enlargements
may be made by daylight,
or by artificial light,
and there are two methods
of producing them, namely,
by enlarging direct from the
negative on to a sheet of
bromide paper; or by first
making a small transparency,
and from that producing an
enlarged negative upon a
slow dry plate. The first is
the method usually adopted
by amateurs, probably because
the necessary operations
are fewer, and perhaps
more simple. The second
plan, however, possesses the
advantage that the prints
may be made by any process,
be it carbon, platinum, or
silver, and thus a great variety of effect obtained.

The first point however that the reader must decide
is whether he will work by artificial light or by daylight.
Each may be said to possess certain advantages, and156
with many the question resolves itself into one of
personal convenience. Artificial light is, or should be,
fairly constant in intensity, and if adopted there will
probably be less waste of material through miscalculation
of exposure. But if the source of light employed
be other than a mixed jet, or the arc-light, if in fact it
be of low intensity, negatives of a somewhat delicate
type will be required in order to produce enlargements
of the highest excellence. If the negatives are dense
and strong, illuminants of low intensity, like oil or gas,
do not possess sufficient penetration to duly register the
denser portions of the negative, and the enlargements
so made are apt to be deficient in half-tone, and hard.
With well-graded negatives of suitable quality, however,
most excellent enlargements may be produced by
artificial light. When artificial light is used work may
be carried on at any time of day or night, in winter or
summer. Those who adopt the daylight plan will, of
course, be subjected to greater restrictions, at any rate,
during the winter months, but amateurs who take a real
interest in the work will do well to adopt the writer’s
plan, and provide themselves with apparatus for each
method of working.

ENLARGING BY DAYLIGHT.

There are two ways of enlarging by daylight. The
first involves the exclusion of all actinic light from a
room except that which passes through the negative.
The alternative method of working is to employ an
ordinary enlarging camera, such as are made by
Middlemiss, or Lancaster. It is desirable, but not
necessary, if the first plan be adopted, to secure the
exclusive use of a room. One with a northerly aspect
should be chosen, for if sunlight falls upon the window
shadows will at some period of the day fall upon the
negative, and produce unevenly lighted enlargements.157
An upper room will be most suitable, and, if the
light be a northern one, and there are no trees
or buildings to obstruct the view, a reflector
may be dispensed with. If external objects intervene,
however, one must be employed. It should be fixed
outside the window-sill, at an angle of 45°, and should
be capable of adjustment. Let it be the full width of the
window, and securely fixed for obvious reasons. A plate-glass
mirror is effective, but expensive. A large
drawing board painted dead white also answers well,
but should not be left outside exposed to the weather.

Fig. 1.Side View Ditto.

Provision for excluding the light from the room is
best secured by making a wooden frame large enough
to fit closely against the window frame. Upon this a
piece of stout calico should be tightly strained and
secured with tacks. It should then be sized, and when
dry will be as tight as a drum; it must then be covered
with two thicknesses of stout brown paper pasted on.
The frame is shown complete in Fig. 1. Now at A.A.
B.B. screw two strips of wood, the distance apart must
be regulated by the size of the negatives to be enlarged.
The ordinary camera is intended to be used as the
enlarging camera, and the distance from C. to C. should158
be just equal to the size of the back portion of the
camera. On the lower rail BB screw a piece of 9 in.
board to form a shelf or support D. for the enlarging
camera. Make a frame E. of ½ in. wood 1 in. deep,
the same size as the back of the camera, and screw to
the shelf and top rail AA. Now carefully cut away
the brown paper and calico from the inside of this
frame, at the part marked H. and paste strips of brown
paper round it so as to prevent any light passing except
through the opening H. A strip of felt should be
tacked all round the large frame to prevent any light from
creeping in between it and the window frame. A couple
of turn buttons will keep it in position. A firm table
should be placed against the window close up to the
wall to form a support for the enlarging easel. Now
a little care must be taken in fitting up this portion
of the apparatus, and it is better to have something
more exact than the propped-up drawing board or
printing frame, which is sometimes recommended. Get
a carpenter to run out two V shaped rails as shown in
Fig. 2 at CC. They should be about the length of the
table, and screwed down upon it. Procure a cheap159
drawing board about 15 x 12, and to the under side
affix two pieces of wood with V shaped grooves corresponding
in angle to the rails. This forms the base of
the easel AA. Make a frame 22 x 20, or rather larger
than the biggest enlargement that it is desired to produce.
It should be constructed of ½ in. wood, and be 2 in. deep.
It is shown in Fig. 2 at 1 DDDD. Now make, or get
made, a set of carriers EE, the largest of which should
just fit into the frame. Narrow fillets of wood screwed
each side will afford a rise and fall adjustment, and a
thumb screw at G will fix the carrier in any desired
position. To obtain the cross-movement screw the
frame DDDD to a piece of inch board 5 in. wide HH.
Place this exactly in the centre of the base board, and
screw fillets II of 1 in. wood to each side. This will
afford a cross motion, and a thumb screw at J will fix
the carrier frame when the necessary adjustment has
been made.

Fig. 2.

In setting up an enlarging apparatus, whether it be
for day or artificial light, it is absolutely essential to
preserve the parallelism of its various parts, otherwise
it will be impossible to produce sharp or evenly defined
enlargements, and for this reason I have described somewhat
fully the construction of a suitable easel. I may
add that it will serve equally well for either daylight or
artificial illumination, and I strongly advise the reader
to construct, or have constructed, an easel on the lines I
have laid down. With it either direct enlargements on
paper can be produced, or plates may be used and
enlarged negatives made. The easiest way of holding
the paper during exposure is to procure two sheets of
clear glass, patent plate is most suitable, sandwich the
bromide paper between them, and secure with two
strong bands of elastic. The complete apparatus in
position for working is shown at Fig. 3.

160

Fig. 3.

The second method of enlarging by daylight is by
employing an ordinary enlarging camera. The same
conditions as to lighting, etc., should be sought for, and
the most convenient way of working will be to tilt the
camera at such an angle as that the negative receives
unobstructed illumination from the sky. A reflector in
this case will not be necessary, but a piece of very finely
ground glass should be placed about an inch in front of161
the negative in order to soften and diffuse the light.
This method of working is shown in Fig. 4.

Fig. 4.

ENLARGING BY ARTIFICIAL LIGHT.

Before describing the actual process of making an
enlargement it will be well to deal with the alternative
method of working, namely, by artificial light, as the
manipulations of the sensitive material used are the
same in either case. Practically the most satisfactory
way of working by the latter method is to use
an enlarging lantern properly fitted with a condenser.
The general principles of such an
apparatus are identical with those which obtain
in an ordinary optical lantern. Methods which dispense
with the use of a condenser are more or less unsatisfactory,
and should be avoided. In the space at the
disposal of the writer it is not possible to give directions
for the construction of an enlarging lantern, but those
who may desire to make their own, will find full
instructions and working drawings in “Practical Enlarging.”6

Fig. 5.

Enlarging lanterns of excellent quality are obtainable
commercially, but for the guidance of the uninitiated
it may be useful to refer a little in detail to one or
two important points with regard to their construction.
The condenser will first claim attention. The
ordinary pattern consists of two plano-convex lenses
mounted as shown in section at Fig. 5. This answers
fairly well with the smaller sizes, but when the diameter162
of the condenser is large, a good deal of light may be
lost. The interposition of a small meniscus or plano-convex
lens, in the manner first suggested by the late
J. Traill Taylor, and shown in Fig. 6, will be found a
great improvement. Its proper position will be at the
point where the divergent cone of rays proceeding from
it just covers the large condenser. In our own practice
we always place a diffusing screen of very finely-ground glass
in front of the condenser at E.E. The diameter
of the condenser is governed by the size of the negatives
to be enlarged, it must be of sufficient size to include
the longer sides of the plate within its circumference
without cutting the corners. If it is much larger than
this, an unnecessary loss of light will occur, because only
that which passes through the negative can be utilized.

Fig. 6.

THE ILLUMINANT.

The smaller and more intense the light, the nearer
we approach to the ideal projection illuminant, and the
better will be the definition of our enlargements. The
arc light most nearly fulfils the desired conditions, and
if it be available it should certainly be employed. Next
in point of utility comes the limelight, preferably in the
form of the mixed jet, and those who understand its
manipulation are recommended to adopt it, but the
majority of amateurs will probably find it more convenient
to use either incandescent gaslight or an
oil-lamp. Parallel wick-lamps should be avoided163
on account of the unequal illumination they produce,
and if oil must be used a good circular wick
burner will be found more suitable. Where house-gas
is available the incandescent gaslight is however
much to be preferred. The light is perhaps not so
powerful as that given by a really good parallel wick-lamp,
but it is far more actinic and penetrating. The
writer has used this light with great satisfaction, and
therefore has no hesitation in recommending it. Some
workers have been troubled by the appearance of an
image of the mantle on the screen, but this can usually
be got rid of by a suitable adjustment of the lenses and
the light, and in any case by the interposition of a piece
of ground glass between condenser and negative.

THE CHOICE OF THE LENS.

It is commonly stated that the lens with which the
original negative was taken will serve equally well to
enlarge it, and in the abstract the statement is perhaps
not inaccurate. But assuming that a lens of a focus equal
to about 1¼ times the base of the plate has been used,
it will be found that better results, both in regard
to definition and equality of illumination, will be
obtained by substituting a lens of rather longer focus,
for example a half-plate lens for enlarging from quarter-plate
negatives. This, although applying to both
methods of working is particularly desirable when
enlarging by artificial light, for an objective of small
diameter and short focus cannot possibly pick up or
receive the whole of the cone of rays proceeding from
the condenser. A reference to Figs. 7 and 8 will explain
why this is so. In Fig. 7 we see what happens when a
lens of too short a focus is used, but when one of longer
focus is substituted, the whole of the cone of rays passes
through and is utilized (Fig. 8). In selecting a lens one164
should be chosen which has a sufficiently large diameter to
permit the apex of the cone of rays from the condenser to
pass through. This point will, of course, vary with the
degree of amplification, and in order to obtain the best
results optically, the distance of the light from the
condenser must be carefully adjusted in every case, and
a clear, evenly lighted disc obtained before inserting the
negative to be enlarged.

Fig. 7.

Fig. 8.

With regard to the type of lens, one of the rapid
rectilinear form will answer well. A portrait lens is
often used on account of the brilliancy of image, but
although it answers well for enlarging portraits, the
roundness of its field makes it less suitable for landscapes
unless it is considerably stopped down. If the
very finest results as regards definition are required,
then one of the now numerous flat-field lenses should be
used. The writer can from practical experience speak
well of the Ross-Goerz and the Cooke lens. The latter
is perhaps preferable for working with artificial light on
account of the larger diameter of the back lens. Wide-angle
lenses, on account of their small aperture and
short focus, are not suitable for use with a condenser,
both for the reasons given, and on account of the165
difficulty in focussing owing to the small amount of
light transmitted. When daylight is used, however,
there is less objection to their employment.

Fig. 9.

Before leaving this part of the subject it should be
noted that in regard to preserving the parallelism of
its parts the same care in erecting and fitting up the
enlarging lantern must be observed, as was insisted upon
in the description of the apparatus for daylight. It will
be found convenient, therefore, to mount the lantern on a
base similar to that upon which the easel rests, so that
both may move on the same rails. The easel described
for daylight enlarging will serve equally well for
working by artificial light. The complete apparatus is
shown at Fig. 9, which is a reproduction from a
photograph of the apparatus constructed and used by
the writer.

THE NEGATIVE.

In general practice one may find it necessary at
times to enlarge from negatives of very dissimilar types,166
but there is no reason, when the negatives are to be
produced with the special object of subsequently
making enlargements from them, why care should not
be taken to make them of a suitable character. Thin
delicate negatives should be enlarged by artificial light;
dense, strong ones by daylight. If the negatives are
very strong it will be difficult to produce soft and well-graded
enlargements with a weak illuminant, the light
not being sufficiently intense to properly penetrate the
high-lights. A soft and clear negative, with good gradation,
fully exposed, and neither exhibiting patches of
clear glass shadow devoid of detail, nor of hard impenetrable
high-light, will be found most suitable. Fog
should be avoided, as also should the yellow stain
produced by pyro when improperly used. Not that the
pyro developer is unsuitable, for if sufficient sulphite is
used, and the quantity of pyro kept down, negatives of
very beautiful quality for enlarging purposes may be
produced. Great care should be taken to avoid bubbles,
stains, scratches, or any kind of mechanical defects, as such
when enlarged become painfully obtrusive, and spoil the
effect of the best work. It will be found a good plan to
bind the edge of the negative before enlarging it with a
strip of lantern slide binding, so as to cover the clear
glass rebate mark. If this be omitted the margins of the
enlargement may become fogged by the lateral spreading
action of the light. No hand-work should be attempted
on the original negative, for any such treatment will
become painfully apparent in the enlargement. If retouching
be deemed necessary, it should in the case
of a direct enlargement be executed upon the print itself,
or upon the enlarged negative or preferably upon the
enlarged transparency, when that method of reproduction
has been adopted.

167

DIRECT ENLARGEMENTS.

The following concise instructions for enlarging
upon bromide paper will apply equally to the daylight
or artificial light methods of working. In the first case
the negative is placed in the dark slide of the camera, both
shutters being drawn fully out. The camera is then put
upon the shelf close up against the opening in the shutter,
as shown in Fig. 3, any light creeping in between shutter
and camera being blocked out with the focussing cloth.
If the enlarging lantern is used the negative will be
placed in the carrier, just in the same way as a lantern
slide, with the film side towards the enlarging lens.
Now the first difficulty that will be experienced will be
to get the enlarged image of the required size. It will
be well to content ourselves at the outset with a
moderate degree of enlargement, say from ¼ plate to
12 × 10, and when proficiency is acquired, larger sizes
can be attempted. At first we shall probably not
succeed in getting any image at all. In adjusting the
various parts of the apparatus we shall find the work
easier if we remember that the nearer we place the lens
to the negative the further will it be necessary to move
the easel from the lens, and the greater will be the
enlargement. A useful table of enlargements will be
found in the “British Journal Almanac,” showing the
distance of lens from negative, and negative from paper,
for almost any required degree of amplification.

Now it will be found much easier to focus the
enlarged image by looking at it through a piece of finely
ground glass, than by receiving it on a piece of card or
paper, and the adoption of the easel plan of focussing
previously described will enable this to be done. The
ground surface of the glass (which must be of the same
thickness as the piece behind which the paper is to be
exposed) should be away from the lens and towards the168
person focussing, when it is placed in the carrier of the
easel, it being retained in position with the spring S.,
Fig. 2. Focussing must be carefully performed, and
is effected by sliding the easel to and fro upon the
runners, and which should have been previously rubbed
with blacklead.

Bromide paper is made in several varieties, such as
smooth, rough, snow-enamel, cream crayon, etc., and is
put up either in tubes, or packed flat. The latter is
decidedly the more convenient, it being somewhat difficult
to take the curl out of paper that has been rolled. The
choice of paper is a matter of taste; for landscape work
the rough paper or the cream crayon will perhaps be found
most suitable. For finer work, and some classes of portraiture
the enamel will prove effective. Rough paper is
better for strong broad effects, smooth for more delicate
work and the rendering of fine detail. The coated side
may be distinguished by its tendency to curl inwards.
The easiest way of exposing it is to procure two pieces
of patent plate glass of the same thickness as the
focussing glass, sandwich the sheet of paper between
the two, and secure with strong elastic bands. This
will hold it quite flat during exposure, and will not
disturb the actinism of the lens or impair the definition
of the enlargement.

DRIFTING STORM CLOUDS.
W. THOMAS.

DEVELOPMENT.

This part of the work of producing an enlargement
will only be lightly dealt with, as the subject is
fully treated elsewhere in this volume. The writer
prefers the ferrous-oxalate developer for bromide
enlargements to any of the more recently introduced
developers, but as it requires more skill and judgment
to employ it with complete success, beginners may find
it better to use amidol or metol, either of which when169
properly used gives excellent results. Hydrokinone we
do not recommend for this purpose owing to its tendency
to give rusty blacks in the event of over-exposure, or
undue hardness if it has been too short. With amidol
a pure delicate black is easily obtainable, and it is
moreover a very simple developer to use. Our own
plan is to employ a weak solution and give a full
exposure, and by these means we find no difficulty in
obtaining good gradation and pure blacks. The dish
used for development must not be used for other developers
or stains will probably occur. Although a quick
appearance of the image is usually a characteristic of
amidol, no trouble will be experienced when the developer
is used in the way we advise, for the picture will
be found to develop slowly and regularly, and gradually
grow in strength. Quick development by this method
would be an indication of over-exposure. A correctly
exposed enlargement should take about ten minutes to
develop. One stock solution only is necessary. It
will keep indefinitely.

To each ounce of the above add, just before using, three
grains of dry amidol. The exposure must be accurately
timed. It is, however, impossible to give useful
information on this head, unless such varying factors as
the rapidity of the paper, the intensity of the light, the
aperture of the lens, and the degree of enlargement are
known. The best plan is to cut one of the sheets
of bromide paper into twelve strips, and on these
make several test exposures, carefully noting the
duration of each. It is better (at any rate for a beginner)
not to vary the constituents or strength of the developer,
but to increase or diminish the exposure until a good170
result in colour and tonality is obtained. By entering
full details relating to the production of a successful
enlargement in a notebook, great exactitude in working
will be obtained, and there need be little or no waste of
material when additional enlargements have to be made
from the same negatives at a future time.

A glass dish, though expensive, is very suitable for
developing, for being flat-bottomed a minimum of
solution can be used, and moreover if the dish should be
dirty, the fact is at once apparent. The exposed paper
should be soaked in water for a few minutes until
uniformly wetted, and any air-bells removed with a
camel-hair brush. The water is then poured off, and
the developer applied in an even wave, so that the whole
of the paper is covered uniformly and quickly. The
image will appear slowly, and gradually gain in detail.
When all the detail has appeared it may still appear
lacking in vigour and contrast, but this will come if
sufficient time be allowed. Development should not be
stopped until the print is of the full strength required, but it is
not advisable to allow it to become much darker than it
is desired to appear when finished, because there is very
little loss of strength in the fixing bath.

If the image flashes out immediately upon the
application of the developer, the paper has been over-exposed.
A strong dose (one or two drams) of ten per
cent. bromide added to the developer may help to
save it, but the enlargement will probably look poor
and flat and of bad colour when finished. If the
picture appears very slowly, and refuses to gain in
strength, under-exposure is the cause, and two or three
drams of a ten per cent. solution of sulphite of soda may
improve matters, but as a rule the most satisfactory
plan will be to make another exposure. With regard to
the strength of the developer, that given is very suitable171
for negatives of normal density, but some papers may
require a little more amidol, the appearance of the finished
enlargements will guide the reader in regulating the
quantity to suit the particular paper with which he may
be working. The enlargement should be washed in
plenty of running water from the tap to arrest development,
and then fixed in:—

A quarter of an hour should be allowed for fixation, but
it is better to use two baths, giving ten minutes in each.
After washing in running water for a couple of hours
they may be hung up by one corner to dry, or pinned
down to a blotting board.

Enlargements produced in the manner described
should be of a pure engraving black colour, and if they
are mounted upon pure boards with freshly made Glenfield
starch, they should prove permanent. Enlargements
are frequently toned to various shades of brown
and red, generally by the employment of the uranium-toning
bath. Although the colours so obtained are
often very artistic and pleasing, no reliance can be placed
upon the permanence of an enlargement so treated, and
the writer strongly recommends that when warm coloured
prints are desired, an enlarged negative should be made
and prints made therefrom in carbon, silver, or sepia
platinotype.

ENLARGED NEGATIVES.

The production of an enlarged negative presents no
difficulty that need deter any careful worker from
attempting the work. No additional apparatus to that
already described will be required, and either day or
artificial light may be employed. In the first place a172
transparency must be made from the small original
negative. It may be made either by contact or in the
camera, preferably the latter as then the acme of
sharpness will be obtained. If, however, the reader is
acquainted with the carbon process he cannot do better
than make a carbon transparency, for such are specially
adapted for the production of enlarged negatives.
Many, however, will prefer to make the transparency on
a bromide plate, and as this is the part of the process
which requires the greatest amount of care, and as in
fact the quality of the enlarged negative will entirely depend
upon the character of the small transparency, it is necessary
to deal with the matter somewhat in detail. Preconceived
ideas of quality based upon the appearance of a
good lantern slide must be put aside, for that is not at
all what is required. What is wanted is a transparency
in which every possible detail existing in the negative
has been reproduced, and which in comparison with a
lantern slide would look rather flat and over-exposed.
Every possible precaution should be taken to avoid
granularity or coarseness of image, therefore a slow
plate is almost essential; plates coated with lantern-slide
emulsion are now obtainable, and will be found
very suitable. A full exposure should be given, and a
weak and well-restrained developer employed. These
conditions tend to the production of the qualities desired.
Warm coloured transparencies so produced generally
have a finer grain than those developed to a black
or colder colour, but unless the colours produced
are fairly uniform, considerable variation in exposure
when making the enlarged negatives will be necessary,
and for this reason it would perhaps be better
for the beginner to aim at the production of good
black transparencies possessing the qualities indicated.

173

The small transparency, having been fixed, washed
and dried, should be edged with black paper to prevent
any subsequent fogging of the plate, by the lateral
spreading action of the light. It is then placed in the
enlarging apparatus, just as in the case of a negative,
and carefully focussed. This operation must be very
carefully performed. The writer uses a thin and very
sharp negative of an architectural subject to focus with,
afterwards substituting the transparency which is to be
enlarged. Landscape subjects, consisting chiefly of
foliage, are seldom critically sharp, and it is then difficult to
secure a sharply-focussed enlargement. The remainder of
the operation is extremely simple. In the place of the
ground-glass screen (which in this case should have its
rough or ground side nearest to the enlarging lens) a
slow dry plate is placed, backed with a piece of cardboard
covered with black velvet to avoid reflections and
possible fog. The exposure should be full, and a weak
developer employed. Trial exposures may be made on
quarter-plates, coated from the same batch of emulsion,
which the manufacturers will willingly supply, if the
purpose for which they are required is made known.
Pyro will be found the most suitable developer, but it
should contain a full proportion of sulphite, and not be
too strong. Exposure and development should be
so adjusted that by the time every possible detail has
been developed up, the plate will not have become
unduly dense. If expense has to be considered, a
piece of slow smooth bromide paper may be substituted
for the large dry plate in which case the result will be
an enlarged paper negative. For large sizes, 15 × 12
and beyond, the latter is a very economical method of
working, and the negatives will be found to yield most
artistic prints, and if the operations have been carried
out as described, and the prescribed conditions carefully174
observed, the grain of the paper will not show obtrusively
or unpleasantly in the prints.

An alternative method of working, and one which
admits of a large amount of control over the ultimate
result, is to make in the first place a large transparency
of the full size that the enlarged negative is desired to
be. All the precautions upon which stress has been laid
should be observed in regard to the choice of plate,
developer, etc.; but in this case the enlarged transparency
may be given a little more vigour and sparkle
than would be desirable if the other method of
reproduction were adopted, though in this the reader
must be guided by the particular effect which he may
be seeking to produce in his prints. For this purpose
pyro will be found to be the most suitable developer,
in that it permits of a large amount of control. From
the large transparency a negative is produced by
contact printing either upon a plate, or upon a piece of
bromide paper.

The great advantages of the latter mode of working
are the facilities which are afforded for retouching or
working upon the large transparency. Negative retouching
is always a difficult operation to an amateur,
for he cannot see the effect of his work until he has
made a print; whereas, in retouching a transparency
the effect produced by each stroke of the pencil or brush
is at once apparent. In the space at disposal it is not
possible to describe the various ways in which improvements
can be effected. First there are the chemical
aids of local intensification or reduction. Then much
may be done by the judicious use of a pencil, but the
part to be retouched must first be lightly rubbed with a
little retouching medium in order to make the pencil
bite. In extreme cases the back of the negative may175
be covered with tissue paper upon which a stump and
chalk may be used at discretion.

The novice must not be disappointed with the
appearance of his enlarged negative when it is finished,
nor should he form an adverse opinion of its printing
qualities until he has made a print from it. Confessedly
an enlarged negative generally presents a different
appearance to one that has been taken direct, and may
even seem to lack some of those qualities that are
commonly regarded as essential to perfection, but if the
final result, the picture, comes up to our expectations,
we may surely dismiss any lingering doubts as to
whether the enlarged negative conforms to certain preconceived
notions of technique, and it should be enough
for us to know (and the fact is incontrovertible) that
some of the finest and most artistic photographs
ever shown owe their existence to this method of
production.

John A. Hodges.

Walberswick. By Rev. A. H. Blake.

P.O.P.

The three letters
“P.O.P.” are now so
widely understood as referring
to the Gelatino-Chloride
Printing-Out class of Papers
that it may be said that
P.O.P. is known to many
who are not acquainted with
the fully-written name of
this class of productions.

Also it should be mentioned
that when these
papers are spoken of as
gelatino-chloride papers it is
not to be concluded therefrom
that chloride of silver
is the only silver salt present.
What they do actually contain
is probably only known
to their respective producers.
But generally speaking, it is
enough to say that so far as
the ordinary consumer is concerned, the family resemblance
is so strong and chief characteristics so general that the
following directions for using them may be held as178
generally applicable to the various well-known brands
now on the market. At the outset, however, it will be
convenient to note that for the purposes of manipulation
we may roughly group them into two chief classes—viz.,
the matt (probably from the German word “matt,”
i.e., dull) and the glazed, glossy or enamelled. The
latter comes to us with a highly glazed, i.e., shiny smooth
surface, the former being slightly rough, of a surface
and texture somewhat like that of very finely ground
glass.

Care of the Paper.—The paper is sent out either in
the full-sized sheet, measuring about 24 × 17 inches, or
in smaller cut sizes, suitable for the usual ¹/₄, ¹/₂, ¹/₁ plate
and other popular dimensions of plates. Compared with
albumenized print-out paper, P.O.P. is more sensitive to
light; therefore, some care must be taken to avoid
needlessly exposing it to the influence of daylight or
strong artificial light. For example, the printing frames
should be filled as far away from any window as possible,
and the prints examined from time to time either by
gaslight or as feeble daylight as possible.

In handling the paper—cutting it up, etc.—care
must be taken to avoid touching the sensitive surface
with the fingers in any case. The touch of a moist or
hot finger is very likely to produce a mark or stain which
is usually irremovable. The paper should be protected
from damp, excessive heat and impure air. If kept
rolled in a tin tube or flat under pressure in the original
packages, it will keep a considerable time—i.e., longer
than ordinary albumenized paper.

Printing is done in the usual way. Strong diffused
light reflected from the sky or clouds usually gives a
better print than direct sunshine. In case, however, of
a thin flat negative—i.e., one with insufficient contrast—good
results may sometimes be obtained by covering the179
printing frame with a sheet of green glass and printing
in moderately strong sunshine. In hot summer sunshine
it is as well to cover the green glass with a sheet of
tissue paper or fine-ground glass. Care must be always
taken when printing in sunshine or very hot weather to
see that the negative itself does not get too warm, or the
paper may stick to it. In this case the print is of course
lost, and the negative, unless varnished, is also probably
seriously damaged by silver stains, which are very
difficult to remove. Printing should not be carried
quite so far as in the case of ordinary albumenized paper
because in the subsequent operations of toning, etc.,
not so much strength is lost. The same care as regards
shielding from light, etc., should be given to the prints
after they leave the printing frame. They may be
proceeded with at once or kept for some days before being
toned, etc., but if this is done the prints should be kept
under pressure. Some workers have thought that the
light action goes on, “continues” in the print after it is
removed from the printing frame. This, however, is not
the generally received opinion.

Washing.—It is important that the first washing
should be done with some care, or the prints may become
stained. The points calling for attention are (1) running
water and plenty of it, (2) care to see that the prints do
not stick together. What is needed is that the soluble
salts should be washed out of the paper as quickly as
possible, and that the prints be not allowed to remain in
the water containing these soluble salts longer than is
necessary. Hence the advantage of running water and
plenty of it. The washing water must not be too cold or
the salts will not pass out of the paper quickly enough;
and again, it must not be too warm or the gelatine will
melt. The best temperature is about 65° F., and the
limits should not go beyond 60° and 70° F., and prefer180ably
are kept within 60° and 65° F. As the paper is
usually rather stout, it will need washing in running or
constantly changed water for about ten to fifteen
minutes, and in any case must be continued until all
milky appearance of the water ceases. The print at
this stage has a red-brown colour. If it is now passed
direct into the fixing bath without toning it becomes
somewhat more yellow, and when dry is usually a colour
somewhat between yellow ochre and sienna.

Toning is usually our next operation, and for this
purpose we have a variety of toning baths recommended
by different workers. The sulphocyanide and gold is
perhaps the chief favourite.

The proper way to mix this bath is to add the gold to
the solution of sulphocyanide a little at a time. The
following method will be found convenient. As ammonium
sulphocyanide is somewhat deliquescent, it is convenient
to keep it in solution. Therefore, one ounce of
the salt dissolved in twenty ounces of (distilled or filtered
rain) water gives us roughly a strength of twenty-two
grains per ounce. Dissolve the contents of a fifteen-grain
chloride of gold in fifteen drams of distilled water.
To mix a bath, take of the sulphocyanide solution half-an
ounce; to this add eight ounces of water. Now take
one dram of the gold solution and dilute with one ounce
of water. Then add this dilute gold solution a little at a
time to the eight ounces of sulphocyanide solution, and
stir well with a glass rod. It will be noticed that as the
gold solution drops into the sulphocyanide solution an
orange-red precipitate is formed, which is redissolved on
stirring. Hence the gold must be added to the sulphocyanide,
and not vice versa.

181

2. Another favourite bath is as follows:—

Instead of weighing out two grains of sulphite it is more
convenient to weigh twenty grains and dissolve in two-and-a-half
ounces of water—i.e., at the rate of one grain
per dram of solution. Thus, to mix this bath, take an
ounce of the above-mentioned sulphocyanide solution
dilute with twenty ounces water. To this add two
drams (¼ oz.) of the sulphite solution. Then take
two drams of the gold chloride solution and dilute
with an ounce of water, and add slowly with stirring
as before.

3. Another favourite bath is:—

Some of the adherents of this bath recommend that the
prints be only washed in running water for a few minutes
and then put into the toning bath. Others advise the
prints to be immersed in the toning bath without
any previous washing—i.e., straight from the printing
frame.