The Technical Evolution of Photography in the 19th Century

Notes and summary of reading, The Technical Evolution of Photography in the 19th Century by Mark Ostermann (pp. 27-36) in Focal Encyclopedia of Photography, 4th Edn. Michael R. Peres, Editor.

Concept and First Attempts

• Who invented photography? Has been disputed from the very beginning.
• Greek photos and graphos meaning 'light drawing'. 
• Best described as "a reasonably stable image made by the effect of light on a chemical substance. ... If light or some other invisible wavelength of energy is not used to make the final picture by chemical means, it cannot, by this definition, be a photograph." [What about Infra-Red photography?]
• Term photography may have first been used by Antoine Hercules Romuald Florence in 1833 (living in Brazil at the time). Sir John Herschel in England used the term in 1839 and he had many contact. Thus he has traditionally been credited.
• Thomas Wedgwood some of 1st images to be recorded on light sensitive material with Sir Humphrey Davey and published in Jnl of Roy. Institution, 1802. 
• Images on paper and white leather coated with silver nitrate. 
• The combined silver solution with sodium chloride making more sensitive silver chloride.
• Their ideas covered earlier by Johanne Heinrich Schulz (1725), Carl Wilhelm Scheele (1777), and Jean Senebier (1782). 

Joseph Nicephore Niépce

Joseph Nicephore Niépce in France, village of Saint-Loup-de-Varennes, he experimented with paper sensitized with silver chloride. In about 1916 he fixed his images with nitric acid. He moved on to another light-sensitive material, asphaltum.

• He worked with etching and lithography. He coated copper, pewter, zinc, and glass with asphaltum dissolved in oil of lavender, exposed to light, unexposed areas were dissolved with a solvent i.e. Dippel's oil, lavender oil or turpentine while the hardened exposed remained intact area remained creating a negative. Unknown why he didn't use it on a glass plate to make a positive on silver chloride paper.
• Heliographs - most famous and only know in existence. 1826 view from window of his estate Le Gras – View from the Window at Le Gras – may have taken 2 days to expose. It is both neg and pos and is permanent. 

Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre

• 1829 Daguerre and Niépce entered partnership.
• Early 1830's they noticed light darkened polished silver previously exposed to Iodine fumes. 
• Physautotype – variant of heliograph, use rosin instead of asphalt on silver plates. Superior image. 

Daguerreotype

• 1833 Niépce died
• 2 years later – Daguerre found that silver iodide plate need less exposure time and image revealed by exposing to mercury fumes. Minutes not hours. Image stabilized in bath sodium chloride.
• Daguerreotype both pos and neg depending on light and angle of view. 
• Later changed fixer to sodium thiosulfate known as hyposulfite or hypo [term we us today in darkroom].
• Every Daguerreotype is unique. 

Photography on Paper

• William Henry Fox Talbot, English, 1834 experimented with silver chloride.
• He made unexposed areas less sensitive, used strong solution of sodium chloride and dilute potassium iodide or potassium bromide which resulted in colors brown, orange, yellow, red, green and lilac depending on the chemical and degree of exposure. Images considered stabilized.
• He could make a contact positive in the sun.

1839 – The race for Acknowledgment

• January 7, 1839 Daguerre's work announced to Academy of Sciences in Paris. 
• Talbot rushed to publish and read to Royal Society January 31. 

Bayard, Ponton, and Herschel

• Others to know
• Hippolyte Bayard, French, invented direct positive process on paper 1839. Bleaching exposed silver chloride paper with potassium iodide solution and fixed with hypo. 
• 1839 Mungo Ponton, in Scotland, observed paper saturated in potassium bichromate was sensitive to light. Printed image washed in water and reasonable permanence. This led Talbot to discover hardening effects of gelatine treated with chromium compounds.
• 1839 Sir John Herschal made hypo-fixed silver carbonate negatives on paper. First silver halide image on glass. When glass neg backed with dark cloth it could be seen as a positive. 

Improvements to Daguerre's and Talbot's Processes
The improved daguerreotype

• Daguerre 1839 process too slow - >20 min. 
• Bromide fumes in sensitizing step and formulation of faster lens improved the process.
• Combining chlorine, bromine, and iodine fumes produced faster and more sensitive plates.
•  1840 Max Petzval formulated a faster lens specifically for portraiture.
• 1840 gold toning introduced by Hippolyte Fizeau. Solution of sel d'or made by adding gold chloride to hypo, applied to fixed plate – gilding. Extended range of tones and made plate less susceptible to abrasion. 

The Calotype – Greek kalos meaning "beautiful".

• 1841 Talbot changed formula to use silver iodide, more sensitive than silver chloride. 
• Same silver halide as used by Daguerre, but applied to paper. The iodized paper was sensitized with solution of silver nitrate, acetic acid, and small amount of gallic acid.
• Image developed in solution of gallic acid and stabilized in potassium bromide or permanently fixed in sodium thiosulfate.
• Negs could be retouched [very early photo manipulation] w/ graphite or inks or made translucent with wax or oil
• Talbot patented and charged an expensive license fee.
• 1844 Talbot published Pencil of Nature illustrated with salt prints from calotype negs. 

The Business of Photography

• Calotypes
• daguerreotypists, plate mfg and frame/case makers.
• Americans electroplated and additional coat of silver - gave greater sensitivity.

Negatives on Glass

•   1847 niépcotype in France, Abel Niépce de Saint Victor - experiment with starch then egg albumen as binder for silver iodine on glass plates.
• Variants simultaneously invented – John Whipple, Boston, Lanenheim brothers, Philadelphia.
• developed identical to calotype but longer – longer exposure but nearly grain less resolution.
• hyalotype 1848 by Langenheim brothers positive transparency on glass that was contact printed from albumen negatives.
• niépcotype not for studio used for landscape and architectural subjects.

The Wet Plate Process

• 1848 Frederick Scott Archer, English sculptor and amateur calotypist experimented with collodion as binder for silver halides to improve calotype. 
• collodion, Greek "to stick" colorless fluid made by dissolving nitrated cotton in ether and alcohol. Poured on glass  collodion dried to thin clear plastic film. 
• Collodion negatives were used to make salted paper prints called crystalotypes by Whipple but were perfectly matched to the albumen printing process introduced by Louis Deserie Blanquart-Evrard in 1850.
• By 1855 collodian process eclipsed the daguerreotype of commercial portraiture and adapted by amateurs.
• Photo journals introduced in 1850s Photographic News, The British Journal of Photography, La Lumiere, Humphrey's Journal,  and the Photographic and fine Art Journal.

The Art of Photography

• Celebrated artists of the wet plate process – Julia Margaret Cameron, Oscar Gustave Rejlander and Gasper Felix Tournachon (aka Nadar)
• Photography not seriously considered an art form. 
• Landscape photographers using collodion Gustav Le Gray, Francis Frith, Leopoldo and Giuseppe Alinari and John Thomson.
• Western America – Carleton Watkins, Eadweard Muybridge, William Henry Jackson and Timothy O'Sullivan.
• Enlarging did not become commonplace until acceptance of silver bromide developing papers in late  1880s.
• 1860s common public commercial photography on salted and albumen paper – carte de visite (calling card), portrait or stereograph (3D) 
• late 1860s – large cabinet card and cartes de visite brought in industry of mounts and album mfg. 

Collodion Variants and the Positive Process

• Amateurs tried to make preserved or dry collodion plates – never made general use but was basis of gelatin emulsion process and production of collodion chloride printing-out papers used into the next century. 
• Humectant based process – oxymel, a medical compound of honey and acetic acid, and various syrups to keep the sensitive plate damp. Successful but plate slower and not sensitive for anything but landscape.

Concerns of Permanency

• 1840s & 50s fading of images a problem. Caused by incomplete fixing or washing. 
• Carbon printing – Alphonse Louis Poitevin and developed-out salt printing process of Thomas Sutton and Louid Deserie Blanquart-Evrard. Cool Tones. 
• Carbon process based on light sensitivity of pigmented gelatin treated with potassium bichromate  came into its own when the single-transfer variant patented by Sir Joseph Wilson Swan was universally adopted in 1864. 
• Carbon prints slow and suited to large runs of single image. 
• Albumen printing was replaced with the collodio-chloride and gelatin-chloride aristotype printing-out papers late in the century.
• 1873 William Willis, London, patented beautiful process – platinotype using platinum. Platinotype Company est 1879 sensitized platinum papers favoured by artist. Matte finish and neutral tones  suited soft masses of tonality favoured by the pictorialists and fashionable portrait galleries. 
• Cyanotype, invented by Herschel in 1841, reasonably permanent and blue and not suited to most images. At end of century amateurs used it as easy and economical way to proof gelatin negs. 

Gelatin Emulsions and the Modern Era

• Last quarter of 19th C modern era of photography.
• 1850s emulsion plates invented, primarily English with collodion emulsions. 
• 1865 G. Wharton Simpson printed on paper coated with collodion chloride emulsion.
• Leptographic paper coated w/ collodion chloride emulsion mfg by Laurent and Jose Martinez-Sanchez in Madrid
• 1864 England, W.B. Bolton and B.J. Sayce introduced collodion emulsion for neg plates based on bromides rather than iodides. Nearly as sensitive as wet collodion plates and processed in alkaline developer.
• Use of bromides and of alkaline development was to become key to making fast plates with gelatin emulsions. 
• Pellicles – J. Johnson allowed gelatin emulsion to dry in thin sheets (pellicles), then cut into small pieces, washed them, dried them in the dark, packaged them for storage. They could then be rehydrated for coating later. 
• Pellicles became popular when it was observed that when rehydrated and the emulsion was melted. The longer the emulsion was heated, the more sensitive it became called ripening  first identified by Sir Joseph Wislon Swan, 1877, and kept a secret until 1878 revealed by Charles Bennett.
• Gelatin plates called dry plates. By 1880 they were being mfg by hand on large scale.
•  America slow to accept dry plates eventually a switch. Prices of plates decreased and manufactures of camera and associated equipment were targeting new generation of amateurs who could make images without the skills that were previously necessary. [Just like our current switching from film to digital]
• Assumed that most commercial photographers in US were using gelatin plates exterior and portraits by 1885. 
• Developers – alkaline solutions of pyrogallic acid or ferrous oxalate. Later hydroquinone followed by metol and a combination of the two chemicals  called MQ developer. Developing powers were available in boxes of premeasured glass tubes. 

Flexible Film

• Flexible film dates back to calotype and Archer's idea of stripping collodion film from glass plates.
• Eastman Dry Plate Company, mid-1880s, first successful large scale manufacturer.
• Eastman's 'American Film' rolls of paper-support stripping film designed to be used in special holder that could be fitted to the back of any size of camera. 
• American Film was supplied in the first Kodak [small detective camera] introduced in 1888. This spawned several generations of hand-held box cameras used by millions of amateur photographers. Not a commercial success it bought time for Eastman Dry Plate and Film Company to introduce Eastman Transparent Film in rolls and sheets of clear, flexible nitrocellulose in 1889.

Sesitometry

• Concept of measuring the actinic effect of light or the sensitivity of photosensitive materials dates to the earliest days of photography, but the first reliable sensitometer was invented by Russian born Leon Warneke in 1880.
• Provided a rating system to an emulsion calculated against the average sensitivity of a collodion plate.
• Numeral standard for apertures – two systems of f-numbering. US (Uniform System) featured numbers 1, 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, and 128.   The f-system 4, 5.6, 8, 11.3, 16, 22.6, 32 and 45.2. 

Glimpses of Colour

• Throughout 1880s gelatin-emulsions makers were increasing sensitivity of product. Speed of gelatin emulsion was gradually increased. 
• Limited to ultraviolet, violet, and blue wavelengths. 
• Colour daguerreotypes - invented by Levi Hill in 1850s and a similar heliochrome first exhibited in 1877 by Niépce de St. Victor stood alone and not influential in evolution of color photography.
• 1861 James Clerk-Maxwell demonstrated additive color synthesis. Thomas Sutten made 3 negatives of a colourful ribbon through red, green, and blue filters for Maxwell's demonstration. Used to make lantern slides projected from 3 magic lanterns through same filters. 
• 1869 Ducos Du Hauron patented in France a procedure relied on red, blue and green additive dots applied to a sensitized plate. Not until mid 1890s did John Joly introduce first commercially successful additive ruled plates. Du Hauron suggested the subtractive-color process from yellow, cyan and magenta carbon tissues exposed form additive color-separation negatives in 1877. 
• Adolph Braun, Hermann Wilheim Vogel, and Frederic Ives 1870s experiment with dye-sensitizing emulsions with eosin and chlorophyll. They were sensitizing collodion bromide emulsions so called orthochromatic emulsion highly sensitive to blue but also green and yellow. 
• 1890s other dye sensitizers extended gelatin to deep orange – plates called isochromatic.
• panochromatic plates sensitive to entire visible spectrum not available til 1906 and few embraced the technology.

Floodgate to the 20th Century

• More individuals, amateur and professions, owned cameras than the daguerreotype and wet plate eras combined.
• No need to go to a professional studio anymore, even though better results. [sounds familiar of today's attitude]
• photofinishing business accommodated amateur market.
• photos being reproduced in magazines and books. 
• 1890s photos common, available in range of sizes and papers.
• Influence of impressionists accepting photography "released a 50-year grip on photographic convention". Allowing picturalist to redefine what photograph need to be. 
• the picturalists' soft imagery and romantic approach to photography influenced a new direction in commercial portraiture that remained popular for 30 years after the turn of the century.