The photographic news

• Bandzählung: 29.1885
• Erscheinungsdatum: 1885
• Sprache: Englisch
• Signatur: F 135
• Vorlage: Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig
• Digitalisat: Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig
• Digitalisat: SLUB Dresden
• Rechtehinweis: Public Domain Mark 1.0
• URN: urn:nbn:de:bsz:14-db-id1780948042-188500006
• PURL: http://digital.slub-dresden.de/id1780948042-18850000
• OAI: oai:de:slub-dresden:db:id-1780948042-18850000
• Sammlungen: LDP: Historische Bestände der Hochschule für Grafik und Buchkunst Leipzig
• Sammlungen: Fotografie
• Bemerkung: Seite I-II fehlen in der Vorlage. Paginierfehler: Seite 160 als Seite 144 gezählt.
• Strukturtyp: Band

• Digitalisat: SLUB Dresden
• Strukturtyp: Ausgabe

650 THE PHOTOGRAPHIC NEWS. [OCTOBER 9, 1885. all negative making is wind. It will not only destroy foliage effects, and cause the camera to vibrate, but, in an unguarded moment, will upset the whole apparatus, blow an easily-fitting cap off the lens, play objectionable pranks with the focussing cloth, letting the light get to the plate—in fact, play the very dickens with the turn-out in its entirety. I speak feelingly, having suffered considerably by wind daring the past early summer. When two exposures have to be made on one plate, and the sub ject is water and trees, absolute quiescence is necessary for success, if only for a few seconds. One exposure may have been satisfactorily accomplished—the wind rises, the watery mirror is a mirror no longer, the branches of the trees sway to and fro, the foreground foliage wavers and trembles, and there is nothing for it but to wait patiently till things are quiet again ; by that time, perhaps, the light has gone, clouds have come up, and if the second half of the plate is exposed, it is difficult to judge the time so that it will develop up with the first exposed portion, and make a negative equal in density and detail. There is an old saying that if you are accidentally hit on the face, it is sure to be in your eye. Now, if there are a few clouds floating about on a fairly clear sky, and you particularly require bright sunshine, they will, in the most perverse manner, float over the sun longest way on, getting larger as they float, till your eyes ache, and patience fails in waiting for the troublesome vapours to disperse. During the time there is not a sign of wind, no rustling of leaves or waving of grass ; everything is beautifully still, which, with a touch of sunlight, would produce a perfect effect. At last the sun is gradually unveiled ; at the same time there is gentle swaying of branches and rustling of leaves, and you are informed, in the plainest possible manner, you have waited only for disappointment. This vexatious condition of things is particularly prevalent by a river side, or on elevated positions, where the gentle breezes are prone to disport them selves. Now, this particularly interesting process of waiting for the clouds to roll by has been tolerably frequent during the past summer. It is all very poetical to talk of gentle zephyrs, and to enjoy refreshing breezes, or to be braced up by a healthy wind ; but it’s not the photographer who will chant its praises. The insidious mischief of wind is something wonderful in photographic picture making. It is almost impossible to keep a strict watch all round on the delicately-poised foliage in a leafy view ; and it will often happen that some portion that, in the photograph, looks conspicuous, has moved, quite spoiling the result, when you had fondly flattered yourself every leaf was beautifully still. Then again, dust, on a windy day on some soils, is an abominable nuisance. It will find its way into the camera and on to the plates, making specks on the negative, no matter what precautions may be taken. Wind, directly or indirectly, causes more trouble than almost any other atmospheric condition. One is lured on by a bright sky to make exposures that only end in failures ; whereas, with a good honest fog, no attempt at work is made, as you are perfectly well assured beforehand what would be the result if you did. Another trouble, which rests with the photographer, and may be called his personal equation, is "flurry ” or excitement, which is a special failing with beginners, and from which old hands are not always exempt. It has undoubtedly something to do with many imperfect results, whether the imputation will be admitted or not. We will suppose the photographer has been waiting hour after hour for a certain effect—an effect that can last but a very short time. It arrives at last, but somewhat unexpectedly all the same, and unless the operator is of a very stolid and unimpression able disposition, the chances are that from some oversight or other, the negative is defective ; exposure calculated for a wrong sized stop, the shutter drawn with the cap off the lens, or some mis chance or other that in an ordinary way would not be likely to occur, and for which the performer is the first to dub himself an ass. Reason and deliberation are terribly discounted by flurry. Unfortunately, some errors are not found out until too late to remedy them ; that is, when the plates are being deve loped. A plate may remain curiously clear under the action of the developer. Possibly the special view that caused so much anxiety—a little extra alkali is added, but with no apparent effect, till it gradually dawns upon you the plate has, by some inexplicable reason, not been exposed* Soon you are sure of it, and, with a puzzled feeling, begin to develop the next plate, on which, after a sort of hesitancy, the image rushes up like a thunderstorm, and you become aware of the mortifying fact you have made two ex posures on one plate—sic transit yloria, &c. Yet another development; another blunder! What is it? There is an indescribable appearance about the negative of an unsatisfactory kind ; we will see how it looks when it’s fixed. The magnifier is brought to bear, but the queer look is only in creased. Is there a hole in the camera bellows ? No. Is it in the front or flange screw out ? No. We examine the lens put away just as last used. The murder is out; the revolving diaphragm, which works too easily, has been shifted, and part of two apertures has been used to make the image instead of one ; hence the trouble. Again, when working with plates of several degrees of rapidity, they are prone to get mixed, and errors of exposure happen in consequence. This is especially the case when many negatives have to be taken, and development is delayed for a day or two, plates of different degrees of sensitiveness being used on the same day. If there then exists the slightest doubt about which is which, the more it’s considered the more foggy one gets, and it is then a mere chance that the development is right for the plate under treatment. Another trouble that sometimes occurs, and that is the plate is a trifle too small for the holder. The dark-slide may get an extra shake, so that when the shutter is drawn the plate falls forward towards the camera sufficiently to prevent the return of the shutter, the spring between the plates is sufficient to prevent it being shaken back into its proper place, spoiling it, as a matter of course. Warping, too, of the thin veneer shutter now iu vogue is a source of trouble. By rubbing the surface of the film in the process of opening and closing the slide wherever the friction takes place there will be lines on the negatives; although the film may be not perceptibly scratched, still the friction will produce lines that show by increased density on developing the negatives. Pulling up the wrong or outside shutter of a double dark-slide will sometimes happen. Owing to the method in which the shutter is generally manipulated, it is entirely a matter of feeling. The apparatus being enveloped in the focussing-cloth, the tabs of the two shutters being close together, it is very easy to pull up the wrong one, unless great care is exercised. A performance of this sort is, however, not likely to occur often to the same photographer unless he is exceptionally careless—the annoyance of spoiling a plate, or probably a negative, being a powerful in centive to caution. With regard to troubles with drop-shutters, if made of ebonite and used in very hot weather, the material may get soft and bent, so that the shutter will stick in its descent, or not drop at all, and so spoil the plate ; but take them all in all, drop-shutters are as free from faults as any part of a photographic outfit, and are usually reliable. Defects may happen in a pneumatic release, or an elastic band get broken ; but with these exceptions there is very little chance of them getting out of order. I think now I have exhausted the list of difficulties that occur to me as likely to happen on a landscape tour ; such matters of carelessness as losing the stops of the lens, or leaving the plate- box open, or similar negligences, are scarcely worth referring to; but I have at the same time refrained from suggesting any remedies, the remedy being in many cases obvious. The simple enumeration of the troubles may perhaps bear fruit by inciting some of our inventive members to introduce little useful modifi cations iu our apparatus that will tend to prevent even accidental mistakes. There is one thing, however, that is, and always has been, an unmitigated nuisance, and that is the focussing-cloth, and he will be a benefactor to photographers who will invent an efficient substitute for it—one that will embrace all the useful qualities, and relieve us from the ever-recurring smothering wo have for so many years resignedly put up with. ABSTRACT OF WM. LANG’S INAUGUR AL ADDRESS. The art we practise has had for me a peculiar fascination “ e’en from my boyish days.” The delight that accompanied the pro duction of the first picture obtained by means of the home-made cigar-box camera and the sixpenny meniscus lens is still present to my mind. In the second half of the 16th century the Italian philosopher, Porta, discovers the camera-obscura, but not till the first half of the nineteenth do the men arise (Niepce and Daguerre) who show mankind how to secure the fleeting images of Porta’s instrument. Referring to the camera's delineations, Arago, in his masterly report presented to the Chamber of Deputies, on the occasion of life pensions being granted to Daguerre and Niepce by the French Government, spoke as follows :—“ No person, however,