Hx photo Ia Flashcards

Question

Joseph Nicéphore Niépce | (1765-1833)

Answer 1

Invented heliographs, which fixed an image from a camera on metal or glass plates. He used bitumen of judea—which hardened when exposed to light, but remained soluble in oil of lavender where not exposed—first to copy an engraving and later to record an image with a camera obscura. To make the copy, he put an engraving (of a portrait from his collection) on a light-sensitive plate and exposed it to sunlight. The printed lines of the engraving held back the light, while the white paper allowed light to pass through. Most of the bitumen became hard/insoluble from the exposure, but the areas directly beneath the lines of the etching remained soluble and could be removed by lavender oil. The bared metal was then etched to form a printing plate. To create direct positives through this process, Niépce washed the bitumen-coated plate in his solvent and put the plate face down on top of an open box of iodine, which became gaseous at room temperature and darkened the plate in the shadowy areas. Next, Niecephore put a light-sensitive plate in the back of a camera obscura to record an image. (“View from His Window at Le Gras”, 1827) To improve detail in his images, Niépce sought assistance from an optician to make a lens, which in turn led to contact with Daguerre and their 10-year partnership (beginning December 4, 1829).

Answer 2

Latticed Window at Lackock Abbey WHF Talbot, English (1800-1877) 1835 or 1839 Depicted: England, Lacock, Wiltshire Photogenic drawing negative 3 1/4 x 4 3/16 in, irregular The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Rubel Collection, Purchase, Ann Tenenbaum and Thomas H. Lee and Anonymous Gifts, 1997 (1997.382.1)

Answer 3

Described the optics of the camera obscura. [NOTES] Described the camera obscura in his “Codex Atlanticus” and “Manuscript D”. This and other sources from the 16th century document use of device during that time, including use as a drawing aid. [VARIOUS]

Answer 4

Daguerre built on Niépce’s work to invent Daguerreotypes. [BN.18] Basic process: * Put silver on a copper plate (through electroplating) and polish it to be mirror bright and chemically clean. * Sensitize the plate by putting it silver-side down over a box with iodine, the fumes of which react with the silver to form light-sensitive silver iodide. While still in the darkroom, put the plate in a plate holder. * Expose the plate in a camera. * Develop the latent image in mercury vapor. * Wash the plate in a salt solution to render the unexposed silver iodide relatively insensitive to further light action. * Wash and dry the plate. Sold rights to the French government, which in turn paid an annual stipend to Daguerre and Niépce. Daguerre was required to give public talks on his process.

Answer 5

Published Excursions Daguerriennes (1840-43), a series of travel images based on Daguerreotypes taken in Europe, The Middle East and America. The images were traced and used for engraving/reproduction. It was one of the first extensive works based on Daguerreotypes. [NR.97] Another publication: Treatise on Photography [see BN.31]

Answer 6

An early process for producing paper negatives without a camera. After objects were placed on paper sensitized with table salt and silver nitrate, the paper was exposed to light. It darkened in proportion to the amount of light each area received, resulting in a negative image, which was then fixed with a salt solution. NR

Answer 7

A sitter’s profile is traced through a movable sight connected by levers to a stylus that records the image on a reduced scale, in ink on a copper plate. The plate is then engraved. Duplicates can be printed from the engraving [BN.11] Invented in France in 1786 by Gilles Louis Chrétien, the device consisted of a pointer attached by a series of levers to a pencil, by means of which the operator could trace on paper a profile cast onto glass. A pantograph reduced and transferred the image to a copper plate, which, when engraved and inked, would permit the printing of an addition. [NR.40]

Answer 8

A Western cultural phenomenon, from about 1750-1850, that gave precedence to feeling and imagination over reason and thought. More narrowly, the art movement that flourished from about 1800 to 1840. [A4A:glossary]

Answer 9

Morse was one of earliest to use the Dagurerreotype process in America. [BN.28] Morse was in Paris when the new of Daguerre’s process was released. He invited Daguerre to a demonstration of his electric telegraph, and Daguerre reciprocated by showing Morse his Daguerreotypes. [BN.16]

Answer 10

First person to attempt to record a camera image by means of the action of light. Before 1800, he began experiments by sensitizing paper or leather with silver nitrate and then placing flat objects or painted transparencies in contact with the paper/leather and exposing the whole to light. The “sun prints” were not permanent. [BN.13] Photography experiments from 1790-1802. [NOTES] Used camera obscura to make sketches of country houses to decorate plates. [BN.13]

Answer 11

Discovered, in 1819, that Hyposulfate of soda (sodium thiosulfate) rendered silver salts insensitive to light. In 1829, after hearing of Daguerre’s and Talbot’s discoveries, Herschel used the chemical to fix his photographs. Hypo washed away the silver salts, and stopped the light sensitivity of the paper. [BN.21] Herschel also observed in 1839 that a weak negative, in which the silver deposit is somewhat light in tone and the shadows transparent, will appear as a positive when viewed against a black background. [BN.62]

Answer 12

A positive image formed by exposing in a camera a thin, varnished sheet of iron coated with black or brown lacquer and sensitized collodion. Used almost exclusively for inexpensive portraiture. (Also called ferrotype and melainotype.) NR

Answer 13

Usually, a wet-plate process in which a negative is made by coating a glass plate with a light-sensitive emulsion of collodion (guncotton dissolved in alcohol and ether) to which potassium iodide and potassium bromide have been added. The plate is inserted into the camera, exposed while wet, and developed immediately thereafter. [The dry collodion process allows the plate to be exposed and developed at a later time, but requires a much longer exposure.] NR

Answer 14

French author and politician who was the source of the name Silhouette. [OED] Comptroller general of France who levied a land tax on estates. He served \< 1 year and his short tenure as finance chief caused him to become an object of ridicule. His penny-pinching manner led the to the term “a la Shilhouette” to refer to something cheap. [NOTES/WIKI] During this time, an art form of growing popularity was a shadow profile cut from black paper. It provided a simple and inexpensive alternative fore those who could not afford more decorative and expensive forms of portraiture. Those who considered it cheap attached the word silhouette to it. [WIKI} SILHOUETTE: A portrait traced from a cast shadow and inked in, or cut freehand from black paper, and then mounted on a lighter ground. A silhouette shows only the profile. [NR.40] With increasing demand for pictures by the middle class, the silhouette required “merely the ability to trace a shadow’. [BN.11]

Answer 15

The oldest surviving camera photograph. A heliograph, taken by Nicéphore Niépce in 1827, that shows parts of the buildings and surrounding countryside at his estate.

Answer 16

In Boston, Albert Sands Southworth and Josiah Johnson Hawes produced portraits far removed from the conventional stiff poses favored by most of their colleagues. [BN.34] Photo firm in Boston, 1843-1862