_Process for Printing on Albumenized Paper._--The power of obtaining
agreeable and well-printed positives from their negatives being the great
object with all photographers, induces me to communicate the following
mode of preparing albumenized paper; a mode which, although it does not
possess any remarkable novelty, seems to me deserving of being made
generally known, from its giving a uniformity of results which may at all
times be depended upon.
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Independently of the very rich and agreeable tones which may be produced
by the process which I am about to describe, it has the property of
affording permanent pictures, not liable to that change by time to
which pictures produced by the use of the ammonio-nitrate solution are
certainly liable. I have upon all occasions advocated the economical
practice of photography, and the present process will be found of that
character; but at the same time I can assure your readers that a rapidity
of action and intensity are hereby obtained with a 40-grain solution of
nitrate of silver, fully equal to those gained from solutions of 120, or
even 200, grains to the ounce, as is frequently practised.
In eight ounces of water (distilled or not) dissolve forty grains of
common salt, and the same quantity of muriate of ammonia.[6] Mix this
solution with eight ounces of albumen; beat[7] the whole well together,
allow it to stand in tall vessel from twenty-four to forty hours, when
the clear liquor may be poured off into a porcelain dish rather larger
than the paper intended to be albumenized.
Undoubtedly the best paper for this process, and relative quantity of
chemicals, is the _thin_ Canson Frères' but a much cheaper, and perhaps
equally suitable paper, is that made by Towgood of St. Neots. Neither
with Whatman's nor Turner's papers, excellent as they are for some
processes, have I obtained such satisfactory results. If the photographer
should unfortunately possess some of the thick paper of any inferior
makers, he had far better throw it away than waste his chemicals, time,
and temper upon the vain endeavour to turn it to any good account.
The paper, having first been marked on the right-hand upper corner of the
smooth side, is then to be floated with that marked side on the albumen.
This operation, which is very easy to perform, is somewhat difficult to
describe. I will however try. Take the marked corner of the sheet in the
right-hand, the opposite corner of the lower side of the paper in the
left; and bellying out the sheet, let the lower end fall gently on to
the albumen. Then gradually let the whole sheet fall, so as to press out
before it any adherent particles of air. If this has been carefully done,
no air-bubbles will have been formed. The presence of an air-bubble may
however soon be detected by the puckered appearance, which the back of
the paper assumes in consequence. When this is the case, the paper must
be carefully raised, the bubble dispersed, and the paper replaced. A thin
paper requires to float for three minutes on the albumen, but a thicker
one proportionably longer. At the end of that time raise the marked
corner with the point of a blanket pin; then take hold of it with the
finger and thumb, and so raise the sheet steadily and _very slowly_, that
the albumen may drain off at the lower left corner. I urge this raising
it very slowly, because air-bubbles are very apt to form on the albumen
by the sudden snatching up of the paper.
Each sheet, as it is removed from the albumen, is to be pinned up by the
marked corner on a long slip of wood, which must be provided for the
purpose. In pinning it up, be careful that the albumenized side takes an
inward curl, otherwise, from there being two angles of incidence, streaks
will form from the middle of the paper. During the drying, remove from
time to time, with a piece of blotting-paper, the drop of fluid which
collects at the lower corner of the paper.
In order to fix the albumen, it is necessary that the paper should be
ironed with an iron as hot as can be used without singeing the paper. It
should be first ironed between blotting-paper, and when the iron begins
to cool, it may be applied directly to the surface of each sheet.
To excite this paper it is only needful to float it carefully from three
to five minutes, in the same way as it was floated on the albumen, upon
a solution of nitrate of silver of forty grains to the ounce. Each sheet
is then to be pinned up and dried as before. It is scarcely necessary to
add, that this exciting process must be carried on by the light of a lamp
or candle.
This paper has the property of keeping good for several days, if kept
in a portfolio. It has also the advantage of being very little affected
by the ordinary light of a room, so that it may be used and handled in
any apartment where the direct light is not shining upon it; yet in a
tolerably intense light it prints much more rapidly than that prepared
with the ammonio-nitrate.
The picture should be fixed in a bath of saturated solution of hypo. The
hypo. never gets discoloured, and should always be carefully preserved.
When a new bath is formed, it is well to add forty grains of chloride of
silver to every eight ounces of the solution.
A beautiful violet or puce tint, with great whiteness of the high lights,
may be obtained by using the following bath as a fixing solution:
Hyposulphite of soda 8 ounces.
Sel d'or 7 grains.
Iodide of silver 10 grains.
Water 8 ounces.
It may be as well to add, that although the nitrate of silver solution
used for exciting becomes {326} discoloured, it acts equally well, even
when of a dark brown colour; but it may always be deprived of its colour,
and rendered sufficiently pure again, by filtering it through a little
animal charcoal.