The Eastman Dry Plate and Film Co., of Rochester, N. Y., exhibited
at the P. A. of A. Exhibition, at Buffalo, N. Y., in July, 1885, a
very remarkable display of photographs, the negatives of which were
made on gelatinized paper and called the Eastman flexible negative
support. They gave a demonstration of their process at the same
time, and also explained the working of their new holder for a
continuous web or band of paper.
The sensitive gelatine emulsion is prepared in the same manner as
for glass plates, and it is spread by means of ingenious machinery
on continuous bands of paper, which bands are afterwards cut into
sizes, or rolled on spools which will contain enough paper to make
from 24 to 40 views or portraits, according to size.
They have invented a very neat apparatus to hold the paper when cut
into sizes so that it may be inserted in the common dry-plate
holder. [p180]
They have also invented and patented a roller holder which may be
made to fit any camera, in which is inserted a spool of the paper,
and by means of ingenious devices it may be drawn across a flat
table and wound upon another roller with an apparatus to register
each length of paper as an exposure is made. This apparatus is
absolutely correct in operation, and the proper length of paper is
infallibly transferred from the table to the roller by simply
turning the roller with a key from the outside.
By this invention the viewist is given command of as many as 24
exposures, with no greater weight to carry than one double dry-plate
holder when filled with glass, thus reducing his "tote" the weight
of five double dry-plate holders and ten glass plates, and his
resources are increased two-fold.
The exposures having been made the holder is taken to the dark room,
the paper unwound from the spools, cut at the register marks and
developed in the same manner as glass plates, but with the
difference that several pieces may be developed at the same time in
the same manner that paper prints are toned, thus securing a uniform
intensity to the negatives; the fixing and washing are performed in
the same manner as silver prints and as easily.
The paper negatives after being washed are dried between blotters,
or in any other preferred manner, and they are then saturated with
castor oil and ironed with a hot flat-iron, to make the oil more
effectually permeate the fibre of the paper.
These negatives are more perfectly susceptible of being retouched
and worked up than those on glass.
They are printed from the gelatine side, and when [p181] the
prints are made the negatives are stored in portfolios. If after a
time it is found that the oil has dried out of the film, they may be
again oiled the same as at the first.
The roller holders are made for every size and style of camera box
from the Detective and the Bijou pocket apparatus, up to the 20×24
mammoth size Novel Camera.