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Of course it may be said that there is scarcely time yet to make a fair comparison that the argentic enlargements are still only on their trial. I will give you my own experience.
Argentic paper is capable of yielding excellent enlargements, but it must be intelligently exposed, intelligently developed, and cleanly and carefully handled. At a recent meeting of the London and Provincial Photographic Association Mr.
I have already spoken of the great ease and facility with which an argentic enlargement may be made as compared with a collodion transfer, for instance; but there is another and more important point to be considered between the two, and that is, their durability and permanence.
My experiments were successful, and we now prepare an enamel argentic paper on which the prints stand out with brilliancy equal to those on albumenized paper. I here show you specimens of boudoirs and panels pictures enlarged from C.D.V. negatives on this enamel argentic.
The one fault or shortcoming of the plain argentic paper is the dullness of the surface when dry, and this certainly makes it unsuitable for small work, such as the rapid production of cartes or proofs from negatives wanted in a hurry; the tone of an argentic print is also spoken of sometimes as being objectionable; but my impression is, that it is not so much the tone as the want of brilliancy that is the fault there, and if once the public were accustomed to the tones of argentine paper, they might possibly like them twice as well as the purples and browns with which they are familiar, provided they had the depth and gloss of a silver print; and some time ago, acting on a suggestion made by the editor of the Photographic News, I set about trying to produce this result by enameling the paper with a barium emulsion previous to coating it with the gelatinous bromide of silver.
But there is no pigment in an argentic print, nothing but the silver reduced by the developer after the action of light; and that has been shown by, I think, Captain Abney, to be of a very stable and not easily decomposed nature; while if the pictures are passed through a solution of alum after washing and fixing, the gelatine also is so acted upon as to be rendered in a great degree impervious to the action of damp, and the pictures are then somewhat similar to carbon pictures without carbon.
In short, I believe a collodion transfer cannot be made even comparatively permanent, unless an amount of care be taken in the making of it which is neither compatible nor consistent with the popular price and extensive output. How now stands the case with an argentic enlargement?
I here show you the picture referred to, a 12 by 10 enlargement on artist's canvas, and may here state, in short, that my whole experience of argentic enlargements leads me to the conclusion that, setting aside every other quality, they are the most permanent pictures that have ever been produced.
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