Abstract
ALTHOUGH we already possess numerous books of this class, the present little volume will doubtless meet with a welcome from amateur photographers, coming as it does from the pen of one well known to be a thoroughly practical worker. The book is small (numbering only 92 pp.), but contains sufficient information for those who desire to master the dry and wet collodion processes. Indeed, more pretentious works on photography which have come under our notice contain a large amount of what we are inclined to regard as utterly superfluous matter, and it is, moreover, refreshing to open a “Guide” which is not made a medium for some dealer's price-catalogue. The present work consists of three chapters and six appendices. The first chapter treats of cameras, and describes the process of taking pictures by the dry-plate method; some useful hints will be found in this chapter by outdoor photographers. The second chapter describes the ordinary wet collodion process—a process which has been so often described before, that Mr. Stillman has little to add by way of novelty; while the third chapter is devoted to positive prints. In the appendices we have special remarks on baths and bath solutions, on cleaning plates, on developers, on dry processes, &c. On this last subject, by the way, we notice that the decimal point has been omitted from several of the numbers in the formulse, and although these are doubtless typographical erroxs, the tigures as they stand will be apt to mislead beginners: “Sulphuric acid 1840,” for instance, would at first sight lead the uninitiated into the belief that an acid in bottle since this date was necessary for success in making pyroxyline, whereas the author only means an acid of sp. gr. 1840.
The Amateur's Photographic Guide Book.
Being a complete Résumé of the most useful Dry and Wet Collodion Processes, especially for the use of Amateurs. By W. J. Stillman. (London: C. D. Smith and Co.)
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M., R. The Amateur's Photographic Guide Book . Nature 10, 284 (1874). https://doi.org/10.1038/010284a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/010284a0