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PHOTOGRAPHIC ENGRAVDM.
Sous time since we borrowed from the Photographic News the account of a new process, invented by Mr. Fox Talbot, for developing the photograph on a metal print, so as to reproduce it in the form of an engraving. The process, as we believe we have explained, consists in the application of acids and other chemical agencies to a plate already photographically affected by the light, the result being somewhat analagous to etching. As the Photographic News observes, however, the two processes are really distinct; in the case of etching, the plate is cased with a substance un- influenced by acid; the engraver scratches that substance with his tools, and thus exposes the plate more or less to the action of the acid ; the re- sult being strictly proportionate to the skill of the artist, but from the nature of the materials always imperfect. In Mr. Fox Talbot's process chemistry is the sole agent between the object itself and the engraving.
"The subject of the photoglyph in question is a view of a portion of the Tuileries, taken by Messrs. Soldier and Clouzard, and is well calculated to put Mr. Fox Talbot's newly-discovered process to a severe test. It may be advisable here, perhaps, to recapitulate briefly the substance of the descrip- tion of his process, published by us some months back, for the benefit of the numerous subscribers who have since joined. . . .
" It appears to us that in this discovery the long-sought for carbon pro- cess is found. There can be no sort of question that prints from a photo- graph on a steel or copper plate are permanent, since they have the same guarantee of permanency as the print of our books, which has already en- dured in some cases for a very great number of years ; and this cannot be said of the so-called carbon prints exhibited at the competition for the Luynesprize, to say nothing of the inferiority of these latter in an artistic point of view. The extent to which a plate engraved by this process may be made available, is almost unlimited. The plate from which the photo- glyph we give away this week was printed is of copper. This, after being engraved by Mr. Fox Talbot, was steel-faced. The result of this process is to give us a plate which might be used for printing any number of proofs, on the simple condition of having the steel-facing renewed as soon as the present coating of steel shows signs of wear. " By means of photoglyphy a fac-simile of any rare engraving or manu- script may be multiplied to any extent, with the certainty that these fac- similes are not liable to fade. A most important consideration in estimating the value of this discovery is the extreme comparative cheapness with which, by its means, perfectly stable photographs of paintings or other works of art may be produced. A photograph at present is a somewhat costly article, which necessarily follows from the expensive nature of some of the chemicals employed, and the time and labour involved in its production ; but when photographs can be printed with printers' ink, with the same facility as from a metal plate engraved in the ordinary manner, without the preliminary cost of engraving, there can be no reason why the most beautiful prints should not be sold at a price but little above the cost of the paper on which they are printed. Not only has this method of engraving a vast advantage over the ordinary process as regards cheapness, but it has the additional and most important advantage of giving a perfectly faithful reproduction of the scene or object without omitting the most minute details. In proof of this, we may refer to one of the photoglyphs we issued to our readers some months back. This was a view of the Place Henri IV., from the opposite side of the Seine, the photograph-being of such small dimensions that the inscriptions on the fronts of the houses could not be distinguished with the naked eye ; yet, on the application of a magnifying power, we obtained the information that one of the buildings was that in which M. Chevalier, optician, carried on his business operations ; and another, that in the occupation of M. Secretan, who is described as an ingenieur opticien. This microscopical minuteness of delineation will render it of great value in the reproduction of anatomical photographs—a matter in which every individual may be interested. The cost of a complete set of photographs of all the various organs, &e., of the human body, taken by the ordinary process, would be so expensive as to place them beyond the reach of most medical men just commencing practice, which is tlie very time when they most need to keep the knowledge they have acquired fresh in their memory- ; but when multiplied by this mode of printing, cheapness would be secured without the slightest sacrifice of accu- racy or minuteness. " In reproducing photographs of maps, either on a large or reduced scale, it is calculated to be of essential service. This branch of photography is practised now to a considerable extent, but at a cost which would be very materially lessened by employing the photoglyphic process, because for all commercial purposes the reduced or enlarged photograph has to be copied by the engraver on a steel plate, which is rendered unnecessary by the process under consideration. We beg to call the attention of the Govern- ment to this circumstance. There are excellent photographers in the Go- vernment service who are perfectly able to test the value and utility of this process, and a small portion of the sum annually expended in photographic manipulations in the different offices, would be sufficient to prove the su- perior advantages of the photoglyphieally-engraved plate over the ordinary glass negative." The print in question has been sent to us ; its size is 6 inches high by 61 wide; the style of the architecture is very ornate; the view comprises some thirty-one windows, several figures of different sizes, in high or low relief; many columns, fluted and elaborately ornamented in the capital; a clock-face, with -a variety of other objects. The grand entrance is open, and the eye can see through to a corresponding arch, with a grating, • These two Glees are published, in a cheap and handsome form, by Novello. on the opposite side. Of course the reader will perceive that the en- graving is microscopic in its minuteness ; yet it is what an artist would call very broad in the light and shadow. The " treatment" is as grand and massive as it could be in a picture by one of tho old masters, although the details are marked out with the exactness of a Gerard Dow. We will point to an excellent example. We will describe an instance of these qualities combined. The upper windows are divided into six squares, each with its pane of glass ; behind are curtains of some kind of stuff, the curtains being as you almost always see in France, rather tightly bound back to the curtain-pins. They are therefore fluted, and a shadow falls upon them from the upper part of the window. The upper pane of glass is perhaps the twelfth of an inch high; through one pane we discern five or six logitudinal folds in the curtain, with one or two flat spans ; each fold delicately drawn, with its own light and shade ; while at the top a soft shadow falls over the whole, exhibiting the gra- dations from the reflection to the full depth of shade ; all painted, as it were, as broadly as Titian, and as softly as Mceris. And the entire pic- ture is executed in the same style. Here, Nature, and the whole gallery of art, can be mirrored in an engraving executed with a niceness that is denied to the engraver's hand, and all at a price such as machinery can work at. The engraving before us decidedly marks photoglyphy as an established success.
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