1395
unpleasant brick-red color is the result.” That brick-
red color, and the wide range of other reds and sepias
which could be produced when making both salt
prints and albumen prints had long been considered
unpleasant.
It was probably Louis-Desiré Blanquart-Evrard, the
originator of albumen printing paper, who fi rst pro-
posed the application of the gold chloride toner to the
paper print. Fortuitously it had the same preservative
and stability effects which had been experienced with
the daguerreotype, but also brought about a dramatic
color change. The albumen image was, in its un-toned
state, both reddish-brown, and unstable—neither of
them desirable qualities. Relatively quickly the image
deteriorated and the highlights—always a pale cream
and less brilliant than had been previously experienced
with the salt print—darkened and yellowed. The gold
toner not only produced a rich purple/brown hue to the
shadows, but also acted as an effective barrier to the
yellowing of the highlights, as well as reducing image
fading. The richness of many of the Victorian images
preserved today attests to the effectiveness of the gold
toner to an otherwise correctly processed print.
As understanding of the chemical processes deep-
ened, it became clear that the acidity or alkalinity of
the gold chloride bath had a signifi cant impact on its
effect. By the closing years of the nineteenth century,
over twenty recipes for gold chloride toning baths were
available in contemporary manuals—each offering
a slightly different effect dependent upon its pH. An
acidic solution was found to produce a reddish hue in
the print, a neutral solution created the purple/brown
colors so fashionable from the 1850s, and an alkaline
solution tended towards the blue/black shadows, creat-
ing a much colder image.
With the introduction of the bromide print, and a
broader understanding of chemical effect, a much wider
range of print colors could be achieved by the end of
the century—platinum toners produced a rich sepia,
copper a bright red, vanadium a deep muted green, and
iron toners offered a range of blues.
John Hannavy
See also: Albumen Print; Blanquart-Evrard, Louis-
Désiré; Bromide Print; Fizeau, Louis Armand
Hippolyte; and Wall, Edward John.
Further Reading
Jones, Bernard E., Encyclopedia of Photography, London: Cas-
sell, 1911. Reprinted New York: Arno Press, 1974.
Lerebours, N. P., A Treatise on Photography, London: Longmans,
Brown. Green and Longmans, 1843, reprint New York: Arno
Press, 1973.
Wall, E.J., The Dictionary of Photography, London: Hazel,
Watson & Viney, 1897.
TOPLEY, WILLIAM JAMES (1845–1930)
Photographer and businessman
William James Topley, was born 13 February 1845 at
Saint John, near Montreal, Canada East, now Quebec
and died 16 November 1930 in Vancouver, British
Columbia.
Topley began his career as an independent tintyp-
ist but from 1864 apprenticed with William Notman,
Montreal. At age 22, Topley took charge of the new
Notman studio in Ottawa, the fi rst established outside
Montreal; by 1872 Topley was “proprietor” of the Not-
man studio, and in 1875 set up independently as The
Topley Studio with a staff of fourteen. By 1880 he had
vice-regal patronage, being appointed photographer
to Governor General the Marquis of Lorne; this con-
fi rmed his reputation but did not appear to increase his
income. The Topley Scientifi c Instruments Company,
established in the 1890s, specialized in the repair and
sale of optical and survey instruments and photostat
machines; at the same time the Topley Studio started
selling cameras and fi lm and provided developing and
printing services for amateurs.
While the studio specialized in portraits, including
those of most of the leading politicians, it also did scenic
work for the tourist trade and a great deal of commercial,
industrial and government work, in Ottawa and Quebec,
Ontario and the west. Some of Topley’s work has been
used on Canadian currency and postage stamps. Ap-
proximately 150,000 negatives are located at Library
and Archives Canada.
Topley and his son William de Courcy managed the
Studio from 1868 to 1923, successfully negotiating
major changes in photographic methods and materials,
accommodating business cycles and the advent of the
snapshooter, but fi nally closing it because there was no
family successor.
Andrew RodgerTOPOGRAPHICAL PHOTOGRAPHY
Dependence on a long history of pictorial and landscape
conventions means that topographical photography
inherited ways of seeing which precluded the sort of
objectivity and inclusiveness which the medium was
capable of delivering—much that was feasible from
1839 is absent but the reasons for these absences are
complex. Processes were unwieldy, image permanence
problematic, but, above all, demand hardly existed. The
depiction of buildings, townscape and the human envi-
ronment does of course occur—but the earliest evidence
is frequently visible at one remove: daguerreotypes
were employed as the source for line illustrations. This
indirect application of photography is most evident in N.