100
Hetzer seemed to have an instinct for predicting new
photographic fads. On 10 November 1860 he advertised
in the Sydney Morning Herald that he had imported a
camera “expressly adapted for the new style of Portraits
aux Cartes.” Hetzer’s order for camera and supplies was
timely, enabling him to be the fi rst to market the new
process in Sydney. Blackwood, the original proponent
in 1859, did not advertise cdvs again until December
1861.
Mayall’s Royal Album with its portraits of the Royal
family provided the impetus for people to have their
own family album. Next to the Bible, the photographic
album was a family’s most treasured possession. It was
a compact and portable memory bank designed for cdvs
and later for tintypes. It approached the size of a Bible
when it was upsized for cabinet cards and views. Its
shape changed for Kodak prints and postcards at the
turn of the century. The album became the principal
repository for all kinds of photographic images, and
remained so until the widespread use of digital imag-
ing and computer storage in recent years. However, the
album never lost its usefulness or popularity.
As a result of the success of the cdv and negative
photography, the number of photographers leapt in the
1860s. Before the gold rush of 1851 there were less than
six daguerreotypists in Australia. There were 249 profes-
sional, amateur and travelling photographers working
across the country from 1850 to 1859. Between 1860
and 1870, the number of photographers in Australia
rose to 367. Of these, only about 43 were travelling
photographers. From 1866, following the Melbourne
Intercolonial Exhibition, many photographers advertised
their awards on the back of their cdv cards and on view
cards sold in portfolios or individually for framing.
Many photographers stayed in the trade only a
few months when they found that profi ts could not
be sustained. Some, perhaps uncertain whether the
boom would last, retained two professions. John Sharp
(1823–99) of Hobart Town was Governor Young’s den-
tist, as well as a photographer, photographic supplier
and retailer in stereo-views of Tasmanian scenery from
1856–62. Together with Frederick Frith he made a fi ve
part panorama of Hobart from the Domain in January
- This panorama is seen as the beginning of the
views trade in Australia.
News of the Tasmanian panorama spread to Sydney
and Melbourne, where photographers quickly followed
suit by making larger panoramas. In Melbourne, Walter
Woodbury (1834–85) (inventor of the Woodburytype)
made an eight part panorama of the streets of Melbourne
in circa 1857. Ten part panoramas of Sydney were
made in 1858 by the Freeman Brothers and William
Blackwood.
Panoramas were expensive and sales were low com-
pared with the small and ubiquitous cdv. The cdv was
perfect for portraits of people posed in their “Sunday
Best,” however there were rigid conventions and a nar-
row catalogue of orthodox poses for studio portraiture.
Exceptions to the “house-style” were made by itinerant
photographers who seemed as interested in real estate
as much as portraiture. Men, women and children re-
sponded enthusiastically to requests by itinerant pho-
tographers to pose outdoors in front of their residences,
modest or grand. Shop owners stood with their staff and
customers in front of their shops free from the constrict-
ing apparatus of the studio.
Street photography had been tried by Charles Dicker
(w. 1861) who exhibited twenty four ambrotypes at the
Victorian Exhibition “illustrative of the buildings and
places around Dunolly” (Argus, 8 October 1861). These
outdoor portrait-views were a precursor to cdv itinerant
photography, but it seems Dicker met with little commer-
cial success. Only twenty two plates survive and are now
part of the La Trobe Library, State Library of Victoria.
The fi nest exponents of itinerant street photography
were Henry Beaufoy Merlin (c. 1830–73) and his
assistant, Charles Bayliss (1850–97). In September 1870
the Englishman and Australasian Photographic Company
said it would “photograph every public building, shop,
and private residence in Sydney.” They claimed to have
created a “revolution...in street photography...within
the last 2 years they have photographed almost every
house in Melbourne, and the other towns of Victoria”
(Sydney Morning Herald, 21 September 1870). In 1873
Merlin and Bayliss arrived at Hill End, New South
Wales, where they documented the burgeoning gold
mining town and nearby Gulgong. Their studio was built
on land owned by their future patron, German emigrant
Bernard Otto Holtermann (1838–85).
Holtermann hoped to play a vital role in introducing
photographs of Australian urban life and scenery to the
world. He came into serious wealth as a major share-
holder and mining manager of the Star of Hope Gold
Mining Company which in 1872 uncovered the world’s
largest specimen of reef gold, standing 144 centimetres
high. It was valued at over 50,000 pounds, a fortune at
the time. Seeing the excellence of his tenant’s photo-
graphs, he engaged Merlin to help him with his vision
to promote migration to Australia through photography.
Using Daintree’s example for the London Exhibition of
Art and Industry of 1871, he proposed that New South
Wales should do the same with “Holtermann’s Interna-
tional Travelling Exposition” of panoramic photographs,
minerals, models of machinery, raw materials, zoologi-
cal specimens and natural produce.
When Merlin died of pneumonia in September 1873,
Bayliss took over Holtermann’s project. He travelled
to Ballarat, Victoria in 1874 where he made a nine part
360 degree panorama of the mining city from the tower
in the Town Hall. In 1875 he positioned himself in the