696
widen during the 1870s. The fi rst photographic analysis
of movement by Eadweard Muybridge in America was
an impressive achievement. In 1872 the former gov-
ernor of California, Leyland Stanford commissioned
Muybridge, to photograph a trotting horse, in order
to determine whether at any point all hooves left the
ground. Muybridge’s early attempts in 1872 and 1873
were only partially successful. His chaotic personal life
prevented immediate further work but he returned to
the investigation in 1877. Armed with a faster shutter,
Muybridge produced pictures suffi ciently improved
for Stanford to finance the conclusive project. In
1878 Muybridge adopted a method fi rst proposed by
Rejlander. Using a battery of cameras, he produced
sequential photographs showing that a galloping horse
did indeed briefl y lift all four legs off the ground. That
he was still using wet plate photography makes his suc-
cess even more impressive. By the 1870s police forces
were making increasing use of photography as an aid
to identifying criminals and systematic picture archives
were beginning to be assembled in the major Euro-
pean cities. The classifi cation of thousands of images
was a particular problem. In the late 1870s Alphonse
Bertillon in Paris began devising a practicable system
involving the measurements of specifi c anatomical
details and strict standardisation of identifi cation por-
traits, which were to bear no relation to commercial
portraiture. Scientifi c studies by Cesare Lombroso in
Italy and Francis Galton in England were undertaken
to discover whether criminality could be determined
from facial features. Galton’s 1870s investigations led
him to devise composite portraiture, successive brief
exposures of several different portraits on a single plate.
His work on criminal physiognomy was never accepted
but he went on to use composite photography to confi rm
Muybridge’s studies. During the Franco-Prussian War
of 1870–1871, the use of microphotographs transported
by ‘Pigeon Post’ created widespread interest. The chief
architect of the scheme was the French photographer,
Prudent Dagron, who used his experience gained
making microphotographs for jewellery and trinkets
to prepare microphotographs of written messages that
were transported by pigeons to and from Paris during
its siege. Photographic techniques were a key compo-
nent of the many expeditions organised to observe the
1874 Transit of Venus and there was much speculation
in contemporary photographic journals. Photographers
and scientists had high hopes but most were disap-
pointed with the quality of their fi nal images. The wet
collodion plates the majority of observers favoured
were unable able to produce the sharp images required.
The notable exception was the good results achieved
by the French astronomer, Pierre-Jules-Cesar Janssen,
who built an ‘astronomical revolver’ camera using
circular daguerreotype plates. The insensitivity of the
obsolete process was no handicap when photograph-
ing the sun.
One of the most signifi cant technological develop-
ments in photographic history was brought about unwit-
tingly by British amateur photographers. The gentleman
amateur had been an important and infl uential fi gure in
British photography since the days of the pioneers and
by the early 1870s there were more amateur photogra-
phers in Britain than in any other country. The standard
way of making photographic negatives remained the
wet collodion process, reliable and practicable in a
studio but the chemical manipulations involved, along
with the necessary equipment and materials, made it
far less suited to work in the fi eld. As a consequence,
many amateur photographers favoured dry processes,
which allowed them to roam far and wide burdened by
little more than a supply of pre-prepared plates and a
camera. Unfortunately, early dry plates were unreli-
able and exposure times almost always longer than
that for wet collodion, which was a continual source
of frustration. New and supposedly better dry plates
were a regular feature in the photographic press. Much
space was taken up with discussions of their relative
merits with fi rm conclusions rarely reached. A popular
instruction book of the period describes no less than six
different dry plate processes (Hughes, 1870, 66–74).
Richard Leach Maddox’s seminal British Journal of
Photography paper of 1871 suggested that gelatine
silver bromide emulsions might produce a dry plate that
could match the qualities of wet collodion but it made
little immediate impact. However, In 1873 a London
photographer, John Burgess, marketed a bottled emul-
sion of gelatine bromide and later sold pre-prepared
plates. The same year Richard Kennett patented a dried
gelatine bromide emulsion, which was also marketed.
Although many amateurs welcomed both products they
enjoyed only limited commercial success. Reservations
about the early products of Burgess and Kennett were
partly due to their inconsistent quality but a major
problem was the extraordinary sensitivity of gelatine
bromide plates. Photographers of the period were totally
unprepared for the short exposures possible with the
new emulsions and regularly over-exposed their plates.
But as amateur photographers slowly became more
familiar with the characteristics of gelatine bromide,
the advantages of short exposures became apparent,
while refi nements in the process and in manufacturing
led to plates of improved and consistent quality. The
Liverpool Dry Plate Company began selling Kennett’s
plates in 1876 and Charles Bennett’s improved plates
in 1878. Demand increased and other companies eager
to exploit the enormous amateur market rapidly entered
the business. By the end of the decade there were over
twenty companies manufacturing and selling gelatine
dry plates and many exhibitions now included amateurHISTORY: 6. 1870s