Samuel F. B. Morse, who had met Daguerre in Paris and was so impressed by his daguerreotypes that he persuaded the National Academy of Design to elect him an honorary member, tried to take portraits shortly after Daguerre’s instructions arrived in New York on September 20, 1839. His wife and daughter sat “from ten to twenty minutes,” he recollected, “out of doors, on the roof of a building, in the full sunlight, and with the eyes closed.” This trial of patience took place, according to Morse, in September or October. He stated that his associate, John William Draper, was taking portraits “at about the same time.” Alexander S. Wolcott and John Johnson claimed to have taken “profile miniatures” in New York in October, using a camera of their own invention, in which a concave mirror was substituted for a lens. The results were at first indeed miniatures, for the plates were but three-eighths of an inch
RICHARD BEARD’S DAGUERREOTYPE GALLERY, LONDON:
Portrait, dated 1842. Daguerreotype. 1 1/2 x 2 inches, probably taken with Wolcott’s reflecting camera. Collection
Helmut Gernsheim, London
square. A few months later they were taking them 2 x 2 1/2 inches. To increase the illumination, sunbeams were reflected into the room by mirrors. Sitting was an ordeal; one victim recollected that he sat
for eight minutes, with the strong sunlight shining on his face and tears trickling down his cheeks while . . . the operator promenaded the room with watch in hand, calling out the time every five seconds, till the fountains of his eyes were dry.
In Philadelphia, Robert Cornelius took a self portrait in his back yard, which is said to antedate the New York experiments. But one hesitates, in the absence of more complete documentation, to assign to any one of these pioneers the honor of priority. Despite their efforts, portraitists could not hope for popular support so long as they demanded the heroism of immobility beneath blinding light for minutes on end. Radical improvements in technique were needed. Daguerre himself, who predicted the eventual use of his technique for portraiture, did little to perfect his invention. He took up again the scene painter’s brush and painted an illusionary apse for the church at Bry-sur-Marne. He died in that village in 1851.
By the end of 1840 substantial technical advances had been made.
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| Asher B. Durand. American painter. Daguerreotype. New-York Historical Society. New York |
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| fOntayne & porter: Cincinnati waterfront: Public Landing and Front Street. One of eight daguerreotypes taken in 1848. Cincinnati Public Library |
First, a double lens, which passed sixteen times more light than the simple meniscus fitted to the original daguerreotype cameras, had been designed by Josef Petzval and constructed in Vienna by Peter Friedrich Voigtlander. The design at once became so popular in France that imitations were made and marketed as “German lenses,” while in America unscrupulous dealers even engraved the name Voigtlander on “tubes” of domestic manufacture.
Second, the light sensitivity of the plate was increased by adding to the iodized surface another halide. The thought had occurred to many and had been tried by many, but it is clear that the first to publish a practical method was John Frederick Goddard, lecturer on optics and natural philosophy at the Adelaide Gallery, London: after the silvered plate had been fumed with iodine, the operation was repeated with bromine. The use of such an accelerator, or in the vernacular of the daguerreotypists, quickstuff, in combination with the Petzval lens, made it entirely possible to take portraits regularly at exposures of less than a minute.
Third, the tones of the daguerreotype were softened and enriched by gilding the plate, the invention of Hippolyte-Louis Fizeau. After the plate had been
bathed with hypo it was heated, and a solution containing gold chloride was flowed over it, which toned the image deep purplish brown. This operation had the added advantage that the delicate surface of the daguerreotype — compared by Arago to a butterfly’s wing — was rendered less fragile.
As soon as these improvements had been made, portrait galleries were opened everywhere and the world rushed to them.
All kinds of people sat before the camera; thanks to the relative cheapness of production, financial distinctions mattered little. Celebrated men and distinguished ladies as well as peasants and workmen who otherwise would be forgotten, have left their features on the silvered plate which Oliver Wendell Holmes called “the mirror with a memory.” The best daguerreotype portraits are straightforward and penetrating, due partly to the complete absence of retouching, which, except for delicate tinting, the fragile surface did not allow. But perhaps of more importance is the apparent handicap of the long exposure time. It was hard work to be daguerreotype; you had to cooperate with the operator, forcing yourself not only to sit still for at least halt
Daguerreotype, about 1850. Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities, Boston
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| hawes: Lemuel Shaw, Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Supreme Court. Daguerreotype, 1851. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York |
a minute, but also to assume a natural expression. If you moved, the picture was ruined; if you could not put yourself at ease in spite of the discomfort, the result was so forced that it was a failure.
A chapter of the illustrated book on Paris, La Grande Ville (1842), describes a daguerreotypist’s studio which was so popular that people waited their turn for an hour. One sitter
who is naturally ugly, and finding herself still uglier in the doleful expression of the daguerreotype, insists that it is a failure, and goes out without taking it. After her there conies a man with a tic, who constantly twitches the corner of his mouth, and in spite of it wants to be daguerreotyped; then another who blinks his eyes rapidly, then an old lady who everlastingly shakes her head. All these people cannot understand that they will never have a portrait by this process.
Of all countries, America adopted the daguerreotype with most enthusiasm, and it lived longer here than elsewhere. Yankee ingenuity brought mechanical improvements. The tedious task of bulling the plates to a high polish was done by machinery. John Adams Whipple of Boston installed a steam engine in his gallery to run the bulling wheels, heat the mercury, fan the clients waiting their turn, and revolve a gilded sunburst on his sign outside the gallery. At the Great Exhibition in the London Crystal Palace, 1851, Americans won three of the five medals awarded for daguerreotypes.
The United States department is of a very superior character. In the arrangement of the groups, and in the general tone of the pictures, there will be found an artistic excellence which we do not meet with in many others. This has been attributed to peculiar atmospheric conditions, but we believe it to be due to a great extent also to superior manipulation.
Among the exhibits were eight daguerreotypes of Cincinnati, taken by Charles Fontayne and William S. Porter in 1848. They were framed end to end to form a panorama, showing the river front crowded with steamboats, and the city climbing the heights above. Similar views were frequently made of other cities. The daguerreotype image is normally laterally reversed; the picture appears as in a mirror. In portraiture this reversal was not noticed; indeed the sitter found the likeness identical to his own vision of himself, which he knew only from a looking glass. But the reversal was troublesome in views; landscapes did not appear natural, signboards read backwards. To overcome this defect, daguerreotypists commonly fitted a prism over the lens when working out of doors, despite the fact that exposure was thus increased twofold.