Camera Work: A Photographic Quarterly (1908 (Heft 22))

plate to have been exposed without a screen. A portrait done with sunlight
falling directly on the subject is full of golden amber tones. The tendency of
the plate is to exaggerate these effects ; and often in landscape the light and
shade effect is made more luminous by this exaggeration of the warm and
cold tones.
I have tried compensating for this, but have only been able so far to
change the predominant tone of blue to either a greenish or yellowish one.
But undoubtedly light filters could be made to compensate more accurately.
A very excellent scientific explanation of this change of color sensitiveness
was given by M. Brasseur in No. XX of Camera Work, and I was surprised
not to find the photographic press take it up. It is one of the most impor-
tant points in the question of color photography, and even in painting it
has played a role, coming in for a good deal of experiment with Monet, and
explaining in an admirable manner the blueness of his London series. I
think the change of color of things by moonlight is largely dependent on
this same matter of intensity of light, for the violet and blue-green tones are
preponderant then, to almost the exclusion of other colors.
Although the lens does not play a very important part in the rendering
of color, I have found a difference in the work of a color-corrected anastigmat
like the Goerz Celor, and an ordinary achromatic lens. But it is a difference
of hardly any importance to any but the scientific photographer. A lens
slightly uncorrected for spherical aberration, but corrected for chromatic
aberration, like the Smith lens, gives the most satisfactory results. It masses
the color and the planes of the picture better than an ordinary lens, besides
giving that soft envelope and diffusion which makes the plates at times seem
bathed with light.
Development :—To a timid, unadventurous individual, reading the
formula accompanying the Autochrome plates, with its many finger-staining
solutions, must suggest an elaborate and complicated process. But in
reality, as a process, it is—or can be made—simpler than any other photo-
graphic process in use to-day, and for facility and speed in the getting of
results, it stands on a par with that delightful old process, the tintype.
Leaving any consideration of the Lumière method for the moment, I will
demonstrate this claim for simplicity by describing my own method of
working. The first development is made with Rodinal, in a solution of one
part in from six to twelve of water. When the development is carried to the
required point, the plate is rinsed under the tap and immersed in the acid
permanganate bath for about two minutes for reversal—as soon as it is in this
solution the rest of the operation can be conducted in daylight. The plate
is then rinsed again and put back in the original developer until blackened ;
then washed under the tap for about a minute, dried, and varnished. The
entire operation of developing, and even the washing and drying, can be
accomplished in less than fifteen minutes. It is very important that the
redevelopment be done in a bright light and carried as far as it will go.
The question of fixing is still an open one. Theoretically there is nothing
“fixable” in the plate, but a number of “ experts ” claim that, in spite of

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