Mr. Willis

There is, then, in our opinion, for the art student, but one process in which to print, and that is the platinotype process discovered by Mr. Willis. Every photographer who has the good and advancement of photography at heart, should feel indebted to Mr. Willis for placing within his power a process by which he is able to produce work comparable, on artistic grounds, with any other black and white process. We have no hesitation in saying that the discovery and subsequent practice of this process has had an incalculable amount of influence in raising the standard of photography. No artist could rest content to practise photography alone as an art, so long as such inartistic printing methods as the pre-platino-type processes were in vogue. If the photo-etching process and the platinotype process were to become lost arts, we, for our part, should never take another photograph.

But here it is necessary to warn the student against the remarks of the platinotype company and many of their admirers, who maintain that for good prints

"plucky" negatives are necessary; and then follows the old story about "fire," "snap," "sparkle" and Co. As we have already despatched that gang", we will spend no more time over their funeral. For low-toned effects, and for grey-day landscapes, the platinotype process is unequalled, but the "fire," "snap," "sparkle" company think such effects bad, weak, muddy, and what not. Of course, the student will listen to nothing of this, but try for himself, and when he wants advice, let him ask it of good artists. We once showed a grey-day effect to a clerk at the Platinotype Company's Office, having previously had the opinion of some first-rate painters upon it; the clerk looked at it critically and said, "Yes, very nice; but look at this," and he took us to a frame hanging in the same room and pointed to a commonplace view, taken with a small stop in bright sunlight - a view, we believe, of a church or something of that kind; there was his ideal of what a platinotype should be. The print in question was about fit for a house-agent's window. No! Platinotype print ers do not seem to know what a good thing they have. Their paper is as suitable and as beautiful for soft grey-day effects as for brilliant sunshiny effects, and it is to be hoped they will soon have their eyes opened to this fact, and cease to encourage the false notion that good, ergo plucky, sparkling, snappy negatives are those required for the use of the paper. The process, however, is not perfect, the only perfect printing process being photo-etching, as we shall show presently; but of all the processes for printing from the negative it is the best; of all the typographic processes it is the best; and it is better than many of the copperplate processes.

Cold Process

Since writing this chapter, Mr. Willis has introduced a great improvement in his process, by which the print can be developed with a cold solution; but what is far more important, artistically speaking, the development can be con-trolled,for the developer can be applied with a brush, so that parts can be intensified or kept back at will, and "sinking-in" is avoided. This is a great and distinct advance.

Ferro-Prussiate Printing Process

The Ferro-Prussiate printing process, of course, does not concern us, blue prints are only for plans, not for art.