Milk Glass Positive - The Opalotype

Oh the joys of hunting for tutt - sorry, "treasure" in fields! One of my favourite things about summertime..

This latest find has reminded me not to make assumptions and pay full attention when looking at old photographs. - I almost didn't bother to snap up a very rare gem because I wasn't looking properly.

I found this rather odd looking picture on an autojumble stall for (ahem) not very much money. I rather liked the frame: a concoction of very dark red velvet, gold-painted moulding and black outer edge but almost dismissed the image. There is so much hand work and colouring that it barely looks like a photographic image. The background is very white too. Much whiter than one sees on an albumen or carbon print of this vintage. This and the colouring made me wonder if it was a more modern reproduction. The back was loose (a good thing, as you always want to get in and look at it anyway) but here there were no clues, just lots of dust and spider droppings!

Anyway, I decided I liked the frame enough to buy it even if the picture turned out to be rubbish. Here it is:

It's quite large by nineteenth century standards. The actual image is about 6 x 8 inches- (a shade under whole plate size) and the outer frame is around 12 x 15 inches. The  back practically fell off to reveal this:

- Not very pretty! Sadly there are no labels or other written notes but the white area is a thick sheet of glass. The image is directly printed onto the other side. It is a photograph but with a lot of hand-applied colour and other detail work.  What we have here is an Opalotype.

The Opalotype, or Opaltype, sometimes known as a milk glass positive is an 1850s process, patented by Glover and Boyd in 1857 in Liverpool.  The method varies, either a silver gelatin or carbon emulsion being the commonest, but collodion could also be used. They aren't made in camera, but in a darkroom from a conventional negative. Multiple prints are therefore no problem.  Rarer than Ambrotypes , Opalotypes are very often hand coloured, like this one.

What's interesting is the skill and extend of the hand-work. There's some very subtle colouring to the skin tones and the eye is very well done.

While the face is still pretty 'photographic' the body has been over-worked to the point where it appears to be almost entirely a drawing:

This results in a rather odd appearance- neither one thing nor the other, which is what gave me pause originally.  I generally don't like visible hand-work in photographs; the modernist in me regards it as sullying the purity of the lens image but now I've cleaned her up and properly studied her, I'm very fond of this lady. - I just WISH there was a clue as to who she was!