Ambrotype
This framed ambrotype is of the Farrand family children ca. 1860 from the William J. Farrand fonds. Invented around 1853, the ambrotype was referred to as the poor man’s daguerreotype. The development of this technique relied on two main contributions. The first was by Frederick Scott Archer who used nitrocellulose and ether, a combination referred to as collodion, to coat glass, thus preparing it for capturing an image and making it light sensitive. The second development was by Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard, who discovered that underexposed negatives on glass could appear positive when placed against a dark background. The process was formally patented in 1854 by James Ambrose Cutting, an American photographer, who used Canada balsam to glue the image and backing together. The resulting product was a bleached negative. Yet when a dark backing was used, the image appeared as a positive. The technique was popular until the late 1860’s, as it maintained the clarity of the daguerreotype. However, due to the inability to reproduce multiple images from one print, it was no longer used after the 1880’s.
City of Vaughan Archives: M993.19
Ambrotype
This framed ambrotype is of the Farrand family children ca. 1860 from the William J. Farrand fonds. Invented around 1853, the ambrotype was referred to as the poor man’s daguerreotype. The development of this technique relied on two main contributions. The first was by Frederick Scott Archer who used nitrocellulose and ether, a combination referred to as collodion, to coat glass, thus preparing it for capturing an image and making it light sensitive. The second development was by Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard, who discovered that underexposed negatives on glass could appear positive when placed against a dark background. The process was formally patented in 1854 by James Ambrose Cutting, an American photographer, who used Canada balsam to glue the image and backing together. The resulting product was a bleached negative. Yet when a dark backing was used, the image appeared as a positive. The technique was popular until the late 1860’s, as it maintained the clarity of the daguerreotype. However, due to the inability to reproduce multiple images from one print, it was no longer used after the 1880’s.
City of Vaughan Archives: M993.19