That a transfer can be used as a basis for working up with pastel and water-color need only be incidentally mentioned, because such work is outside of pure photography and it is unnecessary to express an opinion as to the artistic value of such productions in this place. The photographer should always adhere to the fundamental law: Do not forsake photographic methods.
CHAPTER VIII
THE PREPARATION OF BROMOIL INKS
By Eugen Guttmann
Everyone who devotes himself to the higher aims of photography, and studies the works of painters, must learn to see with the artist’s eye if he will apply his knowledge in pictorial presentation of his subjects. In the same way the bromoil printer should become more familiar with the working tools of the painter, and especially with the most valuable material at his command, the ink, than has hitherto been the case.
When we look back on the history of painting, we note the often-mentioned fact that not only the old masters of all schools, Italian, German and Dutch, but also the later generations till about the middle of the last century, ground their own colors. They did this not merely to be assured of the most perfect purity and thus absolute permanency, but also because they wanted to obtain the greatest possible brilliancy.
As regards the purity of the materials used—the colors and the mediums—there is no doubt that to-day, thanks to the high perfection of manufacturing methods, this can usually be depended upon; but as regards the brilliancy, no positive instructions of any kind for obtaining this have come down to us. The painters took their secrets with them to the grave. But as the result of exhaustive research, together with advances in the manufacture of colors, we can assume with some certainty that the masters of past times attained vigor in their colors chiefly by the finest possible grinding of the colors and by a relatively small addition of medium. “It may sound paradoxical,” says Professor Th. Petruscheffsky in one of his treatises on the technique of painting, “but it is, however, true, that in oil painting oil should be avoided as much as possible.”
The old masters knew this and acted accordingly, and the modern manufacturer also knows it, and replaces any excessive quantity of oil in the medium, which is mixed with the pigments to bring them into a paintable form, by other substances, for instance turpentine, and certain resin solutions, which have no binding properties; during the work these substances evaporate and leave behind the color with very little medium.
These facts the bromoil printer must know, for he should also use colors from which he can get the very best possible results.
The ink is one of the most important parts of his equipment. This fact was fully recognized by English, French, and German manufacturers, and inks were obtainable that left nothing to be desired. At the outbreak of the war the position of affairs was immediately altered. It was not possible to use English and French sources of supply and the German supply gradually failed. What was furnished as ink for the oil process was suitable for anything else but that—a soft, smeary and smearing mess, which did not permit any finer working up of the picture, and required so high a relief that individuality in the work was excluded.