Opalotype
Encyclopedia
Opalotype or opaltype is an early technique of photography
. Opalotypes were printed on sheets of opaque, translucent white glass; early opalotypes were sometimes hand-tinted with colors to enhance their effect. The effect of opalotype has been compared "to watercolor or even pastel in its softer coloring and tender mood." "Opalotype portraits...for beauty and delicacy of detail, are equal to ivory miniatures."
The basic opalotype technique, involving wet collodion and silver gelatin, was patented in 1857 by Glover and Bold of Liverpool
. Opalotypes exploited two basic techniques, using either the transfer of a carbon print onto glass, or the exposure of light-sensitive emulsion on the glass surface to the negative. Opalotype photography, never common, was practiced in various forms until it waned and disappeared in the 1930s. "Milk glass positive" is another alternative term for an opalotype.
Opalotype is one of a number of early photographic techniques now generally consigned to historical status, including ambrotype
, autochrome, cyanotype
, daguerrotype, ivorytype, kallitype
, orotone
, and tintype.
Photography
Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either electronically by means of an image sensor or chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as photographic film...
. Opalotypes were printed on sheets of opaque, translucent white glass; early opalotypes were sometimes hand-tinted with colors to enhance their effect. The effect of opalotype has been compared "to watercolor or even pastel in its softer coloring and tender mood." "Opalotype portraits...for beauty and delicacy of detail, are equal to ivory miniatures."
The basic opalotype technique, involving wet collodion and silver gelatin, was patented in 1857 by Glover and Bold of Liverpool
Liverpool
Liverpool is a city and metropolitan borough of Merseyside, England, along the eastern side of the Mersey Estuary. It was founded as a borough in 1207 and was granted city status in 1880...
. Opalotypes exploited two basic techniques, using either the transfer of a carbon print onto glass, or the exposure of light-sensitive emulsion on the glass surface to the negative. Opalotype photography, never common, was practiced in various forms until it waned and disappeared in the 1930s. "Milk glass positive" is another alternative term for an opalotype.
Opalotype is one of a number of early photographic techniques now generally consigned to historical status, including ambrotype
Ambrotype
right|thumb|Many ambrotypes were made by unknown photographers, such as this American example of a small girl holding a flower, circa 1860. Because of their fragility ambrotypes were held in folding cases much like those used for [[daguerreotype]]s...
, autochrome, cyanotype
Cyanotype
Cyanotype is a photographic printing process that gives a cyan-blue print. The process was popular in engineering circles well into the 20th century. The simple and low-cost process enabled them to produce large-scale copies of their work, referred to as blueprints...
, daguerrotype, ivorytype, kallitype
Kallitype
Kallitype is a process for making photographic prints.Patented in 1889 by W. W. J. Nicol, the Kallitype print is an iron-silver process. A chemical process similar to the Van dyke brown based on the use of a combination of ferric and silver salts. Many developing solutions can be used to give a...
, orotone
Orotone
An Orotone or gold tone is one of many types of photographic print which can be made from a negative. An orotone photograph is created by printing a positive on a glass plate precoated with a silver gelatin emulsion. Following exposure and development, the emulsion is coated with banana oil...
, and tintype.