Calotype

The calotype is a photographic process patented by William Henry Fox Talbot in 1841. It produces a paper negative from which multiple positive prints can be made.

Latent image: An invisible image formed by exposure to light and made visible through chemical development. The calotype’s brief exposure formed an image that Talbot later developed chemically.
William Henry Fox Talbot: An English scientist and inventor who developed the calotype and other early photographic processes. Talbot devised the process and secured its patent.
Daguerreotype: An early photographic process that creates a detailed direct-positive image on a silver-coated copper plate. It made a unique plate image, while a calotype negative could yield multiple prints.
Negative-positive process: A photographic method in which a negative image is used to produce one or more positive images. The calotype was an early practical realization of this reproducible photographic principle.
Photographic negative: A photographic image in which tones or colors are reversed relative to the subject. The calotype’s paper negative is the intermediate from which positive prints are made.
The Pencil of Nature: A book published in parts from 1844 to 1846, illustrated with photographs by Talbot. Talbot demonstrated calotype photography and its uses through this landmark publication.
Wet collodion process: A nineteenth-century photographic process using a wet collodion-coated glass plate as a negative. It retained negative-to-print reproduction while replacing the calotype’s paper negative with glass.
Photography: The practice and technology of recording images through light-sensitive materials or electronic sensors. The calotype helped establish photography as a medium capable of making multiple copies.
Photographic printing: The production of photographic images on a support by transferring or exposing an image. Calotype negatives enabled multiple prints through repeated photographic printing.
Royal Patent 8842: The 1841 British patent covering Talbot’s improved photographic process. This patent formally protected the process commonly known as the calotype.

Linked from 15 pages