PHOTOGRAPHIC MARVELS.

Auckland Star, Volume XXVI, Issue 121, 30 May 1885, Page 5

PHOTOGRAPHIC MARVELS.

Judicial Evidonco on the Tip of

Sensitised Nose,

AstonlsuiNi; feats of instantaneous photography are frequently chronicled by the press, and certainly no ono could bo more astonished on reading of these foats than aro photographers themselves.

For example, it was montioned tho other day in a Chicago paper that a photographer, whilo he had his head under the focusiug cloth, with his lens directed at a lady whose portrait he was about to tuke, saw a strange man rush at hor and aeize'hor purse. The photographer instantly touched a spring and caught the robber's likeness, and although tho latter had disappeared whon the photographer issued from beneath the focusing cloth, the malefactor was identified by his photograph and was afterwards arrested.

What astonishes a photographer who reads this interesting anecdote is the apparent fact that a Chicago photographer can tako portraits without a plate, whether wet or dry. Othor photographors havo to use a sensitised plate, but us this can bo placed in the camera only after tho photographer has finished the task of focusing and has withdrawn his head from the focusing cloth, it is evident that tho Chicago photographer used no plate. Tho reader of tho story in question who knows nothing of photography may see nothing incrediblo in it, sineo the general public hns tho impression that photographs can be takon with a lens und camera alono. We neod not, however, wonder that photographers aro astonished at tho Chicago story anddeclino to believe it

Careful inquiry reveals tho fact that tho story was truo, and that an unexpected robber was really photographed instantaneously without tho aid of a sensitised plate. It happonod in this way: The photographer in question was in tho habit of making bin own dry plates, and while engaged in this process ho accidentally transferred somo sonsitisod golatino film to tho inside of his focusing cloth. When ho placod his hoad undor tho cloth, this film was again accidentally transferred to his noso, and whon the image ol tho robbor was projected by tho lens upon tho photographer's noso an impression was mado, A few momonts later, whilo developing a plate, an irritation of tho tip of tho nose compelled tho phoro^rapher to rub that organ with fingers wot with the dovoloping agent. Tho result was that a picture appeared, and when tho photographer looked at himself in the glass he saw a fairly good portrait oxtending from the tip of his noso upward lor tho distance of three-quarters of an inch. Ho instantly " fixod "it with hyposulphite of soda, and it was upon the ovidenco of this no.o that tho robber was identified and arrested. Thus we soo that tho story in its true form is simplo and credible, whereas in tho form in which it was originally published it was absolutely impossible,—" New York Times."