After the introduction of the carte de visite portrait, and later the Imperial card, and the consequent reduction in price, the expense of this work became such a burthen to photographers that they were compelled to perfect their mechanical operations to the utmost extent, and by every means to endeavor to avoid it.
It occurred then to some one of the retouching artists to do this work upon the negative once for all, and from this beginning the art of retouching the negative has reached its present high position.
Retouching, like stippling or hatching in miniature, is a work of art, skill in which is gained only by assiduous practice controlled by good taste, and it is the special work of the artist and not of the photographer.
While then it is not considered wise for the photographer to be his own retoucher any more than it is for every man to be his own lawyer or doctor, yet every photographer should know enough about the art and practice of retouching to appreciate good work and to detect the bad. And for that reason he should make a study of it both from the artistic and the mechanical points of view.
By such a course of study he will learn to produce that quality of negative that will require the least amount of improvement at the hands of the retoucher. [p065]
The work of retouching requires certain appliances to facilitate it, and its own special room or atelier. A small well-ventilated room having a window with a northern exposure is the best adapted for this work. This room should be supplied with the necessary conveniences, such as the retouching stand or frame, which in its earlier form is as represented in Fig 1, but which, after a time, became much improved upon; one form of improvement is shown in Fig. 2, but neither of these forms became universally used, as many artists fashioned their stands or frames to suit their individual [p066] taste or the requirements of their room or light. The march of improvement, however, is never delayed by such a condition of affairs, and was not in this case.
It became necessary on the part of those interested in the manufacture of such apparatus to produce something that should meet all requirements, and this has indeed been accomplished by the production of the desk represented in Fig 3, which is called the Novel Retouching Desk and is suitable for any size of negative under 25×30; it has a false top which can be pulled down to darken the space in front of the ground glass cut out.