R. G. HARRIS

Lantern slides without clouds, are now as rare-ly seen as are prints without them. At the present time the percentage of landscape negatives that do not show clouds in them is small indeed compared with what it was fifteen years ago. The orthocramatic plate, coupled with the use of a light filter makes the retention of clouds in landscape negatives an easy matter; and when even these are not used, the fact that nine-tenths of the exposures made are shutter exposures accounts for the great prevalence of clouds in the negatives of today.

The lantern slide worker, more than any other, should make a special effort to obtain his negatives with clouds in them, for by so doing he will obviate a large amount of subsequent work. Perhaps in his landscape negatives clouds already exist, but owing to their greater opacity they do not show well defined in the print, in such a case the sky portion should be carefully reduced with ferricyanide or persulphate until the clouds assume an opacity of equal printing value with the landscape portion. In some cases the sky portion of the negative exceeds in density the landscape portion by only a small amount, and it is not desirable to interfere with the opacity. Where this is the case, the landscape portion should be screened during exposure, when making the slide, so that the denser may have a few seconds additional exposure. There will, however, always be a certain proportion of slides which necessitate the introduction of clouds from other negatives, so that it is essential for the slide maker to be proficient in the methods whereby clouds are introduced into slides that show no trace of them.

Two methods are generally available; the clouds may be printed on a separate lantern plate from a specially made cloud negative, and this cloud slide used as a cover glass, or they may be printed on the same plate as the landscape portion in the camera by double printing. These two methods will now be described in detail, preference being given to the first, or "cover-glass method."

It is essential that the slide maker, who has the prospect of much landscape work before him, should be well stocked with cloud negatives of every description, specially taken and developed, so that he can at any time select a suitable cloud effect for any particular landscape. I recommend that prints from these cloud negatives be mounted in a rough album, and the time of the day when the negative was taken, with the compass direction of lighting, be written underneath. There will then be no danger of bizarre and contradictory cloud effects being shown on the screen. In these cloud negatives no portion of the landscape should show ; if it is impossible to avoid obtaining some portion when taking the negatives, the landscape should be blocked out by gumming some non-actinic paper upon the reverse side of the negative.

Having obtained a lantern slide of the landscape portion see that the sky part of the slide is represented by absolutely bare glass. If the negative has its sky portion blocked out this will secure perfectly pure glass in the lantern slide, but should any deposit be apparent in the slide it must be cleared away by the application of the ferri-cyanide reducer, applied with a small tuft of cotton wool. The slide is washed and dried in the usual manner. To make the cloud portion, take another lantern plate, and, having selected a suitable cloud negative make a lantern slide of this. The cloud negative must be adjusted in the camera so as to occupy the position on the plate that will enable it to fit in the clear portion of the landscape. All that is necessary is to hold the landscape slide over the image of the cloud neg-agative shown on the focussing screen, when it will be seen at once if the two correspond. Expose and develop, taking care to work under the same conditions as when making the landscape so that the colors of both may be the same.

On removing the plate from the fixing bath and comparing it with the landscape portion it will at once be seen how nearly they correspond with each other. Here, now, is seen the value of reduction and intensification in slide work. Perhaps the sky slide requires a slight intensification to bring it up to the landscape portion, or it may be denser and require a brief application of ferricyanide reducer. Having made the two slides of equal opacity, place them back to back, with the edges of the slides even. It will at once be apparent whether the two dovetail into each other, or whether the sky slide overlaps the landscape slide and give a bad effect. Should the sky slide encroach on the landscape anywhere, take a tuft of cotton wool, dip it in the ferricyanide reducer, and, still holding the slide back to back, carefully remove the portion of the sky slide that overlaps the landscape. Do not use the reducer too strong, and see that none of the reducer reaches the landscape by capillary attraction.

When the slides are dry and bound film to film the sky and landscape portions should fit and form a perfect slide. This is the best method of obtaining clouds in lantern slides; but it has one drawback, when developing for warm colors it is not always easy to closely match the two slides. For this reason it is best, whenever possible, to expose the sky and landscape plates one after the other and develop them together. Another means of ameliorating the difficulty is to prepare a stock of sky slides during leisure moments, so that some variety may enable the slide maker to effect a match.

The second method, that of printing the clouds on the same plate as the landscape, is not quite so certain as the method just described. Having selected the cloud negative it is desired to incorporate with the landscape, a mask has to be prepared with which to screen the landscape portion during the exposure of the cloud negative. To prepare this mask, take a piece of non-actinic paper, lay it-over the landscape negative, and holding the negative up to a strong light, roughly trace with a pencil on the paper the outline of the landscape where it comes against the sky. Cut out the landscape portion along this line so that two masks result, one for the sky and the other for the landscape. For convenience, the landscape mask may be gummed on a piece of cardboard, leaving the outline of the landscape projecting beyond the stiff of the cardboard. The stiffening is an advantage, as it enables the mask to be held more securely by them and during exposure.

Place the landscape negative in the camera and expose on the lantern plate in the usual manner. Then remove the landscape negative and insert the cloud negative, taking care that it is placed in the same relative position that the landscape negative occupied. Now hold the cardboard mask in front of the cloud negative so that it covers that portion of the negative corresponding to the landscape negative. The mask requires holding about an inch away from the negative, and should be kept moving slightly above and below what would be considered to be the line of junction of the landscape and sky portions. It will thus be seen that the sky negative is vignetted into the landscape portion in the camera, so that both are obtained upon the one lantern plate. A little practice enables this to be done in a very neat manner, but this method is probably not so easy for the beginner as the one previously described.

It should be borne in mind that the same necessity exists in this second method for obtaining the landscape portion with the sky showing as clear glass, otherwise on removing the landscape negative and inserting the cloud negative a brilliant result will not be obtainable. If the sky portion of the landscape negative is not sufficiently dense to give freedom from deposit in the slide, that portion of the paper mask covering the sky should be roughly placed in position during the exposure of the landscape negative to insure this end. Photography.