Length 8.2 cm x W 4.9 cm
A hand coloured tintype of a woman. The subject is seated with her proper right arm resting on the arm of a bench. She is wearing a striped dress with buttons down the front of the bust and drop earrings. Her hair is styled in an up-do and she is staring directly at the viewer. Her cheeks have been hand coloured pink.
Tintype photography was invented in the 1850s as a cheaper and more portable alternative to daguerreotype. Tintypes are created by using the wet collodion process. This process involved coating a prepared glass plate with collodion and light-sensitive chemicals in a darkroom. Before drying, the plate was exposed in the camera and then developed. Afterwards, the photos were often hand coloured like this one. Portraiture was the most popular form of photography. Portraits acted as not only novelties but mementos of loved ones. By the late 19th century, it was not uncommon for members of the middle class and elite to carry photos of sweethearts, children and parents. Some were even taken postmortem. This tintype is estimated to have originated from the 1880s, when Kodak released its first amateur camera. This invention made photography much more accessible to the masses.
