Before The Era of Digital Photography.

[greybeard]

After my father passed away eight years ago this old photograph surfaced when we were sorting out his belongings.

The photo is of my grandfather and was taken between 1895 / 1897. The image is on glass measuring 9” x 11” and is about 3/32” thick. I do not know to what extent the image may have deteriorated in 116 years.

Joseph Messinbird circa 1896.jpg (95.86 KiB) Viewed 2393 times

Presently the photo is displayed on my living room wall along with other family photos but with a view to preserving it perhaps I should put up a copy and store the original away from light.

Daryl.

[Roadie]

Ay Darryl, That is a stunning photo, do you know the regiment he was in and was he in the Sudan or Egypt. You should certainlly do all you can to preserve the original photo, to me it's a classic. Cheers Roadie.

[Stickbow Hunter]

Beautiful old photo and a family treasure. I would most certainly be getting it high res scanned and copied.

Jeff

[Gringa Bows]

Man that photo is in good nic, for its age Daryl

[hazard]

Yep get a high res copy and store the original in a safe place

This is a very precious picture, a bit more info about your Grandfather would set the scene a bit more. The memory and respect for those who served has to be kept alive.

Even a story he may have told you. My own grandfather had some fantastic war time stories.

Ay Darryl, That is a stunning photo, do you know the regiment he was in and was he in the Sudan or Egypt. You should certainlly do all you can to preserve the original photo, to me it's a classic. Cheers Roadie.

[Siege]

The chemicals in that photo last better than they did back then. I would get a copy made if it was mine. Saying that if you want it up make sure sunlight doesn't touch it at any time of the day, also things like down lights can break down the chemicals but it takes longer. Even sunlight through windows will break down photos, even if the window has u.v protection.

While you would never sell it, there is a money value associated with the image. Images of men in uniform especially from ww1 and before have become quite collectible, in the right auction I would see this going for between 30-50 bucks, if you know of his history and if he served then that changes the value. Framed nicely with the information framed in the same frame you could see it reach around $250 give or take.

I know the money value isn't high, and you would never sell it, but sometimes it is good to know, people often put it on home contents insurance.

I love film photography, while digital has its benifits, they still haven't worked out how to do black and white properly.

[Dennis La Varenne]

Darryl,

He looks like he is holding a Martini Henry. The Magazine Lee Enfield was just coming into general issue by then, so it is probably one of the MH rifles which was converted to .303 and issued to a reserve unit of some kind. MHs were not generally front line issue by 1895. Your grandfather may also have been on campaign against the Boers then too.

If he was in front line service and was issued with the standard issue long arm of the time, then the picture would predate 1888 which was when the Magazine Lee Metford (MLM) came into service. It still used black powder like the Martini Henrys, many of which were rebarrelled to shoot the 'new fangled' .303 cartridge and relegated to reserve use because they were single shot. The MLM had an 8-round magazine which was later changed to a 10-round magazine - a signal advantage over the MH rifles.

So, based on the firearm he is holding, the picture may even be earlier than 1888. My guess is pre-1888 because the size of the head on the cleaning rod of the rifle is too large to fit a .303 barrel. The MH round was the 577-450 which was a 45 calibre weapon which better agrees with the size of the cleaning rod head. The bayonet lug is on the right hand side of the barrel which is how the MH bayonets were fixed.

On your grandfather's left arm there is a unit insignium of what looks to be a shield crest above crossed rifles. That may be a starting point to find out with whom he served.

If you have the original glass plate, keep it out of light and well padded. These old glass plates can be used to blow up pictures to huge size if required because they are 'continuous tone' images as we used to say in the printing trade in the same way that film negatives are continuous tone - ie they are not composed of pixels. Not having pixels means there is no significant deterioration of the image quality until it is blown up to colossal size.

But, you can scan the plate using your computer with the relevant scanning software set to 'slide' or 'negative'. However, the thickness of the plate may present problems of sharpness. If you can get a clear sharp scan of the plate at the highest resolution your scanning software allows, then you can save that image to disk and use it to print off whatever you like at whatever size you want as often as you want without damaging the original plate which could be stored away safely. But don't attempt scanning the plate repeatedly or there will be light deterioration from the scanner itself.

[TomMcDonald]

Hi mate,
If you are interested I can make an original copy of the photo using traditional darkroom processes. I can either contact print on archival paper or project an image to a larger size on archival paper.
It's just a hobby of mine.
Let me know if you are interested.
Tom.