Queen's Album e-catalogue - Catalog - Page 20
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The negatives also showed the various techniques
used by photographers to perfect the image for
print. In some cases the non-emulsion side is
masked with paper adhered or taped in place,
and painted masking. In others, pencil has been
used on the emulsion side to provide definition
around particular parts of the image. Such editing
techniques were employed to make skies appear
clearer, waterfalls more glistening and shapes
sharper. These, it would seem, were not simply
documentary photographs. They were carefully
constructed images designed to portray NSW
as a desirable place – an ideal. The cloudless,
sun-drenched skies and ‘pure’ natural resources
seen in the photographs would have provided
stark contrast to the hazed and polluted
atmosphere of industrial Britain.
The Garden Palace
1880
Glass plate negative
NSW State Archives
NRS 4481 SH331
