One of the greatest things about early photography processes is it also sparks others’ interest in the field. With this, the knowledge base grows. Inventors, scientists, and artists expand on the ideas, materials and processes, giving us the information we have today.
Today, we are looking at the Albumen process; what it is and why it was the most popular photography technique of the last half of the nineteenth century.
Cover photo - natasha t on Unsplash" target="'_blank'" rel="noopener">Natasha T
What is Albumen?
Albumen is a word you might have heard before, except not attached to photography. It is the white part of the egg, taken from the Latin word Albus (like Dumbledore) meaning ‘white’.
What Does Egg White Have to Do with Photography?
To be honest; nothing. The consistency of the egg white is a perfect paper coating for some alternative processes, such as Salt Print. An Albumen print is like a Salt Print. The biggest difference is that the silver nitrate (light-sensitive medium) is not absorbed into the paper.
History of Albumen Photography
The Albumen silver print was born in 1947 by (you guessed it) a French inventor by the name of Louis Désiré Blanquart-Evrard. Louis had heard about the Daguerreotype, and had studied the Calotype and the salt print. He then started writing about the processes. He was the first person to write about positive/negative paper photo processes in France.
He continued to write about his experiments; especially bathing paper rather than brush coating them. 3 years later in 1850, he introduced his technique as the Albumen paper printing technique, which was popular until the end of the century.
What helped to make it famous and widely used was the Carte de Visite. These were the photographic version of baseball cards, prints of 6cm x 10 that people traded. It was helped by a process by photographer André Adolphe Eugène Disdéri that allowed 8 images to be printed at once. These quickly became a success with the photograph of Emperor Napoleon III.
The popularity of one prompted photos of others. The thin paper photographs measured 54 mm x 89 mm, then mounted on a card of 64 mm x 100 mm. They kept the typically warm, brown tones of the albumen print. Soldiers fighting in the civil war kept these as a reminder of loved ones back home, and are now very collectible.
Why Were Albumen Prints a Better Reproduction Process?
Albumen prints start by dipping the paper into a solution of egg white and salt. When dry, this creates a protective layer over the paper and is a huge benefit for two reasons. The silver nitrate floats on the glossy surface, creating better detail and high contrasted images. Also, less silver nitrate is needed, making it an inexpensive process.
It was so popular that it became the first commercially viable process to reproduce images from contact printing. Commercial because they are created in a quick and cheap manner. Albumen prints are cheaper than Daguerreotypes and Ambrotypes and hold much better quality. You would need access to a lot of eggs. One manufacturer of Albumen photographic paper was reported to use over 60,000 eggs a day in its process.
How to Make an Albumen Print
To make an Albumen print, you need a negative and four ingredients; eggs, salt (sodium or ammonium chloride), silver nitrate, and water. On top of this, you need paper, where 100% cotton paper or pure watercolor paper works best.
For the solution, separate the white part of the egg from the yolk. To remove any chance of contamination, separate each egg over a separate container in case the yolk breaks. The number of eggs you use will depend on the size of the prints and the number of prints you will process.
Mix the eggs and salt together. You can either use the solution immediately or store it in the fridge (will last for months). To use immediately, pour into a tray bigger than the paper you will use. The solution seals the paper from absorbing the silver nitrate while giving the image a glossy sheen for rich details and contrast.
The idea is to float it on the solution for three minutes, but not immerse it. Some photographers bend the left and right sides of the paper (90 degrees for a few cm) to make it easier to remove from the solution. Check for air bubbles as you pull up, and use the side of the tray to remove the excess.
Let the paper dry, which could take a long time depending on the temperature. When dry, dip the paper into a 15% solution of silver nitrate and water, which measures approximately 40 g silver nitrate and 250 ml water. CAUTION – use gloves and eye protection as silver nitrate can permanently damage eyes. Let it float for 3 minutes, then let it dry in an area without UV light.
Expose the negative immediately through contact printing. Use a clip frame to sandwich the negative on top of the Albumen paper (collodion negative works well). Leave it in the sun until the highlights look violet and the shadows look bronze.
NB – Sunlight will give better contrast and highlights/blacks than UV light.
It will look darker than it will be before washing and fixing. Wash the print for 15 minutes, or until the water is no longer milky (silver nitrate runoff). A bath of sodium thiosulfate will fix the exposure, which will need 60 seconds. Place in gentle running water for another hour.
From this stage, you can tone the image with gold or selenium. This will not only improve the color and density of the scene, but it also protects against further processing or oxidization. In this stage, you are replacing some of the silver with gold or platinum.