Mrs Cramp, Birmingham – A painted lady.

Bruce Schultz says:

Tony,

I have also seen these and wondered how they were made. I did a digital remake of a civil war soldier’s portrait last year that was done like this but I had no idea how the original was made.
I visited with Mark Ostermann at his studio and he explained these pictures were made with a solar enlarger. He has what may be the only functional one in the world. A negative is placed in the negative and the contraption is aimed at the sun, and adjusted every few minutes to keep things aligned. An image that’s barely more than an outline of a subject’s features is burned onto a print, presumably albumen or collodion POP. Then a retoucher sets about to add color and fine details.

Marizu says:

I love that there are sections for, “whiskers” and “moustache” in the shooting notes 🙂