Victorian Humour on Cartes de Visite informative download now available

Victorian Humour on Cartes de Visite

This article looks at the various ways that cartes de visite used humour – intentionally and otherwise.

The article was first published in Photographica World, the magazine of the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain. For more details about the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain, please visit http://www.pccgb.com

An Introduction to Dating Cartes de Visite informative download now available

An Introduction to Dating Cartes de Visite

This article looks at some of the clues that help to date cartes de visite and cabinet card photographs.

The article was first published in Photographica World, the magazine of the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain. For more details about the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain, please visit http://www.pccgb.com

Photography Prize Medals informative download now available

Photography Prize Medals

This article looks at the way that Victorian photographers illustrated their prize medals on their photographic mounts to promote their businesses.

The article was first published in Photographica World, the magazine of the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain. For more details about the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain, please visit http://www.pccgb.com

Victorian Photographic Studio Backgrounds informative download now available

Victorian Photographic Studio Backgrounds

This article looks at the many styles of backgrounds and backcloths used in Victorian photographic studios. Some were very artistically painted whilst others were very crudely made.

The article was first published in Photographica World, the magazine of the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain. For more details about the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain, please visit http://www.pccgb.com

Marketing Victorian Photographic Studios informative download available

Marketing Victorian Photographic Studios

This article looks at the popular ways that Victorian photographers used to promote their studios and their services.

The article was first published in Photographica World, the magazine of the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain. For more details about the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain, please visit http://www.pccgb.com

Victorian Photographic Studios Illustrated

Cartomania 3 StudiosNOW AVAILABLE – for carte de visite enthusiasts everywhere. This is the fourth of a series of free articles about collecting Victorian cartes de visite and cabinet cards. There are more articles to follow. Please visit Photographers of Great Britain & Ireland 1840 – 1940 for your free download.

Victorian Photographic Studios Illustrated

This article looks at Victorian cartes de visite and cabinet cards and how some of them illustrate the photographer’s studio – outdoors and indoors.

The article was first published in Photographica World, the magazine of the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain. For more details about the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain, please visit http://www.pccgb.com

 

The Victorian Photo Dating Wizard incorporates A & G Taylor

A & G Taylor

Our unique, guaranteed photo dating wizard has been enhanced by the addition of a specific section on A & G Taylor, the Victorian photographers that referred to themselves as ‘The Biggest Photographers in the World’.

All of the carte de visite and cabinet card photograph mounts used by A & G Taylor have been analysed, researched and dated. There are now over 50 different A & G Taylor designs which are illustrated for you to choose from.

You can now date your A & G Taylor photographs even more accurately by using our DIY Victorian photo dating programme – click here for more details.

Of course, the Wizard will also date ANY of your cartes de visite or cabinet cards – whoever the photographer was !

The Victorian Photo Dating Wizard incorporates Hellis & Sons

Hellis & Sons

Our unique, guaranteed photo dating wizard has been enhanced again by the addition of a specific section on Hellis & Sons, one of London’s biggest photographic firms.

All of the carte de visite and cabinet card photograph mounts used by Hellis & Sons have been analysed, researched and dated. There are now nearly 40 different Hellis & Sons designs which are illustrated for you to choose from.

You can now date your Hellis & Sons photographs even more accurately by using our DIY Victorian photo dating programme – click here for more details.

Of course, the Wizard will also date ANY of your cartes de visite or cabinet cards – whoever the photographer was !

How Our Unique Photo Dating Wizard Works

How Our Unique Photo Dating Wizard Works - Cartomania 10 NOW AVAILABLE – for carte de visite enthusiasts everywhere. This is the third of a series of free articles about collecting Victorian cartes de visite and cabinet cards. There are more articles to follow. Please visit Photographers of Great Britain & Ireland 1840 – 1940 for your free download.

How Our Unique Photo Dating Wizard Works

This article explains how our unique, photograph dating wizard actually works. To use the Wizard click here.

The article was first published in Photographica World, the high quality magazine of the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain – the club for collectors of all things photographic from around the world. For more details about the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain, please visit http://www.pccgb.com


 

Victorian Photographic Studio Furniture

Victorian Photographic Studio Furniture - Cartomania 8NOW AVAILABLE – for carte de visite enthusiasts everywhere. This is the second of a series of free articles about collecting Victorian cartes de visite and cabinet cards. There are more articles to follow. Please visit Photographers of Great Britain & Ireland 1840 – 1940 for your free download.

Victorian Photographic Studio Furniture

This article looks at the many types of posing chairs and other posing devices used in Victorian photographic studios. Many were specially designed to change in size so that they suited men, women and children.

The article was first published in Photographica World, the high quality magazine of the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain – the club for collectors of all things photographic from around the world. For more details about the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain, please visit http://www.pccgb.com

 

Collecting Victorian cartes de visite and cabinet cards

Cartomania Part 1NOW AVAILABLE – for carte de visite enthusiasts everywhere. This is the first of a series of free articles about collecting Victorian cartes de visite and cabinet cards. There are more articles to follow. Please visit Photographers of Great Britain & Ireland 1840 – 1940 for your free download.

This article was first published in Photographica World in 2003. Photographica World is the magazine of the Photographic Collectors Club of Great Britain – the club for collectors of all things photographic from around the world.

 

Three more new Victorian Photographer Biographies published

Three (3) new biographies have been published at ‘Photographers 1840 – 1940 Great Britain & Ireland’

These are three (3) of many more free Victorian Photographer biographies currently published. More are scheduled for publication over the coming months.

 


Have you visited our DIY Photo Dating Wizard yet?

This service is about dating cartes de visite and cabinet cards from the attributes and characteristics of the photographic card mounts.

For only £1.99, our automated DIY dating Wizard will date your carte de visite or cabinet card for you. Really simple to do.

The Wizard is based on the detailed and extensive analysis of over 10,000 dated cartes de visite and cabinet cards supplemented by examination of trade directory dates for over 33,000 UK photographers and 65,000 studio addresses.

Would you like us to date your old family portraits?

Customised Dating of Photographs  –  service offered through ‘Photographers of Great Britain & Ireland, 1840 – 1940’

We have a lot of experience and data to enable accurate dating of individual portrait photographs from 1840 – 1940. There is a  charge and funds received help with the cost of maintaining the archive.

Individually researched photo dating service by archive staff – cost as follows

1 = £7.00     2 = £13.00     3 = £18.00    4 = £22.00. Thereafter £4.50 per photograph.

The more you would like dated, the cheaper it gets!  There is no charge unless photographs can be dated confidently to within a 10 year period.

DATING your photos will certainly help to fit them into your Family Tree

Free photographer lists, 1840 – 1940, completed A through to S

During recent weeks additional content has been added to the Photographer lists, 1840 – 1940, published at Photographers 1840 – 1940. These free listings now include content listed  A through to S, with the corresponding data available for immediate download through our e-commerce site.  Work continues apace on data T through to Z, likely to be completed this summer 2009.

Using Trade Directories to Date Photographs

Using Trade Directories

Trade directories are extremely helpful for dating old photographs. They are ONE of the main tools available and will often provide an answer that is accurate enough.

However, like most historical records, it helps to understand a little bit about them, including their strengths and their limitations.

Trade directories were, and still are today (Yellow Pages etc.), designed to allow businesses to advertise their goods and services. They are almost always DATED to reflect the year of publication and can cover a very small area such as a village or a wider area such as a town, city or county.

Good things about trade directories. They

  • are dated
  • include the business name
  • include one or more business addresses
  • sometimes include other marketing information such as products and prices.

Limitations of trade directories.

  • not every business advertised in trade directories
  • those that did advertise did not necessarily advertise every year; some advertised only periodically when they felt the need to or when funds were available
  • dating a photograph using trade directory data is less precise when businesses stayed at the same address for a long time
  • compilation  of a directory was usually six to 12 months in advance and business details sometimes altered between compilation and publication
  • historically, compilation errors did inevitably occur.

From this, we can deduce that

  • a trade directory entry indicates that a firm WAS IN BUSINESS at a particular address in at least part of  the year that the directory was published (unless details changed between compilation and publication ) – the actual dates are not definable – only the year
  • the ABSENCE of a trade directory entry does not mean that a firm was NOT in business at that time (maybe it did not advertise)
  • trade directory data helps most when firms moved about – the longer a firm was at a particular address, the less useful the trade directory information is for dating purposes.

Other ways of dating a photograph

For a general introduction, go to Dating Old Photographs.

If your photograph is a carte de visite or a cabinet card, and the trade directory information alone is not precise enough for you, use our unique dating wizard – coming SOON only on this website.

OR – if you prefer – go to our Custom Dating page and ask for our personal estimate of the date of your photograph which we will assess using all of the many sources of information available to us.

Ron Cosens 2009 https://www.cartedevisite.co.uk