Ifyou want to re-photograph a photograph (of a deceased friend, for instance) the size of the original print, you may find that your camera is not of long enough extension. This may be remedied by your taking off the front, if removable, and making a fret-wood box, say of 6 inches depth, best with another flange to carry your lens, or with a circular hole into which your lens may screw tightly.
The joints of such a box may be made Tight-tight by a piece of black tape nailed between, and the inside had better be blackened with cheap glossless Chinese ink. Having extended your camera by this or other means, place it on the table 80 that it is quite firm. Fix your photo to be copied, preferably upside down for focussing, in x position exactly parallel to the ground glass of your camera. Draw horizontal and vertical lines on that ground,.say of lantern plate size (allowing for slide binding) or half plate or cabinet size as the case may be.
With two lamps, say of the candle power of Rochesters on either side at two feet distance from the print, the exposure may be about ten minutes. It varies, of course, with the distance of the lens from the plate.
Use a thick plate. Ilford Process Plates ought to be the best and probably are, but the specimen sent me was antiquated on arrival. A thicker plate than Ilford Empress would be advisable, though such plates will answer after a little intensifiaction. For engravings and black and white generally, a little under-developing and subsequent intensification, with ura num or copper and silver other wi-e, may yield the best results.
Your n ive can either be enlarged on bromide paper or made into a lantern slide. Paget Printing Out Slides give very beautiful results' with engravings. And one groat merit of these plates is that they are transparent enough to show up brilliantly with an old lantern.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.