In the late 1800s, a camera was not a pocket-sized convenience. It was a serious, often expensive piece of machinery built from polished hardwoods like mahogany, fitted with brass lenses, and connected by accordion-like bellows to a glass plate at the back. It required a sturdy wooden tripod, precise chemistry knowledge, and a steady hand. When photographers chose to pose for portraits alongside these machines, they were making a statement about who they were and what they did.
This gentleman has passed dapper and is approaching a lampoon representation of an artiste! The floppy polka dot bow tie and bunch of flowers might be his everyday dress but it feels to us as if he is having some fun or playing a part. He holds the bulb of a pneumatic shutter mounted on a large view camera. His pocket watch is in hand to time the exposure.
Not every photographer posed with rigid formality. Some brought personality to the frame. The man above leans into theatrics, gripping the pneumatic shutter bulb while checking his pocket watch to time the exposure — a detail that captures the technical demands of the craft with a wink.
This cabinet card shows a mustached man with a folding camera in a studio setting.
Cabinet cards — photographs mounted on thick cardboard — were a standard format of the era, used both as portrait keepsakes and subtle professional advertisements. A photographer posing with his own equipment in a studio setting told potential clients exactly what kind of work he was capable of.
In this cabinet card a young man uncaps the lens of his tripod mounted camera to make an exposure. In spite of the caped coat, grass, and landscape background it was taken in a studio. The background is unusual because it seems to be painted directly on the wall rather than on canvas. The landscape has been painted over the baseboard of the wall. The photograph is by Whitley of Elmira, NY.
A well dressed young man inserts a film holder into a folding plate camera on a tripod in this oval cut photograph on a heavy black mat. The photographer’s name is embossed in hard to read script but the location, Hancock, Michigan is clear.
These portraits also documented the actual mechanics of the job. Inserting a glass plate holder, uncapping a lens, or holding a shutter release — these were not staged gestures. They were the real, practiced steps of making a photograph, and showing them communicated skill and experience.
Two women in hoop skirts tease a photographer in this albumen print taken from an album of Mount Savage, Maryland photographs. The dresses suggest the 1850s/60s.Tintype of 3 young women with studio camera. The cryptic writing reads “The Three Damnid” or “Danmid” Wilhemina Greek Slave & Damnid or Danmid”. Perhaps they were referring to the Danaïds, daughters of Danaüs in Greek mythology painted by Burne-Jones. “Greek Slave” seems to be a reference to Hiram Powers famous stature but these young ladies are certainly more completely dressed than she! Wilhemina has defeated us as an art history reference.
Not all subjects treated the camera with reverence. The playful scenes above show that the studio camera was also a social prop — something to joke around, pose beside, and interact with in ways that broke from the stiff formality typical of Victorian portraiture.
Samuel F. B. Morse with his camera. The albumen photograph by A. Bogardus of New York shows an older Morse with his daguerreotype camera beside him on a table. In addition to his accomplishments as a painter and inventor of the telegraph Morse was a very early practitioner of the daguerreotype process. He was given a demonstration by Daguerre himself in 1839 before the public presentation. Morse taught the process to a succession of eager American photographers, including Mathew Brady.
Samuel F. B. Morse — best known for the telegraph — was also a pivotal figure in early American photography. Daguerre personally demonstrated his process to Morse in 1839 before it was publicly announced. Morse then taught the daguerreotype process to a string of American photographers, including Mathew Brady, cementing his place in the history of the medium.
Dr. Hermann Wilhelm Vogel poses with his camera in an oval cut albumen print mounted on a gold and black decorative page. The handwritten text reads “your old friend H. Vogel” and we can not determine if it is written or printed on the mount. Vogel was a famous figure in 19th century photography and well known as the teacher of Alfred Steiglitz.
Dr. Hermann Wilhelm Vogel was a major name in 19th-century photography, remembered as the teacher of Alfred Stieglitz. His inscription — “your old friend H. Vogel” — turns what could be a formal portrait into something more personal, a record of friendship within photography’s close-knit professional world.
This is a collodion negative that has been mounted as a lantern slide. It has been labeled by the photographer “Wet col neg Wet col positive”. The paper mat tells us it was made in 1873 in Belvidere, New Jersey. It names the young men (it appears that the young women did not rate naming) are H. W. Hazard and John C. Browne. The camera peeks out of the mat on the left side but the dark tent, buckets, and other supplies give us a delightful window on what was involved in an afternoon of photographing in 1873.
Outdoor photography in the wet plate era required hauling a portable darkroom into the field. The dark tent, chemical buckets, and supplies visible in this 1873 image from Belvidere, New Jersey, show just how labor-intensive a single afternoon of photography could be. The camera itself is almost secondary to the sheer volume of equipment surrounding it.
In this tintype a young man stands beside a table holding a camera.
The clumsily hung backdrop says interior but the real looking grass under the two young men says outdoor.
This European carte-de-visite is by W. Freudentheil. It seems unlikely that the grim faced little boy in the strange coat could manage the large stereo camera beside him.
The camera appeared in portraits of all kinds of subjects — young men, children, and amateurs alike. The stereo camera beside the stiff-faced boy in the carte-de-visite above dwarfs him entirely, yet its presence gives the image its defining character. Cameras of this size were genuinely imposing objects.
This trimmed amateur photograph is not identified. The tripod appears to be homemade but the camera under the darkcloth is a real box camera.
Not every photographer worked out of a polished studio. Amateur photographers built their own equipment when necessary. The homemade tripod in this unidentified photograph speaks to the resourcefulness of hobbyists who were serious about the craft but working with limited means.
A cyanotype self portrait with a folding camera taken in a mirror.A young woman in a tinted blue dress and her camera are reflected in a large mirror. The left side shows a double image of a chair and the wall paper in the beveled edge of the mirror. This real photo postcard is marked “Républiuqe Française” and “Carte Postale”.
Taking a self-portrait with large format equipment required real ingenuity. Both images above use mirrors to solve the problem — the photographer frames themselves in the reflection, turning the act of capturing their own image into a visible part of the composition. The French postcard above even catches the beveled edge of the mirror doubling the background.
This image is half a stereo card by G.S. Irish of Glen’s Falls, N.Y. The Fort William Henry Hotel, Lake George, N.Y.; the photographer; and his stereo camera are reflected in a mirrored gazing ball.This stereo card is labeled “Finley & Sons, Photographers, Canandaigua, N.Y.” On the back is a label “View at Sonnenberg, the residence of F.F.Thompson, Canandaigua, N.Y.” and in ink “The Glass Bubble”. Reflected in the gazing ball is a house and garden, a stereo camera on a tripod and two men reclining on the path. The “Artistic” size mount suggests a 1870s date.
Garden gazing balls became an unexpected tool for photographers wanting to capture themselves and their surroundings in a single frame. Both stereo cards above use the reflective sphere to show the photographer, camera, and location together — a clever workaround that also produced visually striking images.
This image called “Focusing” by Miss Emily V. Clarkson was printed by the NN Photogravure. company Since we are a couple absorbed in all things photographic we find this couple sharing a darkcloth especially poignant. Why, however, is he wearing that striped coat and cap?This is half of a stereo card that is marked “E. M. Johnson, Photographer, Crown Point, N.Y.”. Mr. Johnson wears a rather bazarre printed coat while he photographs a couple.
Some photographers clearly had a sense of style that extended well beyond their camera work. The boldly patterned coats worn in both images above stand out in an era when professional portraiture typically demanded somber, formal dress. Whether a deliberate statement or simply personal taste, the choices make these images memorable.
Young woman is standing behind a camera on a tripod in a back garden.This is half of a stereo card that is marked “Horace D. Udall, Landscape Photographer”. We can assume that the man inside the darktent is Horace or his assistant. The location is not marked but the printer of the label on the back is identified as the Cleveland Foundry.
Women appear throughout these photographs as active photographers, not just subjects. The woman photographing in her back garden operated her camera with the same large format equipment used by professional studio photographers. Meanwhile, landscape photographers like Horace D. Udall required a portable dark tent to process plates in the field — a reminder of how physically demanding location work was.
Cyanotype of a photographer with a cable release in his hand in a field, 1893.The print shows some free silver in the shadows but the appeal of the young person, a boy we thought, proudly showing off a Graflex type camera was immediate.
By the early 1890s, cable releases allowed photographers to trigger the shutter from a short distance, making true self-portraits in open spaces more achievable. The 1893 cyanotype above captures exactly that moment. The young person proudly displaying a Graflex-type camera shows that pride in photographic equipment was not limited to seasoned professionals.
Photographer with view camera in the median of Green Street in Augusta, Georgia.The camera on a tripod is from the dry plate era, late 19th or early 20th century. Two young boys stand with the photographer in a derby in the median of a wide city boulevard lined with large residences. On the right is a carriage with a mounting block and on the left a carriage with a horse. There is a monument in the distance and there appear to be electric light strung across the median.
Urban photographers worked in the middle of city streets, horses and carriages passing on either side. This dry plate era image from Augusta, Georgia, places the photographer and his tripod in the center median of Green Street, electric lights strung overhead and a distant monument marking the boulevard — a full document of a city moment and a working photographer in it.
Lady photographing a dog with a view cameraThis is a tintype from the Cliff House Studio in San Francisco made sometime in the early 29th century before it burned in 1907. I have another tintype with the same backdrop and they appear on the market regularly. The seated woman has a large box camera on her lap.
Cameras appeared in the hands of women across a wide range of settings and formats. The view camera aimed at a dog and the box camera resting on a woman’s lap at the Cliff House Studio in San Francisco — before the studio burned in 1907 — both show women as confident, comfortable operators of photographic equipment.
Edmanson The Ventriloquist photographs his Dummy RPPC. Robert Edmanson (1890-1949) was an English magician and ventriloquist.Self portrait of a photographer, ca 1860s. Since it bears the backmark of Wm. Giles, West Aurora, Illinois, it must be him. The 1870 census lists William Giles as a photographer in the 3rd Ward, Aurora, Kane County, Illinois.
English ventriloquist Robert Edmanson brought his dummy into the frame for a portrait that doubles as a performance piece. By contrast, William Giles of West Aurora, Illinois — confirmed by both his studio backmark and the 1870 census — produced a straightforward self-portrait that serves today as a direct record of a working 19th-century photographer’s face.
This stereo card, with an 1882 copyright, shows the photographic party of Edward L. Wilson in Egypt.. The title of the card is “Photographing Cephren and Mencheres” from the series “Scenes in the Orient”.
Photography also traveled far from home. Edward L. Wilson’s 1882 stereo card documents his photographic expedition to Egypt, where his party set up equipment in front of ancient monuments. The image captures the camera as both a professional tool and a passport into the wider world — proof that 19th-century photographers took their machines wherever history was waiting to be recorded.
Michael Rodriguez is a content creator and historian who specializes in creating viral listicles and other engaging content about historical photos and events. He has a passion for history in a fun and accessible way, curating interesting and informative lists that showcase the lesser-known stories and significance behind famous historical events and figures.
