Photographing Trees, Fungi, etc. 273 



of any deep masses of shadow in the foliage. 

 The very best pictures of trees can be obtained 

 on days when the sun is slightly obscured, and 

 should there be light clouds in the sky it is 

 always best to wait until one crosses the sun 

 before making the exposure. The light then is 

 sufficiently intense for all purposes and it will 

 give no hard contrasts. 



We must use the non-halation plate, for that is 

 the only one that will reproduce perfectly the deli- 

 cate outline of the upper branches and prevent the 

 blurring of halation, caused by the bright back- 

 ground of sky, which is always a disagreeable 

 feature of this kind of a negative made on the 

 ordinary plate. If we had rather do it, we can 

 "back" an ordinary plate which gives it the non- 

 halation properties. This consists in painting the 

 back of the plate with a preparation that is sold by 

 all photographic dealers. This "backing" must, 

 of course, be done in the dark room and washed 

 off again, before development, in clean water. 

 Care must be exercised, when putting it on, not 

 to allow it to run over the edges of the plate on to 

 the film side. Many people prefer these backed 

 plates to the regular non-halation, but they are 

 considerable trouble, and I cannot see that they 

 give any better results. 



It is important, however, that we use one of 

 these two plates, as one can soon discover for 



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