392 
AMATEUR PHOTOGRAPHY. 
“For sport the lens is better than the gun.” 
I wish to make this department of the utmost 
use to amateurs. I shall, therefore, be glad to 
answer any questions and ‘to print any items sent 
me by practical amateurs relating to their experi- 
ence in photography. 

THE ANNUAL COMPETITION 
RECREATION has conducted 8 amateur 
photographic competitions, all of which 
have been eminently successful. The gth 
opens April Ist, 1904, and will close No- 
vember 30th, 1904. 
Following is a list of prizes to be 
awarded: 
First prize: A Long Focus Korona Camera, 
5 x 7, made by the Gundlach Optical Co., Roch- 
ester, N. Y., fitted with a Turner-Reich Anastig- 
mat Lens, and listed at $85. 
Second prize: A 4 x 5 Petite Century Camera, 
with Goerz Anastigmat Lens and Century Shutter, 
listed at $73. 
Third prize: 
made by the Rochester Lens Co., 
listed at $36. 
Fourth prize: A Waterproof Wall Tent, 12 x 16, 
made by Abercrombie & Fitch, New York, and 
listed at $32. 
Fifth prize: An Al-Vista-Panoramic Camera, 
made by the Multiscope and Film Co., Burlington, 
Wis., and listed at $30. 
Sixth prize: A No. 3 Focusing Weno Hawk- 
eye Camera, made by the Blair Camera Co., Roch- 
ester, N. Y., and listed at $27.50. 
Seventh prize: A 12 x 12 Waterproof Wall 
Tent, listed at $16.30. 
Eighth prize: A Tourist Hawkeye Camera, 
4 X 5, and made by the Blair Camera Co., Roch- 
A Royal Anastigmat Lens, 4 x 5, 
Rochester, N. Y.; 
ester, N. Y., and listed at $15. 
Ninth prize: A Bristol] Steel Fishing Rod, made 
by the Horton Mfg. Co., Bristol, Conn., and 
listed at $8. 
Tenth prize: A pair of High Grade Skates, 
made by Barney & Berry, Springfield, Mass., and 
listed at $6. 
The 10 next best pictures will each be awarded 
a pair of chrome tanned leather driving or hunt- 
ing gloves made by the Luther Glove Co., and 
listed at $1.50. 
The 10 next best pictures will each be awarded 
a Laughlin Fountain Pen, listed at $1. 
A special prize: A Goerz Binocular Field Glass, 
listed at $74.25, will be given for the best picture 
of a live wild animal. 
Subjects are limited to wild animals, 
birds, fishes, camp scenes, and to figures 
or groups of persons, or animals, repre- 
senting in a truthful manner shooting, fish- 
ing, amateur photography, bicycling, sail- 
ing or other form of.outdoor or indoor 
sport or recreation. Awards to be made 
by 3 judges, none of whom shall be com- 
petitors. 
Conditions: Contestants must submit 2 
mounted prints, either silver, bromide, 
platinum or carbon; of each subject, which, 
as well as the negative, shall become the 
property of Recreation. Negatives not to 
be sent unless called for. 
In submitting pictures; please write sim- 
ply your full name and address on the back 
of each, and number such prints as you 
may send, I, 2, 3, etc. Then in a letter ad- 
RECREATION, 
dressed Photographic Editor, RECREATION, 
say, for instance: 
No. I is entitled ——- ——. < 
Made with a —— —— camera. 
—— —— lens. 
On a —— —— plate. 
Printed on ——- —— paper. 
Length of exposure, ——- ——. 
Then add any further information you 
may deem of interest to the judges, or to 
other amateur photographers. Same as to 
Nos. 2, 3,¢tc. 
This is necessary in order to save post- 
age. In all cases where more than the 
name and address of the sender and serial 
number of picture are written on the back 
of prints I am required to pay letter post- 
age here. I have paid as high as $2.50 on 
a single package of a dozen pictures, in ad- 
dition to that prepaid by the sender, on ac- 
count of too much writing on the prints. ._ 
Any number of subjects may be sub- 
mitted. . 
Pictures that may have been published 
elsewhere, or that may have been entered 
in any other competition, not available. No 
entry fee charged. 
Don’t let people who pose for you look 
at the camera.- Occupy them in some other 
way. Many otherwise fine pictures have 
failed to win in the former competitions 
because the makers did not heed this warn- © 
ing. 

IMPROVING NEGATIVES. 
III. 
Faulty negatives may be much improved 
by a judicious choice of printing paper, but 
some negatives fail to give satisfactory 
prints, even when used with whet is appar- 
ently the correct, paper. Often these may 
be modified and improved in other ways. 
Take, for instance, an over exposed nega- 
tive. It is full of detail but thin. The sky 
prints a dirty gray and there are no high 
lights. Although a slow printing paper like 
carbon velox, or even slow cyco, gives 
a fair print, a vastly better one can be 
made by intensifying the negative. This 
is a simple operation and the newest recruit 
in the art need not hesitate to try it. There 
are various formule for intensification, 
but probably the one most used is that 
which employs bichloride of mercury as the 
active agent. Intensification by this meth- 
od consists in first bleaching the negative 
in a solution of bichloride of mercury and 
then blackening it in a weak solution of — 
sodium sulphite or ammonia. 
To prepare the bleaching solution, take 
4 ounces of-water and to it add 40 grains 
each of bichloride of mercury (corrosive 
sublimate) and ammonium chloride (sal 
ammonic). While these are dissolving, 
which takes some time with the bichloride. 
put the negative to soak in a tray of cold 
we oe 
