Timothy H. O'Sullivan - Photographer

[Lin Evans]

A photographer not usually known to the public, perhaps because he died at the age of 42 from tuberculosis, but nontheless responsible for some of the most poignant and impressive photos of the American Civil War and probably the first ethnographic photographer in America. He died in 1882, fifteen years before Edward S. Curtiss took his first photograph of a Native American Indian.

O'Sullivan covered the Civil War then went west employed with the US Geological Survey survey team with the intent of photographing the west to make it attractive to settlers. His work was a favorite of Ansel Adams. This is a brief introduction to his body of work. I converted his sepia tone photos to black and white for consistency. Timothy travelled the west in a mule drawn wagon which served both as his home and his photographic laboratory. Considering the hardships he endured, his photographs are absolutely amazing in so many ways.

http://www.lin-evans.org/pte/thosullivan.zip (windows zipped exe - about 68 meg)

http://www.lin-evans.org/pte/thosullivanmac.zip (native MacIntosh exe - about 68 meg)

Best regards,

Lin

[David Porter]

I love looking at old photos and these were exceptional, thanks for researching and posting. One comment, I should have liked to see some of the photos in their original format rather than panning up and down. I would have been happy with the light strips (or preferably dark strips) down the side as you did in the last couple of shots. But still very fascinating. Well done.

Mickp

[Jean-Cyprien]

It's always very interesting to look at old photos, specially when we could know where and when they were taken. And also when we know the identity of the figures. Thank you, Lin.

I thought I'll look at a lot of Civil War photos. Perhaps it's better with only the few you've put here : unfortunately this is the sad reality of all the wars !

As I'm also interested by old photographic processes and techniques, I remember having looked at the Civil War 150 Pinhole Project :

http://civilwar150pinholeproject.com/

Of course, at the time, the photos were just in Black and White. But I like the smoothness and the hazy ambiance of some of them.

Best regards

Jean-Cyprien

[smithrg]

Hi Lin, I also enjoy historical photos, and really liked your O'Sullivan show.

I put together a show, in 2011, of historical photos I got from the internet.

If anyone is interested, link is below.

Windows, about 6 min. and about 18 MB.

Best regards, robertgs

http://www.mediafire.com/download/yv5c4uq33ayqvav/Photos_1939_1943.exe

[Lin Evans]

Hi Mick, Jean, Robert,

Thanks very much for your comments!

Timothy's story is fascinating. He used a wet plate process with cameras up to 20x24 inches in size. Glass plates had to be prepared immediately before and processed immediately after snapping the shutter. All the equpment and chemicals had to be packed, unpacked, packed and hauled over mountains, deserts, down and up rivers, etc., over and again.

Glass plate negatives were coated with chemicals to make them sensitive to light. The chemicals had to be wet at the time of the exposure. This meant a portable darkroom for travel. Timothy adapted a war ambulance and he would treat the glass plate negative, rush out to the camera, expose it and rush back to the wagon to develop it before it dried.

The exposure time, compared to modern cameras, was quite long. Sometimes as much as thirty seconds was necessary and for the period of exposure time subjects had to remain perfectly still or the results would be blurred or have multiple images.

When one stops to think about all the issues, it seems nothing short of miraculous that the photographers produced the amazing results they did in those early years.

Mick, I had to decide whether to have a space around the images or pan - it is always difficult to decide because some detail is lost in smaller sizes which result from trying to fit a square peg into a round hole. The 16:9 aspect ratio popular on contemporary displays doesn't fit well with the old aspect ratios in the 1800's which sometimes were more square than anything else. Even our modern dSLR's usually default to 3:2 or in the case of Olympus 4/3rds systems to 4:3 with mostly only consumer level digita cameras and cell phone cameras offering 16:9. It's either crop or have space around or pan in most cases. It got even more complicated for Civil War era photos when stereoscopic images were also common. Many of the old photos are badly scratched and must be restored. A mixture of sepia and black and white is common and it was also problematic to decide to convert the beautiful sepia toned prints to black and white.

In the process of making this little presentation, I also found it difficult to decide whether to add audio descriptions or to have text descriptions for each slide. The text would hide some of the photo, but make it easier for non English speaking forum members to translate. I also gained a great deal of appreciation for those who frequently do audio voice-overs - it's not simple to coordinate and organize so that each slide has the proper identification. I commend all of you who have been doing this for years - it's not easy!

Jean, yes when I think of the lives lost and all the destruction from wars it is very sad. In our Civil War there were nearly more American lives lost than in all other wars from WWI to the present day. Nearly ten percent of the population of the United States at the time of the Civil War were killed or died directly as a result of the war. More human lives were lost while incarcerated during the Civil War than we lost in Vietnam. I try not to have too many photos of the death and destruction when I make a show like this, it's just too depressing.

Robert, I'm off to have a look at your show now!

I just watched it! Fantastic images - the color is absolutely perfect and most modern camera manufacturers would love it if they could produce the same color perfection as in those 75 year old photos...

Best regards,

Lin

[cgbraggjr]

Lin - great show. Did he print full frame or did he crop? I'll stipulate that it's probably a better slideshow when it's in the 16:9 format, but I'm really curious about how O'Sullivan did it.

[Lin Evans]

Thanks!

It appears that probably because he used the albumen printing paper proscess, the results were as they came from the neagative. Since most all the work was generally done in the field, it's doubtful that he had any equipment to crop other than physically cutting the paper. I'm just guessing at this. I'm not certain if anyone really knows the complete answer. The glass negatives were quite fragile and what amazes me is how they were successfully transported the thousands of miles back from the frontier.

Best regards,

Lin