A collage of three undated CdV photos shows Hans Müller during a portrait photo session in Eutin, Germany. © Mark Zanzig/zanzig.com/Photo: Alb. Giesler
The story behind the image
As you may know by now, I’m a collector of photos shot by Albert Giesler in Eutin, appointed photographer of the court in Oldenburg/Holstein in Germany.
Here’s a collage of three individual Carte-de-Visite prints showing the same person – Hans Müller – in the same pose, acquired from different sources. And now they’re all back together. We can safely assume that these are just different prints from the same glass negative that was shot by Giesler in his studio between 1895 and 1897.
I deliberately used the color-calibrated but unedited scans. The assembly as collage makes the viewer automatically compare the three images and spot the differences. But as you can see below, presenting the three images separately works as well.
It is interesting to see that the prints have been developed differently already back in 1896. Clear hints are the oval surrounding Hans which are different in each print. The center image had probably been in a frame for a longer period because the colors have faded more than its two neighbors. What’s more, the center image has been damaged where Hans’ left thumb hooks into the pockets of his trousers. (Something had hit the surface of the print here, leaving a white spot and a tiny dent.) And the right image shows several scratches.
But in general the three prints have survided the roughly 130 years pretty well.
I like Hans’ pose. A young man of maybe 15, 16 years, in a jacket that seems to be slightly too large for him. Confident. Smart. The whole life still ahead of him. Sitting in the studio of a celebrity photographer in Eutin.
I envision him ordering a number of prints as gifts for the family – and for his girlfriends.
Design ideas
The high resolution image
| Capture Date | c. 1896 |
| Photographer | Alb. Giesler |
| Location | Eutin, Germany |
| Image Source | Three 6 x 9 cm CdV prints |
| Digital Image Source | EPSON Perfection 4870 Photo |
| Digital Image Source Format | TIFF, 48 bits/pixel, sRGB |
| Edited Image Format | JPEG, 24 bits/pixel, sRGB |
| Edited Image Dimensions | 17858 x 9720 Pixels |
| Copyright | © Mark Zanzig/zanzig.com/Photo: Alb. Giesler |
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