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 Makeup Tips | The Hardmans prided themselves on the quality of the images sent out from the studio – one way of achieving this quality was to retouch the original negative before printing, eliminating flaws and blemishes. In some cases prints were retouched after printing. Hardman also used this technique in his landscape photographs.
For portrait photography, retouching meant that any unwanted flaws or blemishes could be removed after the photograph was taken, meaning that sitters did not need to apply a lot of make up.
A fine lead pencil would be applied to the emulsion of the negative in order to cover almishes and blend them into the photograph.
Before After
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| Patricia Routledge I |
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| Patricia Routledge II |
In this photograph of Patricia Routledge, a stray piece of hair has been touched out, and the image has been cropped to form the final proof.
With landscape photographs, Hardman often used 'coccine nouvelle' (a red dye), to lighten or darken areas of a photograph (depending on whether it was a positive or negative). A good example of this type of retouching is one of Hardman's most famous images; 'The Birth of the Ark Royal'.
This photograph shows the HMS Ark Royal, taken from the top of Holt Hill in Birkenhead. The ship had just been painted white, as part of preparations for its launch from the Cammell Laird shipyard by the Queen Mother
In the original photograph, the gable end nearest the camera was white. This was eliminated by the application of coccine nouvelle (a red dye) to the positive image, as shown below.
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| The Birth of the Ark Royal |
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| The Birth of the Ark Royal |
"I was trying to recreate what I had seen, to produce an effect, and anything that goes against the effect I want, I rule out." E. Chambré Hardman, 1983.
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