Night gained a deeper pictorial significance only with Whistler's nocturnes, and the various delineations of street scene painters. Most of us who dwell in the larger cities must have been struck some time or other with the charm which certain places display after daylight has taken its departure and artificial lighting reigns supreme, also the curious effects one sees on a wet night when the pavements endeavor to reflect to the best of their ability the lights which illuminate them.
New York is at all times picturesque, but never is it more so than when the daylight has faded and the street lamps are lit. Then it becomes another city entirely. Out of the darkness, like some magical effulgence, merges a dazzling shower of light, a myriad of beaming sparks. Buildings and objects that were of no pictorial consequence in the daylight may assume quite the first place in our favor, and ugly things, not to be dodged anyhow by day, most kindly retire out of sight, or else are turned into things of beauty. Of course, sometimes the opposite state of things prevails, and a subject picked out in the day as being particularly attractive may in the evening show all sorts of awkward lines, etc., the existence of which was quite unsuspected before.
Everywhere loom large bulky forms shrouded in mystery, suggestive, conducive to poetical imagining. Emerging from the gloom are weird shapes like outstretched limbs against a confused glare of light, and beyond an impenetrable depth of shadows. Optical sensations, discordant effects which we are not accustomed to in art, but which succeed in stirring the very depth of our nature.
This branch of photography until quite recently seems to have been somewhat neglected. I mean nocturnal photographs, depicting streets and other public places at night and which convey to the mind a true impression of night as we see it under its various conditions, and not to the daylight pictures "faked" to represent nocturnal impressions.
The "moonlight effects" which appeal so strongly to some amateurs, are in most instances merely sunlight exposures, taken facing the sun generally while its direct light is cut off by a cloud. They are grossly under-exposed in order to get most of the landscape and not a little of the sky itself, mere blackness, and the result, as is well known, is labelled "moonlight." It is obviously hopeless to include the moon herself in night pictures, for the longest exposure possible by which one may attain an unblurred image of the earth's satellite is several seconds, and this of course, is all too short for the registration of a strictly moving object.
Probably the reason for this neglect is that many considered it a hopeless, if not an impossible task, whilst others who have taken this work in hand have been deterred by fear of the consequences arising from standing about in the cold or wet or from perilous ascents to inaccessible places to gain a favorable viewpoint.
It offers nevertheless a good scope to those anxious for pastures new and sufficiently generous to consider the waste of innumerable plates as a stimulation to the trade. First and foremost a good stock of patience and perseverance is necessary. The exposures are apt to be so unreasonably long that they would tire out the pluckiest enthusiast.
Alfred Stieglitz, one of the pioneers of night photography in this country, achieved his results ten years ago only by exposures of half an hour or more, even when assisted by the reflection of snow on the ground. With the continual improvement of plates, lenses and shutters, the material has become more and more flexible, and exposures of a few seconds have become possible.
The representation of life, traffic, moving figures, however, on account of the long exposure required, is rarely attempted. This is a shortcoming but a mere temporary one, as we seem to be within measurable distance of the time when the rendering of these subjects will be possible.
There are certainly some parts of our city that look satisfactory when portrayed without figures; but Broadway, for example, without vehicles or people, would -- well, it would not be Broadway. For years the fine effects of the electric light and the moving traffic in this particular thoroughfare and the adjoining streets have fascinated every visitor and no doubt many photographers have had a great longing to photograph it, but always felt that a sufficiently long exposure to record the effect of the light on the buildings would result in a mere blur for the traffic, and a short enough exposure to suit the traffic would give nothing worth having on the plate.
But there exists an endless variety of scenes in every large town that will yield the desired novelty of sensation. Every night as the darkness comes on and all the electric lights and places of amusement are lighted, a new world of solemnity, beauty, and mystery lies before our gaze, and every record looks to us at present like a new conquest.
Different subjects will require different treatment, and that is a matter which to a great extent will be left to the judgment of the operator. Some subjects will look good on moonlight nights, but one can safely say that snow or wet on the ground will no doubt be a great improvement in either case, and it is in this direction that formerly the most pleasing results were obtained.
But lately a new style of night photography has made its appearance. It deals almost exclusively with the bewildering confusion of lights as seen from high viewpoints. Railway terminals, city squares, bridge scenes, torch light processions, illuminations, all sorts of artificial lights, vast vistas of lit-up skyscrapers, have become the topics of the hour, pictures that are perhaps less pictorial than a deserted street or a churchyard in moonlight, but which are more realistically true of the restless flimmer and flare, the blaze and radiance of nocturnal life.
They are not mellow harmonies, these night pictures. The greatest extremes meet. Blinding light and absolute darkness. Vague darks here and there accentuated by vivid spots, flickering sheen, and unsteady scintillations. It is an expressive drama of conflicts. The lighted objects issue painfully out of shadow, they surprise us with their vehemence of lustre, and the eye is startled from them to noticing gradations of obscurity in the universal duskiness that surrounds them. We have to discipline our eyes for these surprising contrasts.
Along this line W. M. Van der Weyde has made some notable achievements. He probably has taken more night pictures than anybody else. They look what they are. In fact, the striking realistic result is one of the most astonishing things about the pictures. Not only are they night pictures but they look like night pictures. The shadows are a dense black it is true, but the blackness is nor more than is required from truthful rendering. The rendering of the actual light is remarkable, the haze around the lights being no more than can be seen by the eye.
It is only fair to add that the results are in no way faked; here and there an obtrusive light may have been toned down, but substantially they are straightforward photographs, and as such may fairly be regarded as amongst the most remarkable that have been published.
The reader may wish to know the modus operandi and apparatus necessary for the accomplishment of such facts, and no doubt will be astonished to hear that the photographer uses an ordinary simple hand camera that will brave the elements, an ordinary lens and sensitive plates.
Most night photographers use rapid isochromatic plates and are particularly careful to have them well backed. They wish to avoid the effects of reversal and undue halation. They still adhere to the old theory that all lights should be outside the field of the camera.
To include the source of illumination, gaslight surfaces, and particularly electric lights may at first appear an insurmountable difficulty, but it will be found that practically it is nil, as halations, and light seen in drizzling rain or spreading mist, really add to the pictorial effect. Ordinary rapid plates are more apt to produce a true realistic impression of the "ghostly joyousness of night" than isochromatic ones.
Those who are enamored with the artificial light of night will want it as it is, with all its breaks, supernatural radiance, hectic glow and gleam amidst opaque recesses and intensest darks.
A new era for after-dark workers in town has set in, and many bits of genuine and effective realism, and unknown harmonies of light and shade will be brought to light, which would have been scouted altogether not so very many years ago.
The life of large cities has found a new mode of expression that can reflect its energies and activities, its impulses and diversities, its light and beauty in virile and individual emotions. Herein consists the latest picturesque attainment; and it is one of the mediums through which the language of illustration nowadays can most powerfully address the modern mind.
