Unusual Typographic Technique from 1875

[Dave Hughes]

Saw these online, reproduced from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, c1875. Brilliant ingenuity used to produce display type from the same case as the body. These pre-dated the Linotype, so I'm presuming were hand set.

[Keri Szafir]

ASCII art, as we would say today. But that's literally nothing compared to portraits set with a Monotype keyboard and caster, where tonal differences (i.e. darker or brighter areas) were made with different characters.

[Dave Hughes]

Yes, the subject of Monotype Portraits has been covered on this forum before.

Here's an old Pathe News film about them.


https://youtu.be/jqPIfHpB0-4

Here's a portrait of the British Queen produced by this method, and discussed here: Monotype Portraits.