Intro II.
Unlike Photochroms, of which many prints could be made, lantern slides were single, hand-painted works projected on a large screen. After Jackson returned to the US, he used these glass slides in a lecture tour called "100 Minutes in Strange Lands." | 
Three boys, Benares | | Magic lanterns are the antecedents of the slide projector, and can be traced back to Europe in the 17th century, if not to shadow plays common around the world. During the 1890's, magic lanterns were in high fashion. They were also popular for religious art, animations and elaborate visual tricks that pre-figured motion pictures, which were invented in 1895. |
Third-class railway passengers |
The glass slides for Jackson's shows were 3.25 inches wide by 4 inches long. Projected as double slides for an audience with a stereopticon projector, they could be enormous and seem three dimensional. Jackson selected appropriate shots for colorization as glass slides. Details like a man high on the mast of a sailboat could best be appreciated when greatly magnified. | |
Like the Photochroms, the magic lantern slides form a unique photographic record of the Indian subcontinent a century ago. Some of the colors Jackson used are traditional 19th century hues, others come from Jackson's careful notes. His selection for the tone of certain brick or sari could be very close to the original. |
| I. JACKSON
| III. PHOTOCHROMS
| IV. BOOKS | | | | |
