Historical information

This is a set of seven photographs of technicians retouching orthophoto reproduction material at the Army Survey Regiment, Bendigo, c1975. Retouching mainly entailed the application of liquid opaque (Plumtree), commonly known as “duff” to cover blemishes such as scratches and spots on film negatives before photographic exposure. Retouching technicians also used specialised techniques such as “needling” to repair faults on the emulsion of map reproduction material. The technicians in this set of photos were probably working on the retouching and registration of orthophotomap colour film separations in preparation for publication by Print Troop. Peter Dew featuring in photos .1P to .5P was a serving member of RA Svy, who died in a tragic accident at home. He was fondly remembered as one of Lithographic Squadron’s colourful personalities. The Peter Dew Memorial Award was a humorous novelty award generally presented annually to a member of the squadron selected as the "Super Animal of the Year." To view a photo of this award, refer to item 6230 of the Victorian Collections.

Physical description

This is a set of seven photographs of technicians retouching and assembling orthophoto reproduction material at the Army Survey Regiment, Fortuna, Bendigo. c1975. The photographs are on 35mm colour slides and were scanned at 96 dpi. They are part of the Army Survey Regiment’s Collection.
.1) to .3) - Photo, colour, c1975. Retouching reproduction material. L to R: SPR Ralph Chant, PTE Laurie Tedford, SGT Peter Dew.
.4) to .5) - Photo, colour, c1975. Retouching reproduction material. SGT Peter Dew.
.6) - Photo, colour, c1975. Assembly of orthophoto colour film separations.
.7) - Photo, colour, c1975. Assembly of orthophoto colour film separations, CPL Garran Hill.

Inscriptions & markings

.1P to .7P - There are no annotations stored with the 35mm slides.