Question about catalogue gun illustrations

[ccdjg]

I was browsing through some pre-war and early post-war airgun catalogues and it struck me that they nearly always used line drawings to illustrate their airguns rather than photographs. I wondered why that was, as I imagine commissioning an artist to draw a gun would be more expensive than just taking a photo.

I also wondered when a photograph of an airgun first appeared in a catalogue,and what gun it was.

Any ideas, anyone?
.

[Geezer]

Same with everything back then. I presume it was a factor of print technology, with a line drawing cheaper to print than a photographic reproduction.

That seems to begin to change from the 1940s/50s.

[Geezer]

A 1943 Webley ad in Chris Thrale’s book features what looks like a photo (or it is a very good drawing?) of an adult man aiming a Webley pistol, oddly canted, in the manner that would become common a few years later in their pistol adverts.

[Kuyajonathan]

Techically it was probably a challenge to take a photograph and convert it in to a printing plate, where as a line drawing could probably be hand engraved onto a 'plate' . It was a long drawn out process then to make a page of text made up of induvidual letters. Photos into mass print probably came about mid / late 50's, certainly bit more common in 60's newspapers. Probably some members with direct experience here with more precise info 🤔
Mine was a paper boy from 1966 and visit to Bristol Evening Post newspaper with Scouts year or so later going round the print works

[Garvin]

Photos into mass print probably came about mid / late 50's, c

I used to have a newspaper reporting on the 1924 FA Cup final at Wembley, with a photo showing the pitch being over-run.

[Geezer]

Techically it was probably a challenge to take a photograph and convert it in to a printing plate, where as a line drawing could probably be hand engraved onto a 'plate' . It was a long drawn out process then to make a page of text made up of induvidual letters. Photos into mass print probably came about mid / late 50's, certainly bit more common in 60's newspapers. Probably some members with direct experience here with more precise info 🤔
Mine was a paper boy from 1966 and visit to Bristol Evening Post newspaper with Scouts year or so later going round the print works

That’s the kind of thing I meant. I can recall hand-setting type on our own school printing press in the 80s, learning about things like “ells”.

Any older newspaper guy from before the print revolution of the 80s would know exactly how any why for decades photos were a luxury.

[micky2]

Just a bit off track. but cigarette company's used to give away cards of real photographs of various views footballers ect c1899 in their packets so l don't know how expensive they were to produce.