From the turn of the century, some elite amateur photographers strove for a picturesque effect, by using painterly techniques and manipulation. With the bromoil process, an ordinary photograph could be altered by chemically bleaching the image to make the surface of the print susceptible to oily ink. Dabbing ink on the surface magically revealed the image again. Tone could be reduced by judiciously using less ink, or emphasised by applying more.

Here Walton has taken part of plain photograph, enlarged it as a bromoil and removed the woman in the gateway for aesthetic effect.