Physiognotrace

With the help of a second scaling-down pantograph, the basic features of the portrait were transferred from the sheet in the form of dotted lines to a copper plate, which had previously been prepared with a ground for etching.

In 1802, John Isaac Hawkins, who was born in England in 1772 and lived in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, patented the second official physiognotrace and partnered with Charles Willson Peale to market it to prospective buyers.

[4] By 1802, in response to the popularity of silhouettes, which were invented in the late eighteenth century, Peale introduced the British inventor John Hawkins's (1772–1855) physiognotrace at his museum in Philadelphia.

These silhouettes, or profiles as they were also called, could be kept loose, framed, or compiled in albums; a black or blue piece of paper or fabric placed behind the image provided contrast.

Peale, who had an interest in the instrument and kept the original in his Philadelphia Museum, "needed the certified copy to bring suit against a person who was making the device without authority.

William Bache, another British artist traveling through the eastern United States and Cuba, patented his own version of the physiognotrace in 1803, with his partners Augustus Day and Isaac Todd.

[9] The Smithsonian's National Portrait Gallery acquired an album of his work in 2002 but conservationists discovered the pages were infused with arsenic, which made it poisonous to touch.