A stiff piece of card measuring about 4.5 x 4.5 inches, the size of a formal visiting card of the 1860s, with an attached photograph, usually a full-length studio portrait, of nearly the same size. Sometimes the subject matter was a tourist attraction or a work of art. Cartes-de-visite were most popular during the 1860s and were sometime collected in albums.

A photograph, originally albumen, attached to a cardboard backingand used as a visitor's card. The photographs were nearly always portraits and were collected enthusiastically and mounted in albums. The mass-produced photographs were taken by a camera which could take more than one image on a single glass plate negative. They were popular from 1860 to the late 1890s.

an albumen print on a lightweight cardboard mount measuring 2.5 by 4.24 inches, popular from the mid-1850s in Europe and from 1860 in America. Take a look at this CDV.