I watched my recording of "The Man Who Shot Tutankhamun" last night.
It was about a chap called Harry Burton who was only one of two people in Howard Carter's team who stuck with him throughout the whole 10 year period from discovery of the tomb to the completion of photographing and cataloguing. What a photographer...!
He used a 10x8 camera with wafer thin glass plates which he processed in an adjacent tomb and, almost unbelievably, managed to avoid almost any dust / sand, crud, etc, getting onto the plates themselves. Although film was available, the belief is that it wasn't as stable as the glass plates of the time.
Modern-day photographer Harry Cory Wright accompanied the presenter and set up his 10x8 Gandolfi (also using a bit thicker glass plates) to try to get some idea of the complexity and conditions experienced by Burton. He produced some fine photos but, despite processing his plates in the same tomb as Burton had done, and taking great care, Wright's plates weren't nearly as clean as Burton's.
For anyone who missed it, I recommend you get it on the iPlayer as it's a fascinating piece of history, whether you're into photography, or not.
