Moses Billings
With the development of the daguerreotype in the 1840s, the role of the portrait painter declined in general, because it was now much easier and much cheaper to have one's likeness presented in a visual format. While many portrait painters lost business in competition with the daguerreotype, Billings instead began to produce daguerreotype prints himself. It is not known exactly which prints were made by Moses Billings, as daguerreotypes were usually signed, when signed at all, along the side of the plate. Due to the traditional storing methods of daguerreotype plates, even this signature usually quickly became illegible. However, it has been generally noted, or at least hypothesized, that his daguerreotype prints showed a level of talent and artistry above that of amateur daguerreotypists. Though it is not known exactly which prints were his, it is known that he had largely abandoned the process by the 1850s. Even after he stopped making daguerreotypes, he did continue to paint people's portraits on canvas.
Photoengraving
The use of photoengraving for a halftone process that could be used to print grayscale photographic images dates all the way back to the 1839 introduction of the daguerreotype, the first practical photographic process. The daguerreotype image consisted of a microscopically fine granular structure on the surface of a silver-plated copper sheet that had been polished to a mirror finish. Methods were soon devised for differentially etching the image grains and the ground so that the daguerreotype could be used as a printing plate. In some instances, very pleasing results were obtained, but exceptional skill and care were required and the very fine structure of the image limited the useful life of each plate to a few hundred prints at best.