In the late 1870s and early 1880s the Victorian polymath Francis Galton (1822-1911) produced a series of papers on the application of composite portraitures for anthropological purposes. He argued that his technique for producing composite portraiture would enable researchers interested in human variation to visually display “true anthropological averages”. Because composite images layered many anthropological subjects on top of one another, Galton believed that composite portraiture made it possible for researchers to examine more data faster and more efficiently. It was easier to calculate averages because you could cross-measure various features using a single set of composite images. Building on the recent work of historians of science including Secord (2002), Bleichmar (2007), and Daston and Lunbeck (2011), this paper will discuss the relationship between observational practices, imagery, and the natural sciences. In particular, it will examine Galton’s attempt to develop a photographic project within British anthropological circles that systematically classified the various physical features in different races. Moreover, using his statistical theory, Galton aimed to show patterns of similarities and differences between the physical conformations of human varieties. This paper will examine a range of material including Galton’s writings on composite portraiture, and the composite photographs he produced. Drawing together several major disciplinary shifts occurring in the later part of the nineteenth century, this paper will connect Galton’s anthropometric photography to the some of the larger debates about racial variation and scientific practice during the late 1870s and early 1880s.