Definition of "smudger"

Servile smudgers of history, prattling about an Emil Ludwig and a Thomas Mann season — meaning the Weimar period — as if it had produced me and as if I had used the Republic for a background!

1964, William Wasserstrom, Civil Liberties and the Arts: Selections from Twice a Year, 1938-48, page 230

The tools can get rather exotic - spinners, rubber stamps, airbrush, smudgers, and so on.

2002, David Bergsland, Introduction to Digital Publishing, page 147

Smudger An old term for a photographer, one that alludes to dodgy developing.

2004, Ray Puxley, Britslang: An Uncensored A-Z of the People's Language, Including Rhyming Slang, Robson, published 2004, page 456