The History of Photography

Photography is seen anywhere you look, all images and posters have usually been taken by a photographer. Here is a brief history of

photography

Nicéphore Niépce

Nicéphore Niépce was a middle class citizen who had interest in training the military. His ideas for ‘photography’ began in 1793 with him testing light sensitive compounds that could be imprinted with an image. His breakthrough came with the first recorded photograph of his home garden in 1826.

Camera Obscurer

• The device Niépce used during his work was the camera obscurer. It was a simple box with a small whole in the front to take in light. Inside the box was a piece of treated paper which was coated in a thick, light sensitive compound to capture the image onto.

Cyanotype

• Cyanotype was invented in 1842 by the famous astronomer sir John Herschel. Herschel needed a way to copy notes from his Astronomy research. He created what is commonly known as a blue print.

Daguerreotype

• Since the Renaissance, artists and inventors had been looking for a method of capturing visual scenes. Previously, Artist traced images using a camera obscura but Daguerre had thought of a better system. A process which was eventually named the Daguerreotype used a thin silver- plated piece of copper, he then exposed it to the vapour produced by iodine crystals, producing a light sensitive piece of metal which could capture an image.

The first known photo of a person

The first Negative

• The inventor of the first negative was Henry Fox Talbot, an English botanist and mathematician.

• Talbot sensitized paper to light with a silver salt solution. He then exposed the paper to light. The background became black, the colours became shades of grey. This was a negative image, and from the paper negative, Talbot made prints, reversing the light and shadows to create a detailed picture. In 1841, he perfected this paper-negative process.

The first moving photograph

• Eadweard Muybridge wanted to prove that when animals ran, all four legs came off the ground at once.

• To do this he used somewhere between 12 and 24 cameras placed along a track and took all of the photos consecutively. Here is the result.

Louis Daguerre

• A friend of Nicephore Niepce was also experimenting to find a way to capture an image, but it would take years before he could perfect a permanent image in under 30 minuets. Louis Daguerre was the inventor of the first practical process of photography. In 1829 became partners with with Joseph Nicephore Niepce to improve the process Niepce had developed.

First mass market camera

• The first mass market camera, also known as the Brownie, was invented in 1900 by Kodak. It was an inexpensive camera that cost one dollar and went on until 1966 when it was discontinued.

• This was historically significant since it proved that cameras could be afforded by anyone.

Conclusion

• So in the end we can take stunning pictures, learn about animal life and even take pictures from space. All this is possible thanks to Nicéphore Niépce, sir John Herschel, Henry Fox Talbot and Eadweard Muybridge not to mention all of the unsung heroes who made photography is today.