History of photography
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Modern photography began in the 1820s with the first permanent photographs.
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[edit] The conception of permanent photography
Photography is the result of combining several technical discoveries. Long before the first photographies were made, Albertus Magnus (1139-1238) discovered silver nitrate and Georges Fabricius (1516-1571) silver chloride. Daniel Barbaro described a diaphragm in 1568. Wilhelm Homberg described how light darkened some chemicals (photochemical effect) in 1694. The fiction book Giphantie (by the French Thiphaigne de La Roche, 1729-1774) described what can be interpreted as photography. For centuries, images have been projected onto surfaces. According to the Hockney-Falco thesis as argued by artist David Hockney,[citation needed] some artists used the camera obscura and camera lucida to trace scenes as early as the 16th century. However, this theory is heavily disputed by today's contemporary realist artists who find the device almost impossible to use.[citation needed]. These early cameras did not fix an image, but only projected images from an opening in the wall of a darkened room onto a surface, turning the room into a large pinhole camera. The phrase camera obscura literally means darkened room. While this early prototype of today's modern camera may have had modest usage in its time, it was an important step in the evolution of the invention.
[edit] Development of chemical photography
[edit] Monochrome photography
The first photograph was an image produced in 1826 by the French inventor Nicéphore Niépce on a polished pewter plate covered with a petroleum derivative called bitumen of Judea. Produced with a camera, the image required an eight-hour exposure in bright sunshine. Bitumen hardens with exposure to light. The unhardened material may then be washed away and the metal plate polished, rendering a negative image which then may be coated with ink and impressed upon paper, producing a print. Niépce then began experimenting with silver compounds based on a Johann Heinrich Schultz discovery in 1724 that a silver and chalk mixture darkens when exposed to light.
In partnership, Niépce (in Chalon-sur-Saône) and Louis Daguerre (in Paris) refined the existing silver process.[citation needed] In 1833 Niépce died of a stroke, leaving his notes to Daguerre. While he had no scientific background, Daguerre made two pivotal contributions to the process. He discovered that exposing the silver first to iodine vapour before exposure to light, and then to mercury fumes after the photograph was taken, could form a latent image. Bathing the plate in a salt bath then fixes the image. On January 7, 1839 Daguerre announced that he had invented a process using silver on a copper plate called the daguerreotype.[1] A similar process is still used today for Polaroid photos. The French government bought the patent and immediately made it public domain.
In 1832, French-Brazilian painter and inventor Hercules Florence had already created a very similar process, naming it Photographie, and William Fox Talbot had earlier discovered another means to fix a silver process image but had kept it secret.[citation needed] After reading about Daguerre's invention, Talbot refined his process so that it might be fast enough to take photographs of people. By 1840, Talbot had invented the calotype process. He coated paper sheets with silver chloride to create an intermediate negative image. Unlike a daguerreotype, a calotype negative could be used to reproduce positive prints, like most chemical films do today. Talbot patented[citation needed] this process, which greatly limited its adoption. He spent the rest of his life in lawsuits defending the patent until he gave up on photography. Later George Eastman refined Talbot's process, which is the basic technology used by chemical film cameras today. Hippolyte Bayard had also developed a method of photography but delayed announcing it, and so was not recognized as its inventor.
In 1851 Frederick Scott Archer invented the collodion process.[citation needed] Photographer and children's author Lewis Carroll used this process.[citation needed]
Slovene Janez Puhar invented the technical procedure for making photographs on glass in 1841.[citation needed] The invention was recognized on July 17, 1852 in Paris by the Académie Nationale Agricole, Manufacturière et Commerciale.
Herbert Bowyer Berkeley experimented with his own version of collodian emulsions after Samman introduced the idea of adding dithionite to the pyrogallol developer.[citation needed] Berkeley discovered that with his own addition of sulphite, to absorb the sulphur dioxide given off by the chemical dithionite in the developer, that dithionite was not required in the developing process. In 1881 he published his discovery. Berkeley's formula contained pyrogallol, sulphite and citric acid. Ammonia was added just before use to make the formula alkaline. The new formula was sold by the Platinotype Company in London as Sulpho-Pyrogallol Developer.[2]
[edit] Popularization
The daguerreotype proved popular in responding to the demand for portraiture emerging from the middle classes during the Industrial Revolution.[citation needed] This demand, that could not be met in volume and in cost by oil painting, added to the push for the development of photography. By 1851 a broadside by daguerreotypist Augustus Washington was advertising prices ranging from 50 cents to $10.[3] However, daguerreotypes were fragile and difficult to copy. Photographers encouraged chemists to refine the process of making many copies cheaply, which eventually led them back to Talbot's process.
Ultimately, the modern photographic process came about from a series of refinements and improvements in the first 20 years. In 1884 George Eastman, of Rochester, New York, developed dry gel on paper, or film, to replace the photographic plate so that a photographer no longer needed to carry boxes of plates and toxic chemicals around. In July of 1888 Eastman's Kodak camera went on the market with the slogan "You press the button, we do the rest". Now anyone could take a photograph and leave the complex parts of the process to others, and photography became available for the mass-market in 1901 with the introduction of the Kodak Brownie.
In the nineteenth century, photography developed rapidly as a commercial service. End-user supplies of photographic equipment accounted for only about 20% of industry revenue. For the modern enthusiast photographer processing black and white film, little has changed since the introduction of the 35mm film Leica camera in 1925.[citation needed]
[edit] Color photography
Although color photography was explored throughout the 19th century, initial experiments in color could not fix the photograph and prevent the color from fading. Moreover until the 1870s the emulsions available were not sensitive to red or green light.
The first permanent color photo, an additive projected image of a tartan ribbon, was taken in 1861 by the Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell.[citation needed] Several patentable methods for producing images (by either additive or subtractive methods, see below) were devised from 1862 on by two French inventors (working independently), Louis Ducos du Hauron and Charles Cros.[4] Practical methods to sensitize silver halide film to green and then orange light were discovered in 1873 and 1884 by Hermann W. Vogel. (Full sensitivity to red light was not achieved until the early years of the 20th century.)
The first fully practical color film, Autochrome, did not reach the market until 1907. It was based on a screen-plate method, the plate being made using dyed dots of potato starch. The screen plate lets filtered red, green or blue light through each grain to a photographic film in contact with it. This is then developed to a negative, and reversed to a positive, which when viewed through the screen plate restores the original colors in their correct proportions.
Other systems of color photography included that invented by Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii, which involved three separate monochrome exposures ('separation negatives') of a still scene through red, green, and blue filters. These required a special machine to display, but the results are impressive even by modern standards. His collection of glass plates was purchased from his heirs by the Library of Congress in 1948, and is now available in digital format.
Color film has since become standard.
[edit] Development of digital photography
The charge-coupled device (CCD) was invented in 1969 by Willard Boyle and George E. Smith at AT&T Bell Labs. The lab was working on the Picture-phone and on the development of semiconductor bubble memory. Merging these two initiatives, Boyle and Smith conceived of the design of what they termed 'Charge "Bubble" Devices'. The essence of the design was the ability to transfer charge along the surface of a semiconductor.
- 1973 - Fairchild Semiconductor releases the first large image forming CCD chip; 100 rows and 100 columns.
- 1975 - Bryce Bayer of Kodak develops the Bayer filter mosaic pattern for CCD color image sensors
- 1986 - Kodak scientists invent the world's first megapixel sensor
[edit] Boom in sales
Digital recording of images is becoming increasingly common, as digital cameras allow instant previews on LCD screens and the resolution of top of the range models has exceeded high quality 35 mm film while lower resolution models have become affordable.
[edit] Cameras placed in mobile phones
As of April 2006, there has been a significant enhancement of the camera capability of mobile phones both for still photograph and video. The Nokia N90 has a 2M pixel camera and can record video at 352x288 pixels and 15 frames per second. The Nokia N93 is reported to provide "DVD quality" video at 30 frames per second. Modern software allows simple editing and publishing of video content from phones, and CNN reports that 80% of consumer video is now shot on phones. Mobile phones with digital cameras have had a pronounced effect upon photojournalism. Most people do not walk around with a video camera, but do carry a phone. The arrival of video camera phones is transforming the availability of video to consumers, and is helping to fuel the idea of citizen journalism.
[edit] Further reading
- Jenkins, Reese V. Images & Enterprise: Technology and the American Photographic Industry 1839-1925. Baltimore, The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1975. The book provides an overview of the economics of photography and the development of the Eastman Kodak Company.
- Schlegel, Franz-Xaver, "Das Leben der toten Dinge - Studien zur modernen Sachfotografie in den USA 1914-1935", 2 Bände, Stuttgart: Art in Life 1999, ISBN 300-004-407-8.
[edit] References
- ^ Crawford, William (1979). The Keepers of Light: A History and Working Guide to Early Photographic Processes. Dobbs Ferry, New York: Morgan & Morgan, 20. ISBN 0871001586.
- ^ Levenson, G. I. P (May 1993). "Berkeley, overlooked man of photo science". Photographic Journal 133 (4): 169–71.
- ^ PHOTOGRAPHY REVIEW; In a John Brown Portrait, The Essence of a Militant. Retrieved on 2007-03-16.
- ^ Brian, Coe (1976). The Birth of Photography. Ash & Grant. ISBN 0904069079.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- A history of photography from its beginnings till the 1920s, by Robert Leggat, MA M.Ed Ph.D. FRPS FRSA
- History of photography, by J. Monge-Najera, University of Costa Rica
