It’s hard to imagine but until around 1820 photography, in a practical sense, didn’t exist. If you wanted an image of your family, your house or where you’d travelled, you turned to pen, ink and watercolor paints. If you were rich, you went for the expensive alternative - oil paint. Very primitive attempts at photography had been made but exposure times started at 8 hours and often ran to several days. After all that effort the results were barely recognisable anyway.
A key moment
In 1839 Louis Daguerre showed the world his discovery - he had found a way to create a permanent photograph that was clear and detailed, and it needed only a few minutes for the exposure. Processing these images involved exposing the ‘negative’ to highly toxic mercury fumes, and on a dull day the exposure could still take hours but, even so, it was a breakthrough.
Boulevard du Temple, Paris Boulevard du Temple, Paris - Daguerreotype by Louis Daguerre circa 1838/39
Today, with digital camera’s offering exposures as fast as 1/5000 second and not a chemical process insight, a five-minute exposure and toxic fumes sound absurd, but back then it was cutting edge science.
A historical object
In 1835 William Henry Fox Talbot developed a way to make permanent photographs while experimenting at his home - Lacock Abbey. Using writing paper and silver chloride, a chemical that is sensitive to light, all housed in a small wooden box with a simple lens, he photographed a window in his home.
The image he created is now recognized as the world’s oldest surviving camera negative. His negative has deteriorated over the years, but the scene can still be recognized when seen alongside a modern digital image of the same window.
Fox-Talbot Window, Lacock Abbey by William Henry Fox Talbot and a digital image of the same window
The camera that brought photography to the masses
In 1900 the Kodak company produced a camera that brought affordable and portable photography to the masses. The Kodak Brownie designed by Frank Brownell was a box with a simple lens, pre-loaded with a 117-shot roll of film. The lens and focus were fixed, and it cost just $1. In the first year of production, they sold over a quarter of a million, and they were used by everyone from children to soldiers. The arrival of the 'Brownie' marked the point at which ordinary people began to record their lives and create affordable photographic memories.
The Kodak Brownie camera (1900)
The Lenses making history
The standard lens material has always been glass. The precise composition has changed, but the material has remained the same. However, things could be about to change.
There’s a new breed of totally flat lenses made of high-tech materials covered in nanostructures, or microscopic pillars that guide light through the structure, slowing some frequencies and speeding up others. Consequently, the entire spectrum hits the focal point at the same time, which eliminates color fringing caused by different colours of light passing through the lens at different speeds, and reduces the weight and size of the lens to a tiny fraction of what we are used to. These lenses don’t even need focusing!
Ultra-flat lens created by a team led by Electrical and Computer Engineering Professor Rajesh Menon of the University of Utah
A combination of mirrorless cameras and lenses the thickness of human hair may well be the next milestone in the history of photography. Do you agree? What is your favourite moment in photography history?
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