The Evolution Of Early Cameras: A Historical Perspective

The history of cameras is a long one, stretching back to the 5th century BCE when ancient Greek and Chinese philosophers first described the camera obscura, a dark chamber where an image is projected through a pinhole. However, the first device we would recognise as a camera was created in 1816 by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce, who also took the first photograph with it in 1826. This was followed by the invention of the daguerreotype in 1839, the first photographic camera developed for commercial manufacture.

The camera obscura

The image produced by a camera obscura has several distinctive properties. Firstly, the surroundings of the projected image must be dark for it to be clear. Secondly, the image is always projected upside down, and thirdly, it is reversed left to right. Additionally, the luminosity of the image is very low, and it takes a few minutes for the human eye to adjust and make sense of the projection.

By the second half of the 16th century, camera obscuras with lenses in the opening became popular as drawing and painting aids. In the first half of the 19th century, camera obscura boxes were used to expose light-sensitive materials to the projected image, marking a step towards the development of the photographic camera.

Overall, the camera obscura served as an important precursor to the modern photographic camera, bridging the gap between ancient optical phenomena and the eventual development of photography.

Early photographic cameras

The history of the camera began long before the introduction of photography. The first cameras were not portable and produced blurry images.

Camera Obscura

The camera obscura, meaning "dark room" or "dark chamber" in Latin, was the first camera ever created. It was a natural optical phenomenon that projected an inverted image of the outside scene through a small hole in a screen or wall and onto a surface inside the camera. The image produced was not permanent and could not be preserved. The oldest known record of this principle is a description by Han Chinese philosopher Mozi (c. 470 to c. 391 BC).

The first device we recognize as a camera was created in 1816 by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce, a French inventor. Using a prototype, he took the first photograph ever in 1826, capturing the view from his home in France. This photograph, produced using a camera obscura and a pewter plate coated with bitumen, took at least eight hours to create.

Niépce formed a partnership with Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre in 1829, and together they worked to perfect and commercialize the process. Unfortunately, Niépce died in 1833 before witnessing the enormous economic success of his invention.

Daguerre continued to experiment and, in 1839, invented the daguerreotype, an early form of photo camera. A plate with a thin film of silver iodide was exposed to light for minutes or hours. Then, in darkness, the photographer would treat it with mercury vapour and heated saltwater. This would remove any silver iodide that the light had not changed, leaving behind a fixed image.

The first photographic camera developed for commercial manufacture was a daguerreotype camera, built by Alphonse Giroux in 1839. Each device and its accessories cost 400 francs. The camera was a double-box design, with a landscape lens fitted to the outer box and a holder for a ground glass focusing screen and image plate on the inner box.

Further Innovations

In the 1830s, the English scientist William Henry Fox Talbot independently invented a process to capture camera images using silver salts. He called this process the calotype, and it was the first to utilize negative printing.

In 1871, Richard Leach Maddox invented the gelatin dry plate, which produced brief exposures and served as a forerunner to the Polaroid cameras of the 20th century.

The first camera to use 35mm film was the Leica, designed by Oskar Barnack and commercialized in 1924.

Daguerreotypes and calotypes

Daguerreotypes were invented in the 1830s and unveiled in 1839. They were the first mode of photography ever invented. The process involves using a copper plate coated with light-sensitive chemicals, which is then exposed to mercury vapour and fixed with a salt solution to create a lasting image. The image is then developed using hyposulphate of soda (now known as sodium thiosulphite). The process is complicated, time-consuming, and dangerous, but it produces highly detailed images. The daguerreotype method was offered freely without restrictions, and it became hugely popular, especially in the United States. However, it eventually went out of fashion due to its inefficiency, expense, and long exposure times.

Calotypes were invented in the 1840s by Talbot after he learned about the daguerreotype process. The process involves treating paper with various chemical solutions to make it light-sensitive, exposing it to light to create a negative image, and then printing it onto salted paper to create a positive image. The calotype was the first negative-to-positive image process and is considered a forerunner of modern photography as it could create multiple positive images from a single negative. However, calotypes never caught on in the United States as the public preferred the detail and shine of daguerreotypes. By the 1860s, calotypes were largely out of use due to the development of the wet-plate/collodion process.

The gelatin dry plate

Prior to the gelatin dry plate, photographers used the wet collodion process, which was significantly more cumbersome. This process required photographers to prepare and process plates in the field, carrying a complete darkroom with them. In contrast, the gelatin dry plate could be prepared in advance, allowing photographers to carry the plates with them, expose them to light, and develop them later. This made the process much more practical, especially for outdoor photography and when capturing images in the field.

The Kodak roll film

The first roll film camera was "The Kodak", created by American entrepreneur George Eastman in 1888. The camera used a single roll of paper (and then celluloid) film and could capture 100 negative pictures. These pictures were sharp and clear, and the exposure time was so short it could be measured in fractions of a second. Once the roll was finished, the entire camera had to be sent back to Eastman's company for processing and reloading. The Kodak cost $25 and was marketed with the slogan, "You press the button… we do the rest." The Eastman Kodak Company became one of the largest companies in America, with Eastman himself becoming one of the richest men.

In 1900, the company created the Kodak Brownie, a high-quality yet simplistic camera that was relatively inexpensive and accessible to the middle class. This helped to popularize the use of photography to commemorate birthdays, vacations, and family gatherings. As development costs decreased, people could take photos for any reason.

Frequently asked questions