From Earliest
Times |
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It may seem
strange but cameras existed long before photography. It had been observed
as far back as the fifth century BC that an image of the outside scene
was formed by sunlight shining through a small hole into a darkened room.
The phrase Camera Obscura means "Darkened Room". |
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From 16th
Century |
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Camera Obscura
was improved by utilising a simple lens. |
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1666 |
Isaac
Newton |
Demonstrated
that light
is the source of colour. He used a prism to split sunlight into its
constituent colours and another to recombine them to make white light. |
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1725 |
Johann
Schulze |
Discovered
the darkening
of silver salts by the action of light. |
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1758 |
Dolland |
Developed the
Achromatic telescope lens, this improved the camera obscura image. |
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1801 |
Thomas
Young |
Suggested that the retina at the back
of the eye contains three types of colour sensitive receptor, one
sensitive to blue light, one to green and one to red. The brain interprets
various combinations of these colours to form any other colour in the visible
spectrum. |
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1802 |
Wedgwood |
Produced silhouettes
of opaque objects by contact printing them on silver nitrate coated paper
however the images were unfixed and faded in daylight. |
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1826 |
J.
Nicephore Niepce |
Produced the
first permanent image (Heliograph) using a camera obscura and white bitumen
it required 8 hours to expose. |
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1829 |
Daguerre |
Started partnership
with Niepce. |
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1834 |
Fox
Talbot |
Experiments
using Silver chloride coated paper to yield "negatives" of silhouettes. |
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1835 |
Fox
Talbot |
Using his small "mousetrap"
cameras he photographs the inside of his library window at Lacock Abbey,
creating the first negative. |
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1837 |
Daguerre |
Following experiments
on his own he evolved a workable process (Daguerreotype). Silver iodide
coated copper plate was exposed and developed by mercury to give a single
direct positive. He removed the remaining silver iodide with a warm solution
of cooking salt, they took 30 minutes to develop. |
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1839 |
Daguerre |
Daguerreotype
process released for general use in return for state pensions given to
Daguerre and Isidore Niepce. Patented in England. On August 19th 1839 Argo
announced details. |
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1839 |
Fox
Talbot |
Hurriedly prepared
and presented papers at the Royal Institution and the Royal Society. Unlike
the Daguerre process the image is recorded as a "negative" and had to be
printed via a similar process to produce the final "positive". Many positive
prints can be made from a single negative. |
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1839 |
Sir
John Herschel |
Suggests fixing
Talbot's images in sodium thiosulphate and coined the terms "photography",
"negative"
and "positive". |
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1840 |
Fox
Talbot |
Following suggestions
he improved his process, using silver iodide and developing in gallic acid.
The use of paper negatives meant that the images were not as detailed as
Dagurreotypes. |
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1841 |
Fox
Talbot |
Patented "calotype"
(later "Talbotype") a negative / positive process with 5 minutes exposure
time. |
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1841 |
Petzval |
Mathematically
calculated compound lens of f/3.6 effectively reduces Daguerreotype exposure
to 1 minute. |
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1844 |
Fox
Talbot |
Publishes "Pencil
of Nature" the first book with photographic illustrations, glued in calotypes
. |
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1847 |
Niepce
De St. Victor |
Discovers the
use of albumen to bind silver salts on glass base. Albumen process requires
10 minutes exposure. Talbot patents process in England. |
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1850 |
Blanquart-Evrard |
Proposes use
of Albumen for printing paper. Albumen paper was never patented and was
popularly used for 40 years. |
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1851 |
Scott
Archer |
Proposes "Collodion"
process. Collodion (a solution of nitrocellulose in a mixture of ethyl
alcohol and ethyl ether) forms a binder for silver iodide on glass. Exposure
and processing is performed immediately after coating plate. Scott Archer
did not patent the process and died in poverty. Two versions of this process
were "Ambrotype" and "Tintype" . Exposure was about 10 seconds . The Collodion
process greatly expanded photography and brought everyone into contact
with its results. |
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1861 |
James
Clerk Maxwell |
Demonstrated
the formation of colours by combining three light sources of red, green
and blue. All other colours, including white, are a mixture of these
primary colours. The colours combine by an additive
process. |
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1868 |
Louis
Ducos du Hauron |
Published a book suggesting how a
range of colour photographic methods might work, but they could not yet
be put into practice. |
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1871 |
Dr.
Richard Leach Maddox |
Writing
in the ‘British Journal Of Photography’ he suggested gelatin, derived from
a protein found in animal bones, as a collodion substitute. Gelatin "Emulsions"
and "Dry Plates" were marketed by various manufacturing companies from
1878, and gelatin is still used today. Exposure times of 1/25th second
could be achieved. |
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1887 |
Hannibal
Goodwin |
New York clergyman
filled patent for roll film with a flexible plastic base |
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1888 |
George
Eastman |
Produced the
first simplified camera system for the general public, The
Kodak Number 1, and the first mass Developing and Processing service. |
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1889 |
George
Eastman |
Produced the
first transparent roll film (nitrocellulose) |
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1889 |
Thomas
Edition |
Slit the 2
3/4 inch Kodak roll film down the middle making it 1 3/8 inch (35mm) and
put transport perforations down each side - to become the international
standard for motion picture film. |
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1890 |
Hurter
& Driffield |
Devised the first independent system
to give emulsions speed numbers, this essentially led to the current ISO
numbers on film boxes today. |
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1890's |
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The first halftone
photographic reproductions appeared in daily papers, although it took another
ten years before the process was fully adopted. Halftones were created
by using a camera containing a ruled glass screen with a grid pattern to
break up the image into tiny dots of different sizes. |
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1904 |
Dr.
H. Vogel |
Research lead
to panchromatic
film using sensitising dyes. This type of film is sensitive to all visible
colours. |
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1904 |
Augusta
and
Louis Lumiere |
Patented "Autochrome"
the first additive
colour screen film material. |
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1912 |
Siegrist
and
Fischer |
The two German chemists invented the
action of colour
coupling , so dyes required for colour film processing could be created
by combining appropriate developer oxidation products with colour former
chemicals. However the process was not reliable enough to start film
production. |
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1924 |
Oscar
Barnack |
An employer
of E. Leitz designed a camera for use with a microscope using motion picture
film, this became the first precision 35mm camera. It was called the Leica
derived from Leitz camera. The capabilities
of the Leica made a new form of photojournalism possible, as typified by
the
photographic agency. |
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1935 |
Kodak |
Mannes and
Godowsky helped develop Kodachrome
for home movies, the following year it was introduced in 35mm format. |
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1936 |
Agfa |
This German
company was the first to sell a film,
Agfacolor,
with
the colour formers in the film. Towards the end of the second World War
their closely guarded secrets were "liberated". |
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1940s |
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Large factory size laboratories took
over film processing from individual chemists. However chemists still continued
to sell films. |
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1947 |
Magnum |
Magnum, arguably
the most famous photographic agency in the world, was founded in 1947 by
Henri
Cartier-Bresson, David Seymour and Robert
Capa. The agency developed a style of photojournalism that was largely
based upon the capability of the Leica
35 mm camera. Magnum is still an exclusive club of illustrious photographers
with membership limited to thirty six. |
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1947 |
Dr.
Edwin Land |
Invented an "instant" picture process,
first called Polaroid Land. The special camera sandwiched the exposed negative
with a receiving positive paper and spread the processing chemicals between
the two, after processing these were peeled apart. |
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1963 |
Dr.
Edwin Land |
His Polaroid Corporation's research
team invented the first instant colour picture material. |
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1976 |
Canon |
AE-1
the first 35mm camera with built in microprocessor is introduced |
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1980s |
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A system called DX coding was introduced
for 35mm films. The cassettes have an auto-sensing code printed on
them which enable certain cameras to automatically set the film speed,
this information can also be used by processing laboratories. |
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1984 |
Canon |
Demonstrated the first digital
still camera. |
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1985 |
Minolta |
The Minolta
7000 auto-focus 35mm SLR camera was introduced |
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1990 |
Microsoft |
Windows 3.1 is released |
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1990 |
Adobe |
Adobe Photoshop 1.0 image
manipulation program is introduced for Apple Macintosh computers |
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1992 |
Tim
Berners-Lee |
Develops the software and protocol
for the World Wide Web (WWW) |
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1993 |
Adobe |
Adobe Photoshop is made available
for MS-Windows computers. |
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1993 |
NCSA |
Release the first World Wide Web browser. |
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1994 |
Netscape |
Launch their WWW browser called Navigator. |
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1996 |
APS |
Advanced
Photo System (APS)
is introduced. APS uses a cassette which holds 24 mm wide film on a base
which has a magnetic data strip as well as fine grained emulsion. When
the film is being developed automatic handling mechanisms locate the correct
frames and determines the required print format from the data strip. After
processing the film is rewound into the cassette and a digitally mastered
index print of all the frames is created as a reference for reordering. |
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1996 |
Microsoft |
Release their WWW browser called Internet
Explorer. |
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1998 |
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The first consumer megapixel
cameras were introduced. |
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2000 |
Canon |
Canon introduced the EOS
D30, the first digital
for the consumer market with a CMOS
sensor |
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2000 |
Sharp
and J-Phone |
In
November 2000 Sharp and J-Phone introduced the first camera-phone in Japan.
The J-SH04
is a mobile phone with a built in camera, it uses a 110,000-pixel CMOS
image sensor and began the trend for camera-phones. These cameras play
an increasingly significant role in photography, for example the main news
pictures covering the 7 July 2005 London bombings were taken by the general
public on camera-phones and not by professional news crews. However the
use of camera-phones can also be abused leading to invasions of privacy
and other forms of socially unacceptable behaviour. |
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2002 |
Contax |
Contax introduced the NDigital
the first
digital camera with a CCD
the same size as a 35 mm frame. |
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