Photography - A Wonderful Invention That Came About Because of a Long Series of Discoveries

In the 19th century who could have thought that we would one day be able to take photos with a digital camera and transfer the images to a computer and alter the colours or any of the features of the image? Digital cameras allow us to take images that are sharper and offer high quality images that can be used in a number of ways and across multiple mediums. You don’t have to be a professional photographer in order to be able to take high quality photographs today.

This all seems a world apart from the early days of photography. So, who do we have to thank for the invention of photography way back then, which has ultimately led to what we are able to do today?

Sir John Herschel is the man that invented the term 'photography' in 1839 and this was likewise the year when the process of photography was introduced to the public.

How did photography actually evolve before this point though? The invention of photography was a completely scientific process beginning with the use of optics way back in the 1830s.

Whilst Camera Obscuras were being used since the 11th century, photography did not come into public usage before the 1830s.

There were various discoveries made by a number of differen people that in the end brought about the advent of photography. A few of those vital advancements were:

* In 1614 Angelo Sala observed that when silver nitrate powder is left out in the sun for a period of time it becomes black.

* In the 17th century, Robert Boyle figured out that silver chloride also turned dark due to exposure, although he believed that this was due to being subjected to air and not light.

* The first well-documented efforts to produce photos using light sensitive materials in a camera were those of Thomas Wedgwood in the early 19th century. Wedgwood recorded images, but was not able to fix the images permanently.

* The very first successful capturing of an image by what we would recognise as photography was acheived in the June-July of 1827 by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce. The product he used for this became set when exposed to light for almost 8 hours. Niépce went into a partnership with Louis Daguerre in Jan, 1829 to develop his technique further.

* Four years later on, in 1833, Niépce died and Daguerre continued alone to find out how to develop photographic plates. Development of the photographic plates meant that the exposure time was decreased considerably, from 8 hours to 30 minutes. Daguerre also made one more essential discovery and reached the conclusion that submersing a photo in salt would make the photo permanent.

* A leading French scholer, Paul Delaroche subsequently reported on the procedure which resulted in the French government buying the rights in July 1839, and making it public on 19th Aug, 1839. This process was named Daguerreotype after Louis Daguerre.

The Daguerreotype process was certainly not perfect though as it was costly and a one time only affair. At that time there were no negatives involved in the process and therefore the original photograph could not be duplicated. The only means of obtaining two copies of a photograph was to use two cameras next to each other. This led to the expanding need for discovering a way to duplicate pictures and in the end this brought about the development of the Calotype process by William Henry Fox Talbot. The Calotype process was the first negative-positive process that made it possible to multiply the same image, by using an intermediate negative on a silver chloride paper made translucid with wax.

Although the Daguerreotype resulted in photos that were superior in some ways to the Calotype, the latter had the ability to supply multiple positive prints of a single photo, which was revolutionary in 1840.

To further decrease the exposure time, short focal lenses were subsequently developed, letting additional light into the camera whilst maintaining the sharpness of the whole photo.

* In 1841, the physicist Fizeau swapped silver iodide with silver bromide. He found that its sensitivity to light was greatly superior. Time exposures of just a couple of seconds were required to get a Daguerreotype. Thus it became possible to take portrait photographs.

If you have any queries relating to wherever and how to use professional photography - www.cinnamonphotography.co.uk -, you can make contact with us at our own web-site. So, there you have it, this is how photography all began. Ultimately photography would develop into what we all know it as today and this would lead to the many different areas of photography that we recognise, such as portrait photography, commercial photography or even wedding photography.