| Special
Photography Fact File
1981/ The word "photography"
comes from the Greek words for light and writing. Johann von
Maedler, a Berlin astronomer, first used the word in 1839.
1982/ The first camera
was called the camera obscura, which means dark chamber. In
a dark room, a small hole in the wall allowed an outside image
to be projected into the room, upside down. Eventually, smaller
sized cameras were developed and mirrors were added to right
the image.
1983/ The first casual
reference to the Camera Obscura is by Aristotle (Problems,
ca 330 BC), who questions how the sun can make a circular
image when it shines through a square hole.
1984/ Johannes Kepler
was the first person to coin the phrase Camera Obscura in
1604, and in 1609, Kepler further suggested the use of a lens
to improve the image projected by a Camera Obscura.
1985/ The French physicist,
Joseph Nicéphore Niepce, made the first negative (on
paper) in 1816 and the first known photograph (on metal) in
1827.
1986/ In 1827 Niepce
had also begun his association with Louis Jacques Mandé
Daguerre, a French painter who had been experimenting along
parallel lines. A partnership was formed and they collaborated
until Niepce's death in 1833, after which Daguerre continued
their work for the next six years. In 1839 he announced the
invention of a method for making a direct positive image on
a silver plate - the daguerreotype.
1987/ The first commercially
manufacturered camera was the Giroux daguerreotype. Alphonse
Giroux et Cie. began manufacturing them on August 19, 1839,
at Rue du Coq St. Honroe 7, Paris, France. It cost $50 and
approximately 250 were built. View
one here.
1988/ The first mass-marketed
camera, Kodak's Brownie, was sold for $1 in February 1900
and was so named to appeal to children because it was so easy
to use.
1989/ The most requested
photo from the US National Archives is a picture of Elvis
Presley offering to help the country by being a drug enforcement
agent under former President Nixon. Visit
the special website they have setup here
1990/ The Polaroid Corporation
was founded in 1937 with their first instant film produced
in 1947 and instant camera in 1948.
1991/ The first photo
of the Earth taken from space occured in 1959 from the spacecraft
Vanguard 2. Viking Lander 1 took the first picture from the
surface of Mars on July 20 1976. Read
more 'space firsts' here.
1992/ The English scientist
William Henry Fox Talbot, patented his own photographic process
and then published a description of it, entitled "The
Pencil of Nature" (1844–46). This book, containing
24 original prints, was the first publicly available book
illustrated with photographs.
1993/ 'The Pencil Of
Nature' was not just a random collection of pictures, but
rather a prospectus by Talbot stating the possibilities he
saw for photography, including pictorial, scientific and technical
usages.
1994/ Around 15 complete
copies of all parts of 'The Pencil Of Nature' exist in various
museums and collections around the world. There have been
various reprints, including a fine (and expensive) facsimile
produced to mark the 150th anniversary of the invention of
photography. View
one here.
1995/ Late in 1845, Talbot
published a companion volume 'Sun Pictures in Scotland' with
23 salted paper plates.
1996/ On January 7th
1949 the announcement of the first photograph of genes was
given at the University of Southern California by Dr. Daniel
Chapin Pease and Dr. Richard Freligh Baker.
1997/ In 1857 George
Bond (1825-1865) became the first person to photograph a double
star, Mizar, with the aid of wet collodion plates. He suggested
that a star's magnitude could be quantitatively determined
by measuring the size of the image it made. A bright star
would affect a greater area of silver grains. He was also
responsible in 1850 for taking the first photograph of a star
(Vega).
1998/ The largest use
of silver is in photography which accounts for about 35 percent
of all silver that is used throughout the world.
1999/ Over 70 years ago
John Logie Baird produced a working infrared video system
which he called Noctovision and infrared film has been around
for about the same time.
2000/ In 1991, Kodak
released the first professional digital camera system (DCS),
aimed at photojournalists. It was a Nikon F-3 camera equipped
by Kodak with a 1.3 megapixel sensor.
Click on the links below for more great
facts...
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