History of Photography

• mechanical, chemical and artistic parts of photography
• camera obscure was a darkened room with a pinhole and an upside-down image displayed on the opposite wall
• use of camera obscura as early as the 4th century BC
• wasn't until the 16th century it was used by artists as a tool to achieve detail
• lenses were made for greater sharpness
• more portable
• 18th century used mirrors
• lenses allowed artists to use different focal lengths
• an aid for drawing
• capture and fix an image on light sensitive material
• 1727, a natural philosopher Johann Heinrich Schulze noted and recorded certain salts of silver being altered on exposure to light
• some experimented but could not make the image permanent
• upper class commissioned work through painters
• lithography made it affordable for the middle class to have portraits of themselves
• camera lucida
• exact copy of nature
• c. 1800 Thomas Wedgwood, son of a famous potter, attempted to record the camera image by means of the action of light, worked with Sir Humphry Davy
• experimented with paper or white leather coated with silver nitrate
• painted transparencies
• in 1802 their explanation of their process was published in the Journals of the Royal Institution
• were not able to keep the image permanent
• showed results by candle light
• Joseph-Nicephore Niepce, around the same time, is credited to be the first person to successfully record a camera image and make it permanent
• achieved this with the help of his brother Claude
• paper negs were hard to keep permanent
• used pewter plates coated with bitumen of judea (tar-like substance)
• hardens to light
• heliograph
• immerse in a bath of lavender oil to remove the unhardened parts
• came out as a positive and then put into the camera obscura
• this was accomplished 1826 or 1827
• "View Fron His Window at Le Gras" world's first photo
• heliographs were one of a kind, called his process heliography (means sun writing)
• used glass plates, but none survived
• Louis-Jacques-Mande Daguerre from France
• used the same lens maker as Niepce
• in 1829 Niepce and Daguerre went into partnership (met in London)
• in 1833 Niepce died and his son Isidore continued the partnership, but is said to have contributed nothing
• 1837 the process was perfected, detail in shadows and highlights, called daguerreotypes
• used metal plates
• Daguerre used a copper sheet covered in silver
• iodine is more light sensitive
• silver iodide
• treated with fumes from heated mercury and fixed with salt water
• 1838 published his process in the New York Observer with the help of Samuel F. B. Morse
• "Two View of the DeTempo" Paris
• two pictures, one with a person and one without
• first person ever captured
• daguerreotypes were more portraits
• between 1839 and near the end of the 1850s daguerreotypes were popular
• these portraits were one of a kind
• in England, January 1839, William Henry Fox Talbot was able to have his images reproduced
• photogenic drawing (like a photogram)
• placed objects on light sensitive materials with silver chloride
• February 1835, described how to make a positive image
• paper negative is a reversed copy
• a positive is a re-reversed copy
• would cause fading
• sensitized paper inside a camera
• "Latticed Window" August 1835
• Talbot is credited with establishing the negative-positive process/system
• in 1840 changed the name to calotype, and then changed the name to talbotypes
• not the same detail or texture of a paper negative
• Sir John Herschel, creator of the cyanotype process, experimented to make image more permanent
• sodium thiosulfate fixed the negative image (1840) and thought he was working with sodium hyposulfate
• basic chemical in fix today
• incorrectly referred to sodium hyposulfate
• contacted Daguerre and Talbot
• change talbotypes to photography
• negative and positive process and photography was now the general name
• snapshot was also adopted (originally a hunting term)
• 1844, Talbot published the first photographic book called Pencil of Nature
• among the photos in the book, "Breakfast"
• Hercules Florenz claimed he had a process in 1832
• he had notebooks from 1833-1837 that clearly described his process
• Norwegian lawyer Hans Thoger Winther claimed he had a process since 1826
• Hippolyte Bayard, French, with his "self Portrait as a Drowned Man" 1840 (page 262)
• his response July 14, 1839
• exhibited 30 of his photos with his own process
• his process was a direct positive print, in camera
• Talbot was given a pension by the French government
• 1843, Scottish painter David Octavius Hill had a huge group portrait consisting of 407 people
• enlisted Robert Adamsom
• between 1843-1848 Hill and Adamson created over 1500 negatives with the caloptype process
• Adamson died in 1848
• sold as art
• Sandy Linton, 1843
• bright sunlight and concave mirror
• long exposure, but more casual
• "Two Fisherman"
• "broad strokes of light and shade"
• architectural or landscape with calotypes
• 1851 Louis Blanchart
• Maxine DuCamp, amateur photographer
• 1851, used the caloptype negative-positive process, but had the ability to render detail like a daguerreotype
• used coated glass instead of paper
• Niepce De Saint Vincent (related to Nicephore), 1847, used glass instead of paper
• paper absorbs liquid
• used albumin, egg whites
• silver sites
• not as sensitive
• albumin could coat the print
• 1851, English sculptor Frederick Scott Archer invented the collodion photographic process
• bromide, iodide or chloride salts dissolved in collodion and poured onto a glass plate
• plate placed in a silver nitrate and water solution, converting the salt to either silver bromide, iodide or chloride
• added potassium iodide
• tough, waterproof
• pyrogalic acid, had to wet when picture was taken as well as developed
• called the wet plate process, collodion process, or the collodion wet plate process
• photographers carried their darkrooms with them
• photographic van; 700 glass plates, rations and food
• 1880 the collodion process was popular
• tin type, look like daguerreotypes, made on a sheet of metal and black lacquer, and coated with collodion
• when tilted, daguerreotypes look like a negative
• ambiotypes, which are slightly underexposed glass plate negatives, look positive when tilted at a certain degree
• Roger Fenton, a lawyer, used calotypes
• founder of the Photographic Society of London
• war photographer, photographed the royal family
• first war photographer
• "Valley of the Shadow of Death" 1855
• 1861, art photography, English critic, wrote about doctored photos
• 1856, Gustave Le Gray practiced combination printing
• the glass had to be the size of the final print
• different size cameras