30/08/2026
The evolution of kicked off with the discovery of two essential concepts: camera obscura image projection, and the realization that certain materials undergo visible changes when exposed to light. Before the 18th century, there are no recorded attempts or artifacts showing any use of light-sensitive materials to capture images.
Captured around 1826 or 1827, "View from the Window at Le Gras" is widely recognized as the earliest surviving photograph taken with a camera. (Left: Original image | Right: Colorized and reoriented enhanced version).
Back in 1717, Johann Heinrich Schulze managed to display cut-out letters on a bottle using a light-sensitive liquid, though he didn't try to make these results permanent. Later, around 1800, Thomas Wedgwood made the first well-documented—yet ultimately unsuccessful—attempt to secure permanent camera images. While his experiments produced detailed photograms, both Wedgwood and his colleague Humphry Davy couldn't find a way to fix the images permanently.
The real breakthrough came in 1826 when Nicéphore Niépce successfully fixed an image captured via a camera. However, this primitive process required an exposure time of eight hours to several days. Building on this work, Niépce's associate Louis Daguerre developed the 'daguerreotype' process—the world's first publicly announced and commercially practical photographic method. This new technique reduced camera exposure to just a few minutes, delivering sharp and highly detailed images. On August 2, 1839, Daguerre presented his invention to the Chamber of Peers in Paris, and by August 19, the full technical mechanics were shared openly at a joint meeting of the Academy of Sciences and the Academy of Fine Arts. (In exchange for making their patents public, both Daguerre and Niépce’s estate were granted lifelong government pensions). Just as this metal-based daguerreotype process was gaining public acclaim, a rival paper-based approach known as the calotype negative and salt print process began to emerge.
