The document discusses the history and development of early photography processes prior to widespread adoption of the technology. It describes some of the key pioneers and their inventions, including Joseph Nicéphore Niépce creating the first permanent photograph in 1816. Early processes struggled with long exposure times and poor image quality but led to important innovations like Louis Daguerre's daguerreotype in 1839 and Fox Talbot's calotype process. Frederick Archer introduced the wet plate collodion process in 1851, improving image quality but limiting reproduction. These early experiments laid the foundation for modern photography.

1. Pre-
Photography
History

2. The need for photography

3. The need for photography
• Portraits: a portrait for the loved ones (“Civil War Souvenirs”)

4. The need for photography
• Portraits: a portrait for the loved ones (“Civil War Souvenirs”)
• Documenting people: showing future generations how family
members looked like

5. The need for photography
• Portraits: a portrait for the loved ones (“Civil War Souvenirs”)
• Documenting people: showing future generations how family
members looked like
• Documenting landscapes, buildings and cultural events:
spreading knowledge and education around the world

6. Photography substitution
• Portraits: paintings & silhouettes
• Documenting landscapes, buildings and cultural events: paintings
& print drawings (gravures)

7. Substitution barriers
• Paintings – expensive & not reproducible

8. Substitution barriers
• Paintings – expensive & not reproducible
• Silhouettes – less expensive than paintings & limited reproducible

9. Substitution barriers
• Paintings – expensive & not reproducible
• Silhouettes – less expensive than paintings & limited reproducible
• Gravures – missing details

10. Photography meaning
“Photography (n.)
1839, from photo- + -graphy. See photograph.
Photograph (n.)
1839, "picture obtained by photography," coined by Sir John
Herschel from photo- + -graph "instrument for recording; something
written." It won out over other suggestions, such as photogene and
heliograph. Neo-Anglo-Saxonists prefer sunprint; and sun-picture
(1846) was an early Englishing of the word. The verb, as well as
photography, are first found in a paper read before the Royal Society
on March 14, 1839. Related: Photographed; photographing.”
(Online Etymology Dictionary)

11. Photography definition
“The art or practice of taking and processing photographs.”
“Photograph: A picture made using a camera, in which an image is
focused on to light-sensitive material and then made visible and
permanent by chemical treatment, or stored digitally” (Oxford
Dictionary)

12. Photography definition
“The art or practice of taking and processing photographs.”
“Photograph: A picture made using a camera, in which an image is
focused on to light-sensitive material and then made visible and
permanent by chemical treatment, or stored digitally” (Oxford
Dictionary)
“Method of recording the image of an object through the action of
light, or related radiation, on a light-sensitive material. The word,
derived from the Greek photos (“light”) and graphein (“to draw”), was
first used in the 1830s.” (Encyclopedia Britannica)

13. Photography definition
“The art or practice of taking and processing photographs.”
“Photograph: A picture made using a camera, in which an image is
focused on to light-sensitive material and then made visible and
permanent by chemical treatment, or stored digitally” (Oxford
Dictionary)
“Method of recording the image of an object through the action of
light, or related radiation, on a light-sensitive material. The word,
derived from the Greek photos (“light”) and graphein (“to draw”), was
first used in the 1830s.” (Encyclopedia Britannica)
“Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable
images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either
chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as
photographic film, or electronically by means of an image sensor.”
(Wikipedia)

14. Photography definition
“The art or practice of taking and processing photographs.”
“Photograph: A picture made using a camera, in which an image is
focused on to light-sensitive material and then made visible and
permanent by chemical treatment, or stored digitally” (Oxford
Dictionary)
“Method of recording the image of an object through the action of
light, or related radiation, on a light-sensitive material. The word,
derived from the Greek photos (“light”) and graphein (“to draw”), was
first used in the 1830s.” (Encyclopedia Britannica)
“Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable
images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either
chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as
photographic film, or electronically by means of an image sensor.”
(Wikipedia)

15. Photography definition
“The art or practice of taking and processing photographs.”
“Photograph: A picture made using a camera, in which an image is
focused on to light-sensitive material and then made visible and
permanent by chemical treatment, or stored digitally” (Oxford
Dictionary)
“Method of recording the image of an object through the action of
light, or related radiation, on a light-sensitive material. The word,
derived from the Greek photos (“light”) and graphein (“to draw”), was
first used in the 1830s.” (Encyclopedia Britannica)
“Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable
images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either
chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as
photographic film, or electronically by means of an image sensor.”
(Wikipedia)

16. Photography definition
“The art or practice of taking and processing photographs.”
“Photograph: A picture made using a camera, in which an image is
focused on to light-sensitive material and then made visible and
permanent by chemical treatment, or stored digitally” (Oxford
Dictionary)
“Method of recording the image of an object through the action of
light, or related radiation, on a light-sensitive material. The word,
derived from the Greek photos (“light”) and graphein (“to draw”), was
first used in the 1830s.” (Encyclopedia Britannica)
“Photography is the art, science and practice of creating durable
images by recording light or other electromagnetic radiation, either
chemically by means of a light-sensitive material such as
photographic film, or electronically by means of an image sensor.”
(Wikipedia)

17. Capturing Light
Camera Lucida, Latin "light room“,
1807 by William Hyde Wollaston
&
Camera Obscura,
Latin “dark room”,
the first use of the term
by the German astronomer
Johannes Kepler in 1604

18. Mozi (470 to 390 BCE), a Chinese philosopher, recorded that an image
flips upside down because light travels in straight lines from its source.
His disciples developed the theory of optics.
The Greek philosopher Aristotle (384 to 322 BCE) noted that "sunlight
travelling through small openings between the leaves of a tree,
the holes of a sieve, the openings wickerwork, and even interlaced
fingers will create circular patches of light on the ground.”
Euclid (ca 300 BCE) used a camera obscura as a demonstration for light
traveling in straight lines….

20. The 17th century Dutch Masters, such as Johannes Vermeer,
were known for their magnificent attention to detail.
It has been widely speculated that they made use of such a camera.
Jan Vermeer and the Camera Obscura

21. Silhouettes
18th and early 19th century:
a portrait technique used to
document people by making
“profiles” or “shades” with the
use of a candle light.
19th century: an art form

22. Drawing with the help of a
pantograph or Schmalcalder’s
profile machine

23. 3 presentation methods:
• painted on ivory, plaster, paper,
card, or in reverse on glass;
• “hollow-cut” where the negative
image was traced and then cut
away from light colored paper
which was then laid atop a dark
background
• “cut & paste” where the figure
was cut out of dark paper
(usually free-hand) and then
pasted onto a light background.

24. Historical information
There is an inconsistency in the information about historical
photography processes. The reasons are:
• Different names for the same process (Calotype / Talbotype)
• Similarity in processes (Crystoleum / American Ivorytype / Chrysotype )
• Inventions based on earlier similar inventions (Heliography /
Heliogravure)
• Discovered processes, that were later used or patented by others
(Cyanotype)
• Usage of one process on different bearers (Ambrotype / Tintype)
• Similarity in names (Calotype / Cyanotype)
• Similarity in process (Kallitype & Van Dyke Brown)
• Different names for the process and the process on a particular bearer
(Wet Plate Collodion / Ambrotype)
• A slight difference in the used materials (Oil Print / Bromoil Print)
• Multiply discoveries around the same time (Aristotypes / P.O.P)
• Language differences (Photo-Mécanique / Photo Booth)

25. Data
In the literature we can find different names and different dates
regarding a starting point of an historical photography invention. The
reasons are:
• Years of development with a few milestones on the way
• Cooperation of scientists
• Invention or claim of an invention, based on earlier experiments
and discoveries of others
• No / partially recognition of a process
• Different terms used to describe the “fame“:
• First experienced
• First announced
• Invented
• Purportedly invented
• Clamed / Announced
• Patented

26. The Beginning
1816 - World’s First Negative - Joseph Nicéphore Niépce
1826 - Heliography - Joseph Nicéphore Niépce
1832 - Physautotype - Joseph Nicéphore Niépce
1839 - Defining Photography - Sir John Herschel
1839 - Daguerreotype - Louis-Jacques Mandé Daguerre
1839 - Direct Positive on Paper - Hippolyte Bayard
1841 - Calotype (Talbotype) - William Henry Fox Talbot
1851 - Wet Plate Collodion - Frederick Scott Archer

27. World’s First Negative*
Year: 1826
Inventor: Joseph Nicéphore Niépce
Image: Retinas
Base: Paper
Technique: Using a silver salts coated paper in a
camera obscura. No developer and fixer involved.
* It is the first registered made negative. The
photograph becomes completely black, due to light
and no conservation method.

28. Heliography
Year: 1826
Inventor: Joseph Nicéphore Niépce
Image: Landscape in Saint-Loup-de-Varennes
Base: Tin
Technique: Using bitumen as a coating on glass or
metal. The bitumen hardens on the plate when
exposed to light. The plate is then washed with oil of
lavender, to fix the remains of the hardened areas.

29. Physautotype
Year: 1832
Inventor: Joseph Nicéphore Niépce
Image: A set table
Base: Glass plate
Technique: Exposing to light a glass plate
with oil of lavender and alcohol, in a camera
obscura and developing it in oil of white
petroleum.

30. Daguerreotype
Year: 1839
Inventor: Louis-Jacques Mandé Daguerre
Image: Portrait of Louis Daguerre
Base: Silver plated copper
Technique: A highly detailed photographic image on
a polished copper plate coated with silver. A fume of
iodide is added and exposed to light. Then fumed
with mercury vapour and fixed with hyposulphate of
soda.

31. Direct Positive
Year: Allegedly 1839
Inventor: Hippolyte Bayard
Image: Self-Portrait as a Drowned Man
Base: Paper
Technique: Exposing silver chloride paper to light,
which turned the paper completely black. It was then
soaked in potassium iodide before being exposed in
a camera. After the exposure, it was washed in a
bath of hyposulfite of soda and dried.
.

32. Calotype (Talbotype)
Year: founded 1835, introduced in 1841
Inventor: William Henry Fox Talbot
Image: Window in the South Gallery of Lacock
Abbey
Base: Paper
Technique: A sheet of paper coated with silver
chloride is exposed to light in a camera obscura. The
image is developed in gallic acid and fixed with
sodium hyposulfite

33. Wet Plate Collodion
Year: 1851
Image: A set table
Inventor: Frederick Scott Archer
Base: Paper
Technique: a bromide, iodide, or chloride is dissolved
in collodion (a solution of pyroxylin in alcohol and
ether).
The plate is then placed in a silver nitrate solution
and afterwards exposed to light. It is developed
using a solution of iron sulfate, acetic acid and
alcohol in water.

34. The Outcome:
The First
Photography
Inventions:
World’s First
Negative
The negative could
not be fixed
No continuation of
this process
Other scientists
made use of these
learnings
Now belongs to the
“forgotten
processes”
Heliography
Light exposure was
too long
Quality photograph
was too poor
No continuation of
this process
Served as basis for
the Physautotype
Physautotype
Light exposure was
too long
Quality photograph
was too poor
No continuation of
this process
Served as basis for
the Daguerreotype
Daguerreotype
Light exposure was
relatively good
Quality photograph
was very good
No reproduction
possible
The process was
used until apx.
1860
Direct Positive on
Paper
Light exposure was
too long
Quality photograph
was too poor
Bayard did not get
recognition for his
process
Now belongs to the
“forgotten
processes”
Calotype
Light exposure was
relatively good
Quality photograph
relatively poor
Reproduction was
possible
Led to the
development of the
Albumen (1850)
Wet Plate Collodion
Light exposure was
relatively good
Quality photograph
was very good
No reproduction
possible
The process was
used until apx.
1910

35. Photography Pioneers
France
Joseph Nicéphore Niépce
Louis-Jacques Mandé Daguerre
Hippolyte Bayard
England
Thomas Wedgwood
Sir John Herschel
William Henry Fox Talbot
Frederick Scott Archer

36. Books
Photographs of the Past, Process and Preservation by Bertrand
Lavédrine
A Guide to Early Photographic Processes by Brian Coe and Mark
Haworth-Booth
The Book of Alternative Photographic Processes, by Christopher
James
Photo-Imaging: A Complete Visual Guide to Alternative Techniques and
Processes by Jill Enfield

37. Links
www.niepce.com
http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/permanent/firstphotograph/niepce/
www.nationaltrust.org.uk/lacock/things-to-see-and-do/fox-talbot-museum
http://www.daguerre.org/
http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artMakerDetails?maker=1876
http://www.wedgwoodmuseum.org.uk/
http://www.getty.edu/art/gettyguide/artMakerDetails?maker=1917
http://www.frederickscottarcher.com/
www.alternativephotography.com
http://dutchalternativephotography.blogspot.com
© 2013 An Zuriel for