History

Photographic history was made in the early part of last century, when French painter Louis Jacques Mande Daguerre made the first successful photos which included the following (6):

• when copper plates were exposed to iodine, the fumes formed light sensitive silver iodide.
• depending on available light, this exposed to light for 10 to 20 minutes
• the plate was then developed over mercury to about 165 degrees Farenheit. As a result, the mercury amalgamated with the silver.
• the image was fixed in a warm solution of salt.
• the plate was rinse in hot distilled water.

This process did have its drawbacks which included the following (6) :

• the pictures could not be reproduced.
• the surfaces were delicate.
• the image was reversed.
• the chemicals, bromine and chlorine, were toxic.

Other sources say that French inventor Joseph Niepce made the first photographic image using a bitumen-coated pewter plate exposed in a camera obscura, forerunner of the camera. (6) Many people would invent diverse tools and develop processes that would allow photography to be more than just an inexpensive pasttime. The following charts represents some to these inventions that helped shape the trade and art of photography into what it is today.

Photographic Innovations (4 and 6)

Dates	Inventors	Description
1827	Joseph Niepce	The French inventor makes earliest known photos on record
1831	Louis Daguerre	The French painter made nonpermanent photographs on silver plates coated with silver iodide
1851	Frederick Archer	The artist and photographer introduced wet glass plates to expose negatives.
1861	James Maxwell	The British physicist made the first color photograph
1889	George Eastman	This American innovator invented the roll film
1925	Germany	The 35mm camera was introduced in Germany.
1947	Edwin H. Land	The Polaroid Land camera was based on a process which American physicist Edwin H. Land developed.

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