photography, history of photography, Daguerre, Talbot, Nadar, Disdèri

1. ART 100
UNDERSTANDING VISUAL CULTURE
PHOTOGRAPHY GETS BORN
Module 4.1

2. The origins of the “camera”
These diagrams are two early depictions of the workings of the “camera
obscura” (dark room”), in which an external image enters a darkened
chamber through a pinhole opening and appears upside down on the
opposite wall.

3. The original
“camera” is as
big as a walk-in
closet!

4. Slowly the camera obscura
gets smaller and more
portable. Here it has
contracted to the size a small
cabinet with legs.

5. The origins of the “camera”
Gradually it shrinks to a tabletop apparatus, and finally, to the size of a small box.

6. The origins of the “camera”
With the room-size camera obscura now contracted into a small box, the pinhole
replaced with a lens that permits focusing, and a mirror installed to reverse the
image, all that remains is to find a way of making the reflected image permanent.

7. The physics and optics of
the camera are put together
first, but the chemistry
remains to be cracked.

8. As often happens in the history of technology, multiple
competing solutions appear at more or less the same
time.
It turns out that a number of alternative chemical solutions
to the problem are developed.
Use these links to see some of the possibilities that were
explored by early photographers:
 http://www.edinphoto.org.uk/1_early/1_early_photog
raphy_-_processes.htm
 http://photographymuseum.org/primer.html
 http://www.birrcastle.com/history/photographicTechn
iques.asp#

9. Today some photographers
still enjoy experimenting
with different techniques
from the 19th century.
http://www.alternativephotog
raphy.com/wp/processes
http://imsc.usc.edu/haptics/
LostandFound/early.html

10. This link shows how the different kinds of 19th
photographs have aged differently, detailing
how these photographs (which are stored in
many libraries and archived collections) may
appear today and can be properly classified. This
is the kind of information that people who work
closely with historical objects have in mind.
http://www.lib.ua.edu/libraries/hoole/collections/P
hotographTypesatTheW.S.HooleSpecialCollectio
nsLibrary.htm

11. The dominant technology is France is invented
by Niepce in conjunction with Daguerre.

12. Joseph NicéphoreNièpce, View from the Window at
Le Gras, c. 1826, heliograph
“the first photograph”

13. Joseph NicéphoreNièpce, View from the Window at
Le Gras, c. 1826, sketch by Helmut Gernsheim

14. Joseph NicéphoreNièpce, View from the Window at
Le Gras, 1826, 1952 print

15. Joseph NicéphoreNièpce, View from the Window at
Le Gras, 1826, 2002 print

16. HTTP://WWW.HRC.UTEXAS.EDU/EXHI
BITIONS/PERMANENT/WFP/

17. “daguerreotype”

18. Early daguerreotypes
View of San Francisco,
1848

19. Early daguerreotypes
P

20. Early daguerreotypes
Group of 10 unidentified boys,
Date unknown
The Barton family dog, Nero, 1848

21. In England, a competing
process was invented by
William Henry Fox Talbot. He
called his process the
“calotype.”

22. Talbot, Bust of
Patroclus, 1839

23. Talbot, Articles of
Glass, 1839

24. Books in a Library

25. Talbot, “The Haystack,” 1839

26. Nadar’s studio, 35 boulevard des
Capucines
GaspardFélixTournachon, “Nadar”

27. Daumier, “Nadar, elevating
the status of photography to
an art,” May 1862

28. Nadar, Portrait of Sarah
Bernhardt

29. Disdéri, Portrait of Rosa
Bonheur, c. 1871

30. Disdéri and the carte de
visite, uncut sheet of cartes-de
visite of Sarah Bernhardt

31. Queen Victoria in carte-de-
visite format

32. Disdéri, Unidentified
Ballerina, uncut sheet of
carte-de-visite photographs

33. Disdéri, Self Portrait