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300 BCE
Walking through the lanes of camera
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Entering into the world of photography
The daguerreotype was the first practical method of photography. Louis Daguerre perfected it in 1836 after the death of his partner, Joseph Nicéphore Niépce. He covered a copper plate with silver and exposed it to iodine vapor to make it light-sensitive. The plate was "developed" by exposure to mercury vapor. -
Started with improvisation
When they were introduced in 1871, gelatin dry plates allowed for cameras to be made smaller while maintaining quality. Exposure times were shortened, so for the first time, the candid photo became a reality. -
Coming in of Kodak
George Eastman introduced celluloid film in 1889 for use with a camera he called the "Kodak." In 1900, he introduced a fantastically iconic camera, the Brownie, which was so popular that it remained for sale in various forms until the 1960s. -
Reflex Cameras setting in
Single lens reflex cameras had been available for many years at this point, but the Ihagee Exakta shook things up with its compact design. It caught on so well that it was the main character's camera of choice in Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window. -
Experiments with different Focal Lengths
Oskar Barnack began experimenting with 35mm film for use in photography in 1913. World War I delayed any production plans for his new camera design, the Leica I, until 1925 but once it was manufactured it was a quick success that spawned a number of competitors. -
Electronic Cameras making its mark
Here come the analog electronic cameras, which are distinctly different from the digital cameras we know today. Cameras like the Sony Mavica still recorded pixels continuously and uncompressed, not unlike a videocamera that only shoots one frame at a time. -
DSLR taking over the markets
When Fuji introduced the DS-1P in 1988, we saw the beginning digital cameras as we know them today -- shooting compressed pictures and storing them on digital media.
