The History of Photography

The history of the art of photography saw its beginning with the discovery of the principle of the camera obscura (meaning a device that projects an image of its surroundings) and the subject that some things, and their appearance, are altered by their exposure to a light source. It wasn't until 1839 that commercial photography was first introduced and utilized.

Modern Commercial Photography.

It was Thomas Wedgwood who first attempted to capture an image by using a substance that was light-sensitive (paper was one of these). He succeeded in capturing the shadows of his subjects by placing in direct sunlight, and even made shadow-copies of paintings on glass.

In July 1888, George Eastman founded Kodak camera and took it to the market with the slogan: "You press the button, we do the rest". Now, anyone could take a photography using their own personal camera and have Kodak carry out the more complicated stages of the process.

"You press the button, we do the rest." - Kodak

The SLR was first offered by Sweden  in medium-format for commercial use in 1948.

The first camera phone was introduced in Japan by J-Phone, which saw the beginning of a new era of photography (Instagram, Snaphchat etc.).

Kodak ceased production of film cameras in 2004 as the digital age began to take over.