Pre-History Notes

In 1839, photography was officially introduced to the world. Although people were able to see ghostly photographic reflections before the 19th century, they were unable to permanently fix these images on to a solid surface. By the mid 19th century, society was ready for realistic representations of the world. The invention of photography revolutionized daily life. Today, doctors, athletes, scientists, investigators, artists, anthropologists, advertisers, and journalists (to name only a few) rely on the medium for information and publicity. Below, you can find a brief outline of notes from our first lecture, titled “Pre-History.”



The Illustration above pictures a camera obscura, which means in Latin "dark chamber". Originally, the camera was a light-tight, four-walled room with a pinhole opening. An upside-down image of the world in front of the pinhole was cast on to the far wall. The earliest known written evidence of a camera obscura dates from 350 BC when Aristotle made obsevations on an eclipse.



In 1558, Giovanni Battista della Porta (pictured above) published Natural Magic. In his book, he argued that the camera obscura would become useful to draftsman and artists who sought realistic depictions of perspective space.


(Replica of Fox Talbot's Camera Obscura)

In 1676, Johann Christoph Sturm incorporated a 45 degree angle mirror into the camera design. The mirror corrected image reversal and reflected it on to a horizontal glass surface.

In the late 1600s, an aperture was added to the camera obscura to control image sharpness and brightness. The lens was fitted in an adjustable tube for focus control.

Friedrich Risner described the first transportable camera obscura as a light, wooden "hut" that could be moved to suit desired scenes. The camera obscura evolved rapidly from movable rooms to portable tents. By the end of the 17th century, small, hand-held camera obscuras became popular.



In 1807, William Hyde Wollaston introduced the camera lucida, an optical devise designed specifically for renderers who wanted to create true-to-life drawings. The camera lucida consisted of an extendible telescopic tube in three pieces, with a 45 degree prism and sighting lens. The camera lucida quickly gained popularity.

http://physics.kenyon.edu/EarlyApparatus/Optics/Camera_Lucida/Camera_Lucida.html



In the 1790s, Thomas Wedgwood experimented with silver chloride and a camera obscura. Initially, his experiments grew out of his desire to make faithful art reproductions. He successfully created faint, weak images, but they could only be viewed for short intervals in dimly lit rooms. Otherwise, they had to be stored in the complete dark. Although he came close to discovering modern-day photography, he was unable to resolve issues of permanence.