Inventor: Joseph Nicéphore Niépce(France),Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre(France), Robert Cornelius(US)

Photography is the use of light to create an image on a sensitive substance.  The first fixed image was made by Niépce in 1827 and it took him eight hours to accomplish it.  However, the fact that it took this long to do this was a roadblock for the practical success of photography.  A major difficulty in the creation of a more convenient way to take pictures was keeping the images from disappearing shortly after they were taken.  Niépce’s partner Daguerre was able to achieve this, and his process took only thirty minutes of exposure time.  Eventually, the exposure time for this type of photography was shortened to mere seconds.  He named this process Daguerrotype, after himself and sold the rights to the French government.  Daguerrotype worked by capturing an image onto a sheet of copper with a thin layer of polished silver on top.  After the picture had been taken, the metal had to be developed over hot mercury and the image fixed using a special kind of salt and gold chloride.  Photography had an almost immediate impact in America.  Robert Cornelius took the first Daguerrotype picture, a self portrait, in 1839.  Photography gave a much more affordable way to obtain portraits of themselves.  Daguerrotype galleries were very popular in urban areas and many photographers tried to dot their walls with portraits of famous people.     

*Pictures from <http://www.ccsd.ca/charlotte/dagazine/mi/exhibit/brochure.htm>

SOURCES:

Bellis, Mary. “History of Photography and the Camera”, 17 Jan 2004, <http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blphotography.htm>

• This site contains a description of the beginnings of photography

Bellis, Mary. “The Daguerreotype”, 17 Jan 2004, <http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/bldaguerreotype.htm>

• This webpage has a description of Daguerrotype, the first practical type of photography