Digital Photography: A Brief History

Insofar as photography concerns, the function that technology plays and the eyes of the photographer go in the same. The photographic history of digital photography has been filled with revolutionary developments, and the thing that is most fascinating is that the story of advancements is currently being recorded.

The method of taking a photo taking a photo, recording it, and then the transfer of it onto a visible surface has been unchanged since the beginning of photography, when there was a gradual shift of glass plate to dry plates (using gelatin) which was followed by a film in black and white, and finally, color film.

The method by which the image is created was always designed to permit concentrated light to hit an object that is light-sensitive. The light-sensitive surface can then be processed with chemicals in order to create positive or negative images. The fundamental principle is unchanged even after a century when the first image was created on film. What has changed through the years is the method and methods used to make the image.

BOX BROWNIE

Photography’s history is not able to be written without paying homage to The Box Brownie.

George Eastman (of Kodak fame) was a significant player in the creation of a film. The first film was produced in 1884. A few years later, in 1888, he released the well-known Box Brownie camera with the slogan: Once when you press the button, we’ll take care of the rest! The name came from the cartoons that were popularized by Palmer Cox.

This phrase mainly outlined the revolution that in photography, the Box Brownie had brought in the field of photography. This Box Brownie was the first of its kind, and even an amateur photographer could snap photos. With the Box Brownie, any person could snap a picture without worrying about the chemicals needed to make the film. The photographer could snap pictures in just seconds, and the images are stored on film, which could be developed later. The camera could be handed over to a chemist who will create the photos for you. Could anything be more accessible than this? This could lead to an explosion in business!!

The first Brownie, launched in February of 1900, is a primary camera made of cardboard with simple meniscus lenses, which took two 1/4-inch square images on 117 rolls of film. The most well-known Brownie version was Brownie 127, millions of which were sold between 1952 and 1967. It was the Brownie 127 was a simple Bakelite camera that was designed for films with 127 film. It had a simple meniscus lens as well as an angled film plane to counteract the flaws in the lenses. Another camera that was simple is that of the Brownie Cresta, which was sold in 1955 between 1955 and 1958. It had 120 films and had a fixed-focus lens.

KODAK:

George Eastman, the man who was credited with the most significant breakthrough in the field of photography, was from Kodak. So, it’s evident that the name Kodak is likely to be associated with a number of significant advancements.

Kodak has come up with a range of items that are essential for photography today. In 1936, the original color film was created by Kodak and was dubbed Kodachrome.

The world later witnessed an array of inventions from Kodak. Beginning in the mid-1970s, Kodak created a variety of solid-state image sensors that “converted light into digital images” for home and professional consumer use. in 1986, Kodak engineers introduced to the public the world’s first-megapixel sensor with the capacity to record 1.4 million pixels. It could create a 5×7-inch high-quality photo. In the year following, Kodak released seven products to record, store as well as manipulate, transmit, and print electronic still images. In 1990, three years later, Kodak developed the Photo CD system and suggested “the first international standard for defining the color of the digital world of computers and peripherals for computers.” The year 1991 was when Kodak introduced the world’s first digital camera for professionals (DCS) designed for photographers and professionals.

It is said that Kodak solely helped to bring digital cameras to enter the public. Numerous companies joined together with Kodak to make their initiative hugely successful. A few companies supported the campaign to produce less expensive cameras and to allow digital photography to be affordable to everyone. IBM joined forces with Kodak to develop an internet-based digital image exchange network.

Other companies also made equipment needed to print digital images; for instance, Hewlett-Packard was the initial to create color printers to complement the new cameras.

Kinko’s, as well as Microsoft, worked together with Kodak to create digital photo-making kiosks and software that let customers create Photo CD discs and photos and to incorporate digital images into documents.

QUALITY and SPEED:

If you talk to any photographer for advice on film cameras or digital cameras, The two main areas to be considered are speed and image quality.

Speed of film refers to the measurement of a film’s sensitivity towards light, determined through sensitometry and determined on different scales of numerical value, with the most recent of which is an ISO system. In the context of the name, the word quality is used to describe how natural and clear an image appears.

In any type of photography, whether film or digital alike, a decrease of the exposure that results from the greater sensitivity generally reduces the quality of images (via more grainy film or more image noise from other kinds). In essence, the higher the sensitivity, the more grainy the image will appear.

Photographs that were taken with glass plates needed a long time to expose. This meant that people would be unable to move for a long time when the photograph was taken. Even after the photo was taken, the quality was not excellent, and the image was poor. The prices for these photos were the equivalent of a week’s salary!

Since that time, photography has changed dramatically for the better. Since advances in digital imaging, neither the film speed nor the quality of images is affected. Cameras of today are able to automatically decide the proper speed of film for the highest image quality for a specific level of light. In addition, the cost per photo has dropped so drastically that numerous people have found an interest in photography due to the ease with which photographs can be taken. Almost every family has at minimum one camera. The ease with that anyone can now take high-quality photos is fantastic!

Light, Good, Cheap Camera:

When digital photography was at its infancy, there was intense demand for cameras that had greater megapixels that cost less than competitors’ cameras. The world witnessed a significant advancement in the field of photography with the advent of digital SLR (Single Lens Reflex) cameras.

Prior to August 2003, digital SLRs (DSLR) were only intended for professional photographers. The heavy and expensive equipment was prohibitive for the average consumer to afford or to use.

Canon came out with Canon’s DSLR in August of 2003, which was actually the first budget digital SLRs. Canon began to provide avid amateur photographers what they’ve been begging to try their hands the world of photography transformed utterly. It was possible to take the lenses from old film cameras and then attach them to the latest Canon. The camera also came with quick response times in contrast to the compact cameras to the point of this release.

Image MANIPULATION SOFTWARES:

With millions of images being taken around the world and the need to edit and alter those photos was commonplace. What started out as a software program for displaying pictures in grayscale on a monochrome screen in 1987, developed in the hands of Thomas Knoll, a Ph.D. student at the University of Michigan, ended becoming a program designed to edit images. The brothers Thomas and John were working on it to create ImagePro. It was initially distributed as a temporary venture, and it became an instant success. The Photoshop license was bought to be distributed through Adobe at the time of 1988. In the year 1990, Photoshop 1.0 was released for Macintosh.

The professional photographers never realized how much could be added to a photo that had already been snapped. The photography world was re-invented. The thing that Photoshop did was make editing images so simple that professional and amateur photographers were able to spend less time editing and achieving more effective outcomes. A computer is all they need to transform ordinary photos to become entirely different and unique.

Since the market for editing images is growing, more and more companies are entering the industry of creating tools for editing images. While big names like Corel and Adobe offer powerful tools with licenses to edit images in a range of ways, several other companies have released lower-cost, less efficient tools for manipulating images too.

Picasa deserves special attention in this regard. It’s a great tool that lets users add and organize their images using their computers to create private online albums. It also lets users modify the photos at a high level. What’s more? All this is absolutely nothing!!

CONCLUSION:

The advancements in film photography resulted in smaller and more powerful cameras. Advances made in the time of digital photography have resulted in more excellent resolution, smaller cameras, lower prices, and more memory capacity.

The price, as well as the quality of the camera, can range from what a typical man can get for a very reasonable price to something that professional photographers are aspiring to get access to. It could appear that the digital photography world has experienced all the revolutions that it was expected to. Few would have imagined the incredible rise in digital imaging.