Camera Timeline

Johann Heinrich Schulz discovered that a substance called silver nitrate would change color when exposed to light. This paved the way for the first pictures to be taken and processed.

Joseph Niepce developed the camera obscura and took the first photo with it. It wasn't ideal, though, because it took 8 hours of light exposure to make a picture, and the picture faded with time.

Louis Daguerre invented a new way to take pictures. It only needed 30 minutes of light exposure, and the image didn't fade with time.

William Henry Talbot developed the Calotype process. This made it possible to make multiple copies of the same picture.

With the new Collodion process, cameras only needed a few seconds of light exposure to make a picture.

Up until this time pictures had to be developed immediately after being taken. Richard Leach Maddox invented the gelatin dry plate silver bromide process, which made it possible to take a picture and develop it later.

George Eastman invented the first roll-film camera.

The Polaroid allowed people to take a photo and have it developed immediately, right from the camera.

Polaroid came out with the first colored film.

Sony put out the first consumer camcorder, allowing people to record their memories in real time.

The Sasson Company built the first digital camera.

Canon put out the first digital camera for the public, which was later improved by Pixar.

The camera phone technology was first used in Japan, but it quickly spread around the world.

Kodak put out their Easy Share digital camera, which made it easy to snap pictures and download them to the computer.

Kodak put out cameras that didn't have to be connected to a computer in order to download and share the pictures.