The History of Cameras

By Sydney Fillinger

• Aristotle's (384 BC - 322 BC) collection Problemata has the earliest evidence of a primitive camera called the Camera Obscura on paper.

Daguerreotypes

• Daguerreotype camera built by La Maison Susse Frères in 1839, with a lens by Charles Chevalier

Dry plates

• Dry plates had been available since 1855, thanks to the work of Désiré van Monckhoven,

Kodak

• In 1900, Eastman took mass-market photography one step further with the Brownie, a simple and very inexpensive box camera that introduced the concept of the snapshot.

Kodak No. 2 Brownie box camera, circa 1910

Leica I

• Leitz test-marketed the design between 1923 and 1924, receiving enough positive feedback that the camera was put into production as the Leica I

• Cameras changed in 1936 with the introduction of the inexpensive Argus A and to an even greater extent in 1939 with the arrival of the immensely popular Argus C3.

Argus C3.

• The first major post-war SLR innovation was the eye-level viewfinder, which first appeared on the Hungarian Duflex in 1947 and was refined in 1948 with the Contax S, the first camera to use a pentaprism. Prior to this, all SLRs were equipped with waist-level focusing screens.

• In 1952 the Asahi Optical Company introduced the first Japanese SLR using 35mm film, the Asahiflex.

• Nikon's entry, the Nikon F, had a full line of interchangeable components and accessories and is generally regarded as the first Japanese system camera.

• Known as a Land Camera after its inventor, Edwin Land, the Model 95 used a patented chemical process to produce finished positive prints from the exposed negatives in under a minute

• A device meant to be carried and used like a handheld film camera, appeared in 1981 with the demonstration of the Sony Mavica (Magnetic Video Camera).

• Analog electronic cameras do not appear to have reached the market until 1986 with the Canon RC-701.

• The Nikon D1, a 2.74 megapixel camera that was the first digital SLR developed entirely by a major manufacturer, and at a cost of under $6,000

• Face ID that recognizes and optimizes images of your friends and family, Intelligent IS that creates sharp, steady shots in a wide variety of situations

DSLR camera

• This is a DSLR canon is a digital camera where all your pictures go on to a chip and then u can take them to a machine to print off your pictures.