A Snap for the Knowing Ones
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Cameras have existed for a LONG time, a lot longer than “photography” as we usually think of it today. And, as usual with technology, the road from giant wooden boxes on tripods to the camera on your phone wasn’t really that straightforward. There were weird detours, accidental inventions and companies that literally shaped an entire century of visual culture without a lot of people really knowing they did.
Let’s have a small chat about this weird journey, shall we?
The Large Formats
Nowadays, when we say large cameras, we think of things like the Canon R1, a camera about twice as long as your phone, thrice as wide and weighing about 8 times more. But, even that is miniscule compared to what we started off with. Long before digital sensors, photographers worked with what is called the camera obscura principle: in a nutshell, a dark box with a small opening that projected an image of whatever was outside onto the opposite wall. This had been something we understood for centuries, but nobody figured out how to permanently capture that projected image.
Then came the unsuspecting year of 1826, when French inventor Joseph Niépce invented the first permanent camera process. Even compared to all the modern technologies we have now, this feat was nothing short of impressive. It was basically just a wooden box with a piece of glass stuck to it, but more importantly, Niépce managed to figure out a way to permanently store the images that came out of that box. In a nutshell, he used a process called heliography, where he used pewter coated with bitumen (a constituent of petroleum), and took a photograph of the view from his window. It took him eight whole hours to create the image, and it showed a view from the window at Le Gras, creatively called Point de vue du Gras, or View from the Window at Le Gras.
But heliography, or its following successors, though simpler, still took far too much time and there were no negatives. This meant there was no copying the picture–you had that one shot and that’s it. Then came 1857 where dry plates became available. Dry plates at the beginning weren't quite popular because they couldn’t match the speed or the quality of other formats yet. In 1871, Richard Maddox invented the Gelatin dry plate. To skip the details, this meant “instant” exposures, and finally, a tripod or other forms of support weren't always necessary. Gelatin dry plates also created negatives! Meaning these photographs could be copied! And of course, these were faster than their less copy-able counterparts.
But compared to anything we have now (or half a century ago), these cameras were slow, heavy and a lot more technical than anything our doomscrolling little brains can comprehend now. Portraiture in this era meant being completely still for looong stretches, with nothing but your own thoughts to keep you company. Fun fact: This is why nobody really smiles in old photos; just being more neutral meant it was a lot easier and more practical.
Kodak to the rescue!
Some of you must have at least heard of the name Kodak, and for good reason. George Eastman (founder of Kodak), was the pioneer of photographic film, starting with paper film in 1885 before switching to celluloid in 1888. Instead of using single use glass plates, a strip of flexible film was used that could hold multiple exposures.
Eastman released his first camera, simply called the “Kodak”, in 1888. It was quite basic–fixed focus, a single shutter speed and the works. But because of this, it was really, really easy to use. It came with 100 shots and once you were done, send it back to the factory and boom, you get your photos and your camera back with more film! How simple is that! Once the inexpensive Kodak Brownie came out in 1900, mass-market photography was more than just a dream! The Kodak cameras could be used not just by trained photographers, but by the everyday Joe and their kids! In fact, the Brownie was targeted at children. Photography finally became something that just anybody could do on a random Sunday afternoon instead of something that took hours and a specialist.
The Creation of 35mm, and The Birth of Leica
35mm refers to a film that has a width of 35mm. 35mm film defined most 20th century photography. This type of film was originally not made for photography–it was motion picture film. But then came the year 1913 and a certain German engineer named Oscar Barnack, who worked at an optical company called Leitz. You see, Barnack liked adventuring. And he liked taking pictures of stuff when he ventured around. But carrying a camera back then, may it be of roll film, box or large variety, it was still not that compact, and Barnack reportedly had health issues, which made carrying these around not easy. So, he began experimenting around 1913. His goal was to create a compact camera that used standardized 35mm film instead of bulky plates or roll film, which was the norm at the time.
His prototype was later named the “Ur-Leica” (Leica comes from a shortened version of Leitz-Camera). The Ur-Leica ran its film horizontally, rather than vertically, and this meant you got basically double the frame size, compared to other small cameras at the time. 24x36mm. The most important dimensions in photography past the 1930’s. 24x36mm was the size of the exposure on the film. Everything, even now, is based around these. When you see a modern lens, the focal length is based on these dimensions. That’s because Full Frame (the standard for the size of sensors in digital cameras), what we actually base things off, is derived from 35mm film. However, things kind of came to a halt for a bit. World War 1 meant that any further research would come to a sudden stop, and commercialisation would also be postponed temporarily. But after some test-marketing in 1923-24, the Leica 1 was released in 1925, and was received with commercial success. The thing is, the Leica 1 wasn’t the first 35mm camera, but it was the one that made it actually practical and popular. Due to its commercial success, imitators and competitors came in waves. This basically cemented 35mm’s position as the most dominant film format for most, if not all, of the century.
Film is Figured Out, But What About The Camera?
As 35mm took over, cameras branched into varying design styles. The early Leica’s and other early cameras were called “Rangefinders”. A rangefinder, in a nutshell, means that you looked in a separate viewing window with, in simple terms, clever optical tricks to let you focus.
Then comes SLRs and later, TLRs. SLR stands for Single Lens Reflex camera and TLR for Twin Lens Reflex camera. Lens reflex cameras used an internal mirror to let you look directly through the lens. This made focusing easier and more on point, especially with longer focal lengths. The mirror would have to fold up when actually exposing, and that’s where the “kerchunk” sound cameras are known for comes from. TLRs, on the other hand, have two lenses, and while still using a mirror, they use a separate lens to show you the image, so the mirror doesn’t have to fold up while exposing.
Digitalization, At Last!
In the unassuming year of 1975, Kodak, the company known for film, created the one thing that would ruin their monopoly. Steven Sasson, working in Kodak’s research labs, created the first known prototype of a digital camera. It was made out of spare parts and a lens from a Kodak movie camera, wired up to a CCD sensor, and using it, he took the first digital image. It weighed 8 pounds and took 23 seconds to record a single image onto a cassette tape. It produced a black and white image of such low quality that it’s just funny. Kodak patented the technology but didn't pursue it further because they didn't see a commercial future. This was the single worst business decision ever made by Kodak. Because of them not developing this technology, they lost to other companies that did. Kodak now barely exists, still chugging along and making film, a mere shadow of what they were just a few decades ago.
A lot of innovation happened in the following years, but they only became commercially practical in the 1990s and didn't take off until the early 2000s. DSLRs (Digital Single Lens Reflex cameras) dominated the beginning of the 21st century, as they gave people a familiar design with the SLR mechanism, but instead used reusable and instant storage methods, instead of film which you had to buy a new roll of every 36 shots, as well as develop it. However, DSLRs came with their own issues.
Firstly, they showed exactly what the lens showed, so any changes to settings you made weren’t shown until you see the image preview. And of course, the mirror made them heavy and bulky. Then came mirrorless, the most recent generation of cameras. They remove the mirror, and instead use a live digital preview. Most manufacturers now mainly develop mirrorless systems, except for Pentax, though that's an extremely specific case.
The Oddballs
Of course, like any technology or art, there's the weird ones. There's a whole set of cameras just built for extremely specific jobs, and they’re beautifully weird. Here’s just a few of the cool ones.
Panoramic Cameras: Basically built to expose an extra-wide field of view in a single exposure. This either happens via a rotating lens that sweeps across the scene as the film moves, or through a VERY wide and curved film plane. They’ve existed from the beginning in their own ways, long long before “panorama” was a mode on our phone’s camera apps.
Half frame cameras: A personal favorite of mine.These just shoot 35mm film, but they don’t take up the normal 24x36mm frame. They take “vertical” 18x24mm shots, effectively doubling the amount of exposures per film roll. They’re fun little things that try to make a very expensive hobby not as expensive.
Instant Film Cameras: These start off with Edwin Land, the founder of Polaroid. Land was already famous: he made affordable polarizing filters in the 1930’s. According to the Polaroid lore, he started working on instant film after his then three year old daughter asked him why she couldn't see the picture he’d taken of her right away. In 1947, Land presented the first Polaroid camera, The Land Model 95. It started selling at a Boston department store in 1948. The first batch sold out in a day. However, these aren't the same instant cameras we know and love. The first ones needed to be manually timed and peeled and had a sepia-tone. True black and white film came in 1950, and instant colour in 1963. It was easy to figure out why people wanted it, even in its clunky original design. You didn't need a dark room, or to wait days for a lab. Everything was simplified into a print that developed in your hand in about a minute. Polaroid dominated the instant category and was still wildly successful in the overall category of photography. However, then came the wrecking ball. Digital photography. Because modern digital cameras had the flexibility of system cameras and some more, they made the “instant” pitch obsolete. Similar to film cameras, instant cameras definitely still have a market, however they are far from their prime.
Cinema Cameras and a Parallel History
Motion picture cameras actually predate a lot of what we’ve talked about, in terms of being a distinct technology. In the 1890s, the Lumière brothers in France and Edison’s team (mainly W.K.L. Dickson) in the US developed some of the first motion picture cameras. These were simple–just perforated film moving past a lens at a steady and rapid rate to capture a sequence of still frames that, when played quickly, create the illusion of movement.
From there, things got wild. Cinema cameras went on their own track, chasing bigger images, better colour and eventually widescreen formats with the rise of the television in the 1950s. Panavision, a company made by Robert Gottschalk and a few partners in the early 1950’s, gained popularity by making anamorphic projection lenses. In layman’s terms, anamorphic lenses squeeze a wide image horizontally onto standard film, and then unsqueeze it during projection to produce a much wider picture than what the film would normally allow. Panavision’s anamorphic lenses and later camera systems are still somewhat of a dominant force in Hollywood today. Directors like Christopher Nolan are closely related to their large format cameras and lenses.
But similarly to photography cameras, cinema cameras have their own oddities. Mainly IMAX 70mm. So, what is it? Why was the Odyssey being the first film to be fully shot on IMAX 70mm such a big deal? IMAX 70mm does the same thing Barnack did with the Ur-Leica. It ran the film horizontally. But unlike Barnack, who used standardised film (35mm), IMAX used 5 perf, or 70mm film, film that is physically MUCH larger than 35mm. This produced an image that was dramatically sharper and immersive on giant screens.
But there are some issues. Using the film horizontally means you get a bigger image, but you sacrifice how many shots you can get with the same amount of film. IMAX 70mm also needs to be swapped every 3 minutes or so, and the cameras themselves are very loud. The fact that Nolan and the actors managed to do a three hour long film despite these challenges is why it's so impressive.
What's the throughline?
Pretty much every advancement in photography can be summed up into two main things: laziness and picture quality. The large format gave absolutely high quality images, but you carried a mini dark room around. Leica shrank things down by using film made for movies. Digital sensors traded film’s chemistry for electronics and engineering, starting off with sacrificing quality for convenience before overtaking them in that regard too. Cinema cameras have spent more than a century chasing after bigger pictures and sharper images for the biggest possible screens, while photography cameras try to be smaller, faster and more portable. Different problems, but it's all still the same tug of war. And it's still going on today, and probably will till the day we all become cyborgs and our eyes are cameras or something.
Writer: ShamDesigner: MahiraEditor: Emily
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