The First Photograph

The First Photograph, or more specifically, the earliest known surviving photograph made in a camera by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce in 1826 or 1827.

The image depicts the view from an upstairs window at Niépce's estate, Le Gras, in the Burgundy region of France. Exposure of about 8 hours.

Details:

In 1822, Niépce successfully made a heliograph from an engraving of Pope Pius VII, which was destroyed during an attempt to copy it some years later.

Over the next few years, Niépce experimented with bitumen on pewter or zinc plates that could be inked for printing.

His best results came in 1826 with the copying of an engraving of the Cardinal Georges d'Amboise in which Niépce invented the first successful form of photomechanical reproduction.

Original Version:

Edited Version:

These images show us a human fascination with trying to capture visual experience: how we wish to reproduce the sights we can see to the finest detail, and to reflect in a mechanical process a sort of realism that paintings or sketches were not so completely able to reproduce.

Source: http://www.hrc.utexas.edu/exhibitions/permanent/firstphotograph/#top/