Talk:Daguerreotype/Archive 2

Archive 1

Archive 2

Was photography (and the daguerreotype) invented in 1835, or in 1839?

Thread retitled from "Was photography (and the daguerreotype) invented in 1835, or in 1839? Why does the article say "Photography was born in 1839" when Daguerre had already been making daguerreoteypes for four years, documented from several reliable sources?".

At the end of an appreciative review of the Diorama one could read In the Journal des artistes of the 27 September 1835:

"It is said that Daguerre has found a way to collect, on a plate prepared by him, the image produced by the camera obscura, so that a portrait, a landscape or any view, projected on to this plate by the ordinary camera obscura leaves an imprint in light and shade, as well as the most perfect of all drawings ... a contraption placed over this image will preserve it for an indefinite time ... the physical sciences have probably never before presented a miracle to match this one." (my translation)

In fact, at this time Daguerre had not found a way to fix the image of the daguerreotype or to take portraits, as the exposure times were too long,

Original text:

À la suite d’un commentaire élogieux sur le spectacle du Diorama, La Vallée de Goldau1, on peut lire dans le Journal des artistes du 27 septembre 1835 :

« [Daguerre] a trouvé dit-on, le moyen de recueillir, sur une planche préparée par lui, l’image produite par la chambre noire, de manière qu’un portrait, un paysage, une vue quelconque, projetée sur ce plateau par la chambre noire ordinaire, y laisse une empreinte en clair et en ombre, et présente ainsi le plus parfait de tous les dessins… Une préparation mise par dessus cette image, la conserve pendant un temps indéfini… Les sciences physiques n’ont peut-être jamais présenté une merveille comparable à celle-ci2. »

Paul-Louis Roubert Hubert, ou l'honneur de Daguerre' ' Études photographiques No 16 mai 2005

The following quotes are from The Silver Canvas, and some of them are used to establish the date of the first daguerreotype in The Encyclopedia of Ninteenth-Century Photography

When the Paris correspondent of the Athenaeum reported in January 1839 about the invention, he commented that Daguerre's current images were better than those he had seen "four years earlier".

The following year, in September 1836, the father of Eugéne Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc wrote his son that a friend told him of seeing a work by Daguerre taken from atop the Diorama showing the hills of Montmarte one-half miles away. With only a weak magnifying glass, he wrote, it was possible to distinguish among the windmills on the hill the one serving as the telegraph tower, despite the fact that it measured only about three-quarters of an inch on the plate. It was even possible, he added, to distinguish all its working parts and sails, including the glittering iron wires used to operate arms of the semaphore telegraph. The letter concluded the descriiption by adding that Daguerre's new device contained such minuscule details it could not possibly have been produced by an artist.

Footnote:

This little known description is the most detailed evidence proving that by the early winter 1836 Daguerre already had been able to produce a view that could be examined by others and that was clear enough to show minute details. See Eugène-Emmanuel Viollet-le-Duc, Lettres de Italie: 1836 - 1837 addressée à sa famille (Paris: L. Laget, 1971), 165. RPSM (talk) 11:43, 15 January 2015 (UTC)