From Kodak To iPhonography - The Evolution Of Photography Into Social Media

From Kodak To iPhonography – The Evolution Of Photography Into Social Media

Camera & Technology

June 13, 2023 ·

Antonio Lenza

Daguerre And Talbot. Images are taken from “A World History of Photography, Third Edition by Naomi Rosenblum”.

Photography has shaped and defined many of us through the ages, and with this in mind, we owe it to the art itself to truly understand its origin and growth throughout history. The art form has evolved in ways we couldn’t possibly predict and with social media taking to this discipline so seamlessly, it was only natural that it piqued our curiosity into finding out just how far photography has come today.

Have you ever wondered where such a versatile medium originated from? We here at the London School of Photography decided to use our own expertise and research into how photography has progressed through time, who the key pioneers were, the current situation in which we view the conventional DSLR and how mobile photography and social media is taking the world by storm.

We planned this infographic with our own design team by going right back to the original roots of photography as a starting point. The first pioneers where Ibn Al-Haytham – a mathematician born in 354 AH and was the creator of the camera obscura. As the popularity of this invention grew, physicists and inventors sought to perfect a permanent photography which was subsequently achieved by Nicephore Niepce (credited as the ‘inventor of photography’). The process he used to make “View from the Window Le Gras in 1826 or 1827 was called Heliography. He invented this process around 1822. He is also credited with making the first reproduction with this heliographic technical process. It was printed from a metal plate in 1825 and is a reproduction of a Flemish engraving. Here are images of the engraving and the photograph using this process.

Nicéphore Niépce Oldest Photograph 1825 — Nicéphore Niépce Oldest Heliographic reproduction of an engraving.

View From The Window, Nicéphore Niépce — View From The Window at Le Gras, Oldest Photograph using heliography. Nicéphore Niépce

As time went on, Louis Daguerre and Fox Talbot – inventors of the Daguerreotype and Talbotype respectively both created a camera that would permanently capture an image in its own unique way. The difference between these two processes was that the Daguerrotypes were negative images on mirrored surfaces used to ‘reflect’ a positive image, whereas the Talbotype were negatives ‘printed’ as positives on to paper.

As the Daguerro type and Talbot type were popular ‘filters’ used by mobile apps such as Instagram and various other photo-editing apps we thought it would only be natural to look into how photography has been directly affected through social media and mobile photography – with the latter outselling digital cameras 10 to 1. Globally, sales have been down for digital cameras since its peak at 80% in 2010 – which is a rather startling yet unsurprising statistics, especially with the rise of ‘iphonography’. With the demand for better photo quality on mobile phones and the quickness of capturing an image inexpensively – we believe the innovation that’s gone into mobile photography has definitely been the reason for such a decline in digital camera sales, with some phones even out-doing some DSLRs in terms of their camera quality.

We didn’t realize just how groundbreaking the photo-sharing statistics were on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest – the most popular apps for image-sharing. We also found out some rather interesting statistics on the editing styles that got the most shares on Instagram – such as hues of blue and low-gaining more likes. With new features being added to these apps like ‘stories’ – it’s only natural that creative’s and brands alike are needing the best camera phones to be able to record their stories on the go at the highest quality, completely eliminating the traditional record-edit and upload process that’s involved with a traditional digital camera.

We hope that this infographic proves useful and provides an insight into just how much photography has grown and has been influenced by social sharing. Our statistics just might give you the unique edge you need to become the next social media sensation!

From Kodak to iPhonography _ The Evolution of Photography into Social Media

Antonio Lenza
May 2018

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Antonio Lenza

See all articles by Antonio Lenza

Antonio Leanza – artist, lecturer and owner of the https://londonschoolofphotography.com has developed a new way of teaching due to his extensive experience lecturing at LCC for over ten years and for Ilford Film across the UK. The team at LSP believe in helping students achieve their full potential as creative individuals to realize their aspirations in the photographic world.