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Whatв s So Great about Digital Photography

2012-02-01 07:19
Before digital cameras, the only way to get a digital image was to take a picture with a film camera, get the film developed, then have the photographic print or slide digitized using a scanner. Digital cameras eliminate the time needed for developing and scanning. When you own a digital camera, you can skip the darkroom and go strength to the desktop. Photography, Then and Now Before we take a closer look at digital photography, letв s pause and take a look back at photographyв s roots. The term photography has been around for little more than 160 years. The word is derived from the Greek words photos (light) and graphein (to draw) and was first coined by scientist Sir John Herschel in 1839. Two scientific processes, one optical and the other chemical, combined to make photography possible. Interestingly, both processes existed for hundreds of years before photography was invented. The Optical process: Using Light to create Images The equipment that became the foundation of modern photography was nothing like todayв s cameras. The forerunners of todayв s cameras were created from darkened rooms. Light came in through a small hole in the roomв s window shade or wall, causing an upside-down image of what was outside to appear on the opposite wall. This device was called a camera obscura, which means dark room in Latin. This is how a Camera Obscura works The concept of the camera obscura has been around for thousands of years. It is believed that the great Greek philosopher, Aristotle (384-322 B.C.), knew the principle behind the camera obscura, as did the Arabian scholar, Hassan bin Hassan, who in the tenth century described in his manuscripts what can be considered a camera obscura. Later, Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519) wrote about the uses of a camera obscura and depicted one in a drawing dated 1519. During the same period, a Venetian named Daniel Barbaro recommended that the camera obscura be used as an aid to drawing and perspective. And in 1558, Giovanni Battista Della Porta wrote a book called Natural Magic that told of the camera obscura being utilized as a tool by draftsmen and illustrators. From that time onwards, it is thought that many artists employed the camera obscura, including Dutch artist Johannes Vermeer (1632-1675) and British artists Joshua Reynolds (1723-1792), first president of the Royal Academy of Art in London, and Paul Sandby (1725-1809), a founding member of the Royal academy. As time went by, the camera obscura grew similar in size. Made from a wooden box, it had a lens attached at one end and a mirror at the other. The mirror was positioned at a 45-degree angle, with a glass plate above it. By placing a piece of thin paper over the glass, an individual could trace the image projected there. The Camera Obscura below is in the collection of historical apparatus of the National University of Ireland in Galway. It was used for sketching; the tracing paper was placed on the missing glass inside the folding hood, and a 45В...
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