1727
The discovery that silver nitrate changes. Johann Heinrich Schulz discovered that a substance called silver nitrate would change color when exposed to light. This paved the way for the first pictures to be taken and processed.
1826
The camera obscura is developed. Joseph Niepce developed the camera obscura and took the first photo with it. It wasn't ideal, though, because it took 8 hours of light exposure to make a picture, and the picture faded with time.
1837
The daguerreotype was invented. Louis Daguerre invented a new way to take pictures. It only need thirty minutes of light exposure, and the image didn't fake with time. Daguerre's process 'fixed' the images onto a sheet of silver-plated copper. He polished the silver and coated it in iodine, creating a surface that was sensitive to light. Then, he put the plate in a camera and exposed it for a few minutes. After the image was painted by light, Daguerre bathed the plate in a solution of silver chloride. This process created a lasting image, one that would not change if exposed to light.
1841
Making multiple copies possible. William Henry Talbot developed the Calotype process. This made it possible to make multiple copies of the same picture. The inventor of the first negative from which multiple positive prints were made was Henry Fox Talbot, an English botanist and mathematician and a contemporary of Daguerre.Talbot sensitized paper to light with a silver salt solution. He then exposed the paper to light. The background became black, and the subject was rendered in gradations of grey. This was a negative image, and from the paper negative, Talbot made contact prints, reversing the light and shadows to create a detailed picture. In 1841, he perfected this paper-negative process and called it a calotype, Greek for beautiful picture.
1851
Taking pictures gets easier. With the new Collodion process, cameras only needed a few seconds of light exposure to make a picture. The collodion process is an early photographic process, said to have been invented, almost simultaneously, by Frederick Scott Archer and Gustave Le Gray in about 1850. During the subsequent decades of its popularity, many photographers and experimenters refined or varied the process.
1871
Film is made easier to handle. Up until this time pictures had to be developed immediately after being taken. Richard Leach Maddox invented the gelatin dry plate silver bromide process, which made it possible to take a picture and develop it later.
1888
The invention of the roll-film camera. George Eastman invented the first roll-film camera. In 1884, Eastman patented the first film in roll form to prove practicable; he had been tinkering at home to develop it. In 1888, he perfected the Kodak camera, the first camera designed specifically to use roll film. In 1892, he established the Eastman Kodak Company, in Rochester, New York. It was one of the first firms to mass-produce standardized photography equipment. The company also manufactured the flexible transparent film, devised by Eastman in 1889, which proved vital to the subsequent development of the motion picture industry.
1948
The Polaroid camera is marketed. The Polaroid allowed people to take a photo and have it developed immediately, right from the camera. Polaroid 135mm, f/11 lens with aperture wheel with 8 different opening sizes, bulb and instantaneous shutter settings. Camera body is metal with inlaid brown leather, fold open integrated case, and fold out bellows. It was manufactured from 1948 to 1953. It has socket for external flash and takes type 40 roll film packs, which unfortunately is no longer available. Developing is embedded in the camera.
1963
Colored film is introduced. Polaroid came out with the first colored film. They have a glossy finish and take about 30 minutes at 21c to develop. You can still buy this today.
1974
The first digital camera is developed. The Sasson Company built the first digital camera. The result was a Rube Goldberg device with a lens scavenged from a used Super-8 movie camera; a portable digital cassette recorder; 16 nickel cadmium batteries; an analog/digital converter; and several dozen circuits — all wired together on half a dozen circuit boards.
1980
The first consumer camcorder is released. Sony put out the first consumer camcorder, allowing people to record their memories in real time.
1984
The first digital camera is marketed. Canon put out the first digital camera for the public, which was later improved by Pixar. The first digital camera available to the public. The T70 was more upmarket and gave the photographer a lot more control over the camera's operation while keeping with the T-series philosophy of simplicity in control and operation. It offered eight different shooting modes (but no aperture priority) along with automatic film advance and rewind.
2000
The first camera phones (late 1990's). The camera phone technology was first used in Japan, but it quickly spread around the world. The J-SH04 was a mobile phone made by Sharp Corporation and released by J-Phone (SoftBank Mobile). It was only available in Japan, and was released in November 2000. It was Japan's first ever phone with a built-in camera (110,000-pixel CMOS) and color display (256-color display).
2001
The easy share camera comes into play. Kodak put out their Easy Share digital camera, which made it easy to snap pictures and download them to the computer
2008
Wireless cameras are developed. Kodak and many other companies put out cameras that didn't have to be connected to a computer in order to download and share the pictures.