Milestones
The First Photograph
Also Known As View from the Window at Le Gras
Photography
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Nicephore Niepce's View from the Window at Le Gras, a pewter-plate heliograph of the courtyard at his estate near Chalon-sur-Saone, exposed around 1826 or 1827 and the earliest surviving photograph from nature. The plate is preserved at the Harry Ransom Center in Texas.
Facts
Disputed
WhenThe exact date is uncertain: Niepce's own correspondence places his first successful permanent camera image sometime between 1822 and 1827, and the exposure length is likewise disputed, an eight or nine hour mid-20th-century estimate against a later finding of several days. 2 Sources commonly round the date to 1826 or 1827 for convenience, but Niepce's own letters only bound it within a five year window. Milestone YearScholars date the exposure to 1826 or 1827; the plate itself is undated. LocationSaint-Loup-de-Varennes, France 1 Cross-Tradition Connections
Sources
1. National Science and Media Museum Official Site
2. Wikipedia
Wikimedia FoundationNicephore Niepce, Photography sectionQuote, Nicephore Niepce, Photography section
Niepce's correspondence with his brother Claude has preserved the fact that his first real success in using bitumen to create a permanent photograph of the image in a camera obscura came sometime between 1822 and 1827.
2. Wikipedia
Wikimedia FoundationNicephore Niepce, View from the Window at Le GrasView the Source Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)
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