History of digital cameras: From '70s prototypes to iPhone and Galaxy's everyday wonders

[Yo_Mama_Been_Loggin]

The camera in your pocket is pretty amazing. Today's smartphone cameras feel like they're a million miles away from earlier photography tech, but digital cameras had to start somewhere.

Back in the 20th century when cameras needed film, digital camera technology began as a sat-nav for astronauts. Since then, Kodak, Apple and many others have played important roles in developing today's pocket-sized marvels. Let's dive into digital camera history to mark the milestone devices and the groundbreaking tech.

The beginnings

The history of the digital camera started in 1961 with Eugene F. Lally of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. When he wasn't working on artificial gravity, he was thinking about how astronauts could figure out their position in space by using a mosaic photosensor to take pictures of the planets and stars.

Lally actually figured out how to solve red eye in photos, but unfortunately his theory of digital photography was still way ahead of the existing technology. It was the same story 10 years later when Texas Instruments employee Willis Adcock came up with a proposal for a filmless camera (US patent 4,057,830). It wasn't until 15 years later that the digital camera became a reality.

-more-

https://www.cnet.com/news/history-of-digital-cameras-from-70s-prototypes-to-iphone-and-galaxys-everyday-wonders/

[MyOwnPeace]

1. Thanks, Yo!

I SO vividly remember the beginning of the transition from 'film' to digital - and all of the "old school gang" laughing about the possibility of not using 'film!' But I'm guessing those guys are still riding around in their horse-drawn buggies and lighting the kerosene lanterns in their houses every night too......

[moonscape]

4. I admit to coming into the digital photo era with

my heels dug in. Kept rolling my film ...

[Ferrets are Cool]

6. I shot my last roll of film in 2000. One of the best days of my life.

[sir pball]

10. Kodak's production has doubled since 2015

They brought Ektachrome back in 2018 and are rumoured to have two new films coming out this year; Fujifilm is enjoying a similar boon.

Sure, film isn't used at all by snapshotters, and even hobbyists and professionals are vast-majority-digital, but the rumors of silver's demise have been greatly exaggerated.

[MyOwnPeace]

11. Are you saying......

I can use my Nikon FE and the collection of lenses for something other than a door stop?

WOW!!!!

(we won't even talk about my Mamiya twin lens and 645 SLR's - 120 and 220 rolls of FILM!!! )

[Liberal In Texas]

13. I want Kodachrome back!

(It'll probably never happen.)

[dalton99a]

2. "$20,000 for a 1-megapixel camera that can store up to 70 images"

[csziggy]

3. Back when I was on CompuServe there was a guy who had worked on NASA digital cameras

I never knew his real life name, but he was in on the very early development of digital imaging. He had a website for his pictures, but I no longer have the link. He shared a lot of information about digital photography with the Photography Forum on Compuserve.

He could easily have been Mr. Lally, whose photography website is no longer active but was preserved by the Wayback Machine just two months before he died:
http://www.lallyphotography.com/eflgallery.htm
(put that URL into the Wayback Machine at Archive.org and you can see some of Mr. Lally's photos - some of these seem familiar but since CompuServe Forums have been gone for 15 years, I can't be certain if they are the same as what I saw back then.)

ETA - direct link: https://web.archive.org/web/20140518051724/http://www.lallyphotography.com/eflgallery.htm

[Ferrets are Cool]

5. My first digital camera was a Kodak DCS 520.

It cost $15K with a 2mg sensor. Believe it or not, it took amazing images. We printed 16 x 20 with great image quality on a daily basis.
It wasn't long before Nikon got into the game and the D1 could be had for $5,000. We immediately bought 5 of them.

"Yep, the D2000/DCS 520 was the first pro camera with an instant review LCD, and it is the camera that invented "chimping"--the act of constantly reviewing what you just shot, rather than looking in front of you at what you're about to shoot. At a retail price of around $15,000, it was considered a reasonable investment by most daily newspapers, event imaging companies, and commercial photography studios."

https://www.shutterbug.com/content/classic-digital-camerasbrkodaks-vintage-dcs-520-digital-slr-now-bargainbrbut-tech-1999-just-

[Rstrstx]

9. Oh I believe it

I picked up a DCS-330 at a government auction site years ago and the images that could come out of it were amazing for a camera from the ‘90s, the finely toned portrait-like colors it rendered were unmatched until Canon released the d30 in 2000 (and the Kodak still did better skin tones). It had a 3mp sensor about the size of a modern 4/3 sensor and was an absolute light hog, you pretty much had to stick to ISO100. I guess that was before the era of microlenses on the sensor. The IR and AA filters were also removable. Once Canon and Nikon came out with their own digital camera bodies the writing was on the wall for Kodak but their early tech was amazing for the era.

[MineralMan]

7. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, I sold mineral specimens to collectors

on the Internet. I was one of the first online mineral dealers. The issue was photographing the specimens I sold. I started with a video capture device and a video camera. Standard television resolution, so the photos I created were distinctly low-resolution, about 512 pixels wide. But, people's monitors were just 640x480 resolution, so it didn't matter so much.

Anyhow, I had a setup on a table that I used to capture images.

Later, the first web cams came out. I found one from Logitek that allowed you to focus the camera lens for close-up photos. Still 640/480, though. I got pretty good at capturing good images that helped sell the specimens.

I was also doing presentations to mineral collector clubs. Some collectors collect what are called micromount specimens. They're beautiful, but have to be viewed with a stereo microscope to see the details. I started experimenting with the web cam, and designed a mount for the webcam that let me capture images of micromount specimens through the optics of a stereo microscope, or display them on a TV screen. For those mineral club meetings, I'd bring a 32" CRT television set to the meeting, along with my microscope and camera setup, and do a presentation on micromount specimens, with everyone being able to see them at once. It was a big hit at those meetings, for sure.

If I were still doing that today, I'd be displaying those images on a big screen digital TV and using a 4K camera, but I'm not doing that any more. Even so, back in those days, my presentations were unique and exciting for the small audiences at those club meetings. Nobody else was set up to show micromount mineral specimens on a TV screen.

[MyOwnPeace]

8. Poor guy, having to haul around

one of those 'monster 32" TV's!'

I even remember "moving up" to a 27" model - we were the "big shots" in our neighborhood!

[MineralMan]

12. I had a four-wheeler cart for that.

A couple of years ago, we had two of those monsters in the basement. Why I took them down there, I will never know. I finally figured out a safe way to get them up the stairs by myself. I used a 15' long 4' wide canvas painter's dropcloth. I set the TV on the middle of it, and then pulled one end of the drop cloth over the TV. After grabbing both ends of the drop cloth strategically, I could drag the things up the carpeted stair. No sweat, and no carrying a 100 lb TV up. Since then, I've used the same strategy to haul other heavy things up the stairs. It works!

[Klaralven]

14. The demise of Kodak is cautionary tale for US industry

First they let camera manufacturing be taken over by the Japanese.

Then, beginning mid-90s, technological change destroyed their film manufacturing and developing business.