Milestones in Photography (courtesy of Nat Geo)

Milestones in Photography (courtesy Nat Geo)

Milestones in Photography Centuries of advances in chemistry and optics, including the invention of the camera obscura, set the stage for the world's first photograph. In 1826, French scientist Joseph Nicéphore Niépce, took that photograph, titled View from the Window at Le Gras at his family's country home. Niépce produced his photo—a view of a courtyard and outbuildings seen from the house's upstairs window—by exposing a bitumen-coated plate in a camera obscura for several hours on his windowsill. Photograph by Nicéphore Niépce Best known for his development of electromagnetic theory, Scottish physicist James Clerk Maxwell dabbled in color theory throughout his life, eventually producing the first color photograph in 1861. Maxwell created the image of the tartan ribbon shown here by photographing it three times through red, blue, and yellow filters, then recombining the images into one color composite. Photograph by James Clerk Maxwell The settling of a debate—whether, during its trot, all four of a horse's hooves are off the ground at the same time—led English photographer Eadweard Muybridge to develop the first photographs to capture the sequence of movement. In 1878, Muybridge arranged 24 trip-wire cameras along a racetrack. The resulting photos, The Horse in Motion, proved all four hooves leave the ground during a trot and set the stage for the first motion pictures. Photograph by Eadweard Muybridge An unknown photographer inspired legions of tornado-chasers when he captured the earliest known photograph of a tornado. The black-and-white image was taken on August 28, 1884, about 22 miles (45 kilometers) southwest of Howard, South Dakota. Photograph courtesy NOAA Some of the world's first aerial photographs were taken not by humans but by birds. In 1903, German engineer Julius Neubronner combined an analog camera and timer, which he attached to a pigeon's neck. The German military took notice of Neubronner's innovative approach to aerial photography, and by World War II pigeons were collecting secret aerial photography for both Allied and Axis forces. Photograph from Deutsches Museum, Munich This flashlight photograph of a white-tailed doe with her fawns was among the world's first nighttime photographs of animals, shot by photographer and wildlife enthusiast George Shiras. A pioneer in flashlight and trip-wire photography, Shiras captured this shot in Whitefish River, Michigan, around 1906 using a remote-control flashlight camera triggered when an animal stepped on the trip wire. Photograph by George Shiras In April 1909, Admiral Robert Peary and his team (pictured here), including Inuits Ooqeah, Ooatah, Egingwah, and Seeglo and fellow American Matthew Henson, became the first explorers to reach what they believed to be the North Pole. Later studies found that Peary was actually 30 to 60 miles (50 to 100 kilometers) short of the Pole. Photograph by Admiral Robert E. Peary Underwater color photography was born with this shot of a hogfish, photographed off the Florida Keys in the Gulf of Mexico by Dr. William Longley and National Geographic staff photographer Charles Martin in 1926. Equipped with cameras encased in waterproof housing and pounds of highly explosive magnesium flash powder for underwater illumination, the pair pioneered underwater photography. Photograph by Charles Martin & W.H. Longley In 1912 Yale University professor and explorer Hiram Bingham was searching in the Peruvian Andes for the ancient Inca capital of Vilcabamba when he and his guide stumbled onto one of the greatest archaeological finds in history. Thanks to his photographs of the lost city of Machu Picchu, Bingham and National Geographic helped bring archaeology out of the field and into people's homes. Photograph by Hiram Bingham When he wandered into an Afghan refugee camp in Pakistan in December 1984, National Geographic photographer Steve McCurry captured one of the most famous portraits the world had ever seen. The Afghan girl with the haunting green eyes captivated everyone. That captivation proved, once again, the power of photography to open eyes—and hearts and minds—with a single image. Photograph by Steve McCurry