The First Photograph or Heliograph

Joseph Nicéphore Niépce (1765-1833)

The first photograph was made in 1826 by the Frenchman Joseph Nicéphore Niépce. Several earlier attempts by Niépce and others had produced photographic images, but they were not permanent.

Niépce coated a pewter plate with light-sensitive bitumen (tar) and placed it at the focal plane inside his camera obscura. He focused his camera on the view from his workroom window. The exposure took eight hours. When he rinsed the plate in lavender oil and petroleum, the bitumen washed away, except where light had fallen on it. The remaining bitumen made a grainy but permanent photograph. Niépce called these images "heliographs".

In 1829, Niépce and his fellow Frenchman Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre signed a ten-year partnership agreement to share their research on capturing camera images using light. Their collaboration was cut short by Niépce's death in 1833. Daguerre continued the partnership with Niépce's son, Isidore.

In 1839, the French government awarded Isidore Niépce an annual pension for life of 4000 francs in recognition of his father's contribution to the invention of photography.