The History of the Digital Camera

Digital cameras have revolutionized the world of photography, making it possible to take thousands of photos and edit them on a home computer. As the quality of digital photography continues to improve, it has become the industry standard for still and digital photography.

The Influence of Sputnik

When the Russians launched their "Sputnik" satellite into space in 1957, they not only heated up the space race with Americans, but also the development of many kinds of technology. One of the American developments was a camera to be put in a satellite that would beam a signal back to earth where it would be decoded.

Back on Earth

A Kodak engineer named Steven Sasson developed an experimental 8-pound camera that worked the same way as the satellite camera. It had 0.1 megapixel and recorded the image on a chip rather than film.

The Sony Mavica

Sony unveiled its Mavica (for MAgnetic VIdeo CAmera) in 1981. The Mavica stored images on 2-inch floppy disks, again encoding the image rather than storing a representation of it.

Fugi's DS-1P and Dvcam's Model 1

The first consumer digital camera was Fugi's DS-1P which came out in 1988. Dvcam followed in 1990 with its Model 1. These cameras used floppy disks that stored about 1 megabyte, about the size of a single image today. Nikon offered great improvement with its two- and three-megapixel cameras in 1999, the Coolpix 950 and Coolpix 700.

Improved Sensors

Foveon's new image sensors, introduced in 2002, were a huge improvement. Up until this time, each pixel (also called a photosite) on the sensor could only record blue or green or red light. The Foveon sensor collects blue and green and red light at each photosite for a much truer image.

Digital SLRs

At first, digital single-lens reflex, SLR, cameras were practical only for professionals. In 2003, Canon released its Digital Rebel, the first mainstream, or consumer, digital SLR. Photographers could attach the lenses from film-based cameras to the DSLR for greater versatility.

References

• History of Digital Photography