[Zig]

The phones, cameras and beepy things we use to record the things we see may not nowadays use the technology that spawned them, but their design, language and the "analogue" through which they function, all owe themselves to a previous process.
Camera obscuras, those light-safe boxes, that invert an image as light enters the pox via a "pin-hole", have been around for possibly a few thousand years, maybe initially "discovered" by Chaldeans and Sumerians before giving a passing fondle by the Greeks. I'd guess all this old science was closetted away in the libraries of ancient cities, after which it was rediscovered by the Arabs as they expanded even as the French were invading England in 1066; it'd thus be a short time for this electric melting-pot of knowledge of maths, chemistry, astronomy and optics to bubble away and become the phenomenon we know as the "renaissance".

I have no doubt whatsoever that Italian and Belgian/Netherland renaissance artists were using optics and lenses: I find it indeed more than a coincidence that Italy and Belgium both gave rise to a banking phenomenon based on a wealthy wool trade with England, and with that trade wealth were able to access by accident or design the optics necessary to have a new vsion in representational art.
I also have no doubt that the painting schools we know as Italian masters were using lenses and camera obscuras to make their artwork easier to fabricate...and that "perspective" was nothing more than tracing what they would have seen through a lens. Leonardo was quite blasé about tracing an image with a series of dots and holes to join up later. If you see the "telephoto" compression in 15th C Italian paintings, you'll see what I mean.

I won't bore you with the ensuing developments in England and Europe(and the US) throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, and can only wonder at how early "photography" might have happened had it not been for the repression of Cromwell and the puritan dictatorship earlier.
Fox Talbot, at Lacock Abbey, experimented further with camera obscuras and photosensitive chemistry; he was advised to ensure he patented the processes he "discovered"...or should I say refined; he was helped enortmously by the chemical work of others in the experimentation field in terms of "fixing" the cloudy images that appeared from his silver-compound images.
Obviously, Fox Talbot's first ground-breaking images were, as we'd do in our work, taken at home.

If any of you research him on the 'net, chances are you'll come across one of his earliest images: the object he took the pic of is still in situ, as it is a clay model affixed to the wall inside the entrance to his home: this is my version:



The Fox Talbot museum is still part of Lacock Abbey, yet of course this is an historic building in use for hundreds of years as a monastery/abbey, and is an ecclesiastical building first and foremost.
Because of its "medieval" and quite archaic look, and given its rural surroundings, it has become like many places around here, cheap and convenient for London-based film-makers to use as locations. Gloucester cathedral is also close by, and gets used for everything from Doctor Who to Harry Potter...so it is a short hike up the road to Lacock Abbey, which has also been used as Harry Potter locations, particularly Hogwarts. A sad consequence is, of course, that using this as an excuse to drag recalcitrant children on an afternoon out, is often a no-no...on the grounds that, "aw mummm, we know what it's like; we've seen it on the telly...!"

The other day when I visited, it was a chilly and blowy late winter day; snowdrops are still out but now giving way to crocuses and celandines with the early anemone.
Anyway, here's one of the cloisters in the abbey:



Here's my young chum Joseph keen to warm up in front of the house/abbey entrance...you'll know that sunken ground feature to be known as a ha-ha. These hidden boundaries were landscaped into posh people's estates in the 18th century to keep livestock in yet remain invisible...the idea was, of course, to embrace nature(I mean, they were all reading Wordworth's Prelude, for goodness' sake...the Noble Savage and all that). It was called a ha-ha, as this was an exclamation of surprise as one discovered it. Presumably before falling head over heels over one's skirts and making a Compleat Knobbe of Oneself[i][/i]...



And finally, as it was indeed Arctickally-Cold, we repaired forthwith to Mr Talbot's botanickal glass-house, whereupon we were amused by this resplendent Lily, as it gave forth Veritable Ejaculations of Colour[i][/i]...



I feare Messr Zig is behoven to momentarily Recline himslef in his Day Bed, whereto awaiting the minist'ring of his Physick....

[NT73]

And his shrink. Twas a good job he took these images before his demise.

[Zig]

Ha!

[Toad]

Your Physick will no doubt administer Quicksilver and Bleeding...

This is a Ramble of Interest, and a great Teknologikal Preface to your Treatise...

[nia]

Wow! These are amazing too dear Zig, so beautiful and so creative with the young boys! They are great model in your photographs, but sure, this is your creative talent too! I am impressed by the place, and also by the photographs,

Thank you,
with my love,
nia

[matthew]

Interesting story and history. I especially like the background (figuratively speaking) for the first image, and enjoy trying to imagine what it must have been like as this unproven process makes its way into the world. Who could have imagined what would happen?

I also have to confess that I prefer the second photo here to its compatriot in your showcase thread; not necessarily as a better photo, but as a different interpretation that pleases me more. But this opinion is subject to change when I've spent a little more time with them.

Love that third photo, too.