1839–1860s: Origins

Joseph Nicéphore Niépce was born in 1765 in Chalon-sur-Saône, Burgundy, France.

Daguerre began as a theatrical designer who ran a large diorama theater in Paris.

In October 1833, while on his honeymoon at Lake Como, Talbot tried to sketch with a camera lucida and was frustrated by what he saw as his own lack of drawing skill.

David Octavius Hill was born in Perth, Scotland, in 1802 — a painter, printmaker, and founding member and long-serving secretary of the Royal Scottish Academy.

Julia Margaret Cameron was already forty-eight when her daughter gave her a camera in 1863.

Fenton, trained as a lawyer, became one of the key figures behind the founding of the Royal Photographic Society in 1853.

Gustave Le Gray, trained first as a painter in Paris, turned to photography in the late 1840s and opened the school that helped shape figures such as Nadar.

Nadar, born Gaspard-Felix Tournachon, entered photography around 1853 after careers in journalism and caricature had already connected him to the leading figures of French culture.

Alexander Gardner was born in 1821 near Glasgow, Scotland.

Robert Adamson was born in 1821 in Burnside, Fife, Scotland, the son of a farmer.

Mathew Brady became famous through portraits of major American figures and was widely regarded as the leading portrait photographer in the United States.

Felice Beato was one of the earliest globally mobile photographers, following British and French imperial campaigns from the Crimean War onward.

Timothy O'Sullivan was born around 1840, most likely in Ireland, and emigrated with his family to New York as a young child.