To see larger versions of these photographs, see the above slideshow.

The word “photography” might bring to mind the stark granite of an Ansel Adams photograph, or perhaps the memory of a childhood vacation. But the camera is also a scientific tool, whose progress can, in one sense, be measured by its ability to freeze ever-smaller fragments of time for our observation. In 1826, Joseph-Nicéphore Niépce needed at least eight hours to create an imprint of the view from the upstairs window of his Burgundy chateau onto a pewter plate coated with bitumen. Today, we can capture photos with an exposure time of a trillionth of a second, and are at the brink of attosecond photography—that is, snapshots taken 10 billion trillion times faster than those first grainy images in the east of France.

We’ve selected an assortment of photographic images that, at the time they were taken, were breakthroughs in speed.

Joseph-Nicéphore Niépce

Robert Cornelius

Anonymous

William Henry Fox Talbot

Eadweard Muybridge

Étienne-Jules Marey

Ernst Mach

Harold Edgerton

Harold Edgerton





Also in Art The Smaller the Theater, the Faster the Music By Philip Glass & Fredericka Foster This article is part of Nautilus’ month-long exploration of the science and art of time. Read the introduction here.How is composing music of a given meter similar to painting flowing water? In this conversation between the composer and musician Philip...READ MORE