What was the first commercial photography process?

The first commercial Photography process was the daguerreotype, developed by French artist and physicist Louis Daguerre in 1839. The process involved exposing a silver-plated copper sheet to iodine vapor, creating a light-sensitive surface. This was then exposed to light in a camera obscura and further treated with Mercury vapor to fix the image permanently. The daguerreotype was the first commercially successful photography process and was widely used for portraiture in the mid-19th century.

The daguerreotype was an important milestone in the history of photography, as it marked the first use of a chemical process to capture a permanent image. The process was relatively easy to use, and the results were very sharp and detailed. However, the daguerreotype was a one-of-a-kind image and could not be duplicated, which limited its commercial potential.

In 1851, the collodion wet plate process was developed by Englishman Frederick Scott Archer. This process used a glass plate coated in collodion and sensitized with silver nitrate. The plate was exposed in a camera obscura and developed with a variety of chemicals. This process was much faster and cheaper than the daguerreotype, and it allowed for multiple copies of the same image to be made. This process quickly became the most popular form of photography, and remained the dominant form until the 1880s.