Image Formats: Film Photographs

Photographic film consists of a flexible plastic reel that is coated on one side with a gelatin and silver halide emulsion. Production of this film was pioneered by George Eastman in 1885, who founded the Eastman Kodak Company in 1892. The size, chemical composition, and light capturing capabilities of film changed over the 20th century allowing for innovations like color film in the 1930s. These films captured images in negative and needed to be developed in dark rooms where the original film could be printed on chemically prepared paper as an enlarged positive. The film development process was integrated into the camera itself by Edwin H. Land of the Polaroid Corporation, who invented instant or self-developing film in 1947.