Today, photography is everywhere, and photos can be created in an instant. Permanent memories can be captured at the touch of a button or the tap of a screen, but obviously, that was not always the case.
The first widely used form of photography was the daguerreotype, developed in 1839 and used until the 1860s, when easier methods were developed.
Daguerreotypes were created by coating silver-plated copper sheets with chemicals to make them photosensitive.
They were like Polaroids, but on metal.
Today, many of these daguerreotypes remain intact, but they’re incredibly delicate. Scratches, temperature, humidity, and chemical reactions can all eat away at these images of the past, so in order to preserve them, many have been digitized like the ones you see here.
But even in their timeworn state, there’s something eerily beautiful about these pictures. No longer crisp and clear — and in many places obscured by ghostlike shadows and smears — they are full of forgotten moments and persisting mysteries.
The daguerreotypes you see here come from the personal collection of Matthew Brady, a photographer best known for his work during the Civil War.
His collection includes about 800 daguerreotypes.
The images are marred with all kinds of marks from the passage of time, but in a way, they make the photos more poignant.
But we’re not sure if Brady would agree with that statement, especially after all the work that went into creating a single image.
Some of them resemble the ghost photography that spreads online from time to time, but there’s nothing supernatural happening here.
In some cases, the scratches and blemishes make them look like paintings.
(via Visual News)
You can see the entirety of Brady’s daguerreotype collection online thanks to careful curation by the Library of Congress. Some are in good condition, while others have been reduced to little more than vague outlines. But they’re all equally fascinating.
These images remind us that no matter how hard we try to hold onto the past, it sometimes slip away.
