Box cameras are a class of mainly 19th century camera types, except the rollfilm variants which remained popular as cameras for beginners until the mid-1950s.
History
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| Reconstruction of Niépce's experimental camera, small variant image by Uwe Kulick (Image rights) |
The box cameras are the oldest class of photographic cameras. The first camera ever used for making persistent photographic images was the big wooden box camera that Nicéphore Niépce used for experimental photography in the mid-1820s. When Louis Jacques Mandé Daguerre joined his developments of new photographic processes they already used box cameras with iris diaphragm. Daguerre gave Niépce such a camera. Concerning lenses they had different preferences, Daguerre liked the color corrected (achromatic) version of the periscopic lens of optician-engineer Dr. Wollaston. Niépce, however, sought the help of the opticians Vincent and Charles Chevalier. Some years later William Henry Fox Talbot made his photographic experiments. He had a whole series of little box cameras ("mousetraps") to be able to make several exposures on one sunny day - exposure times were very long in those pioneering days. The box design of all these pioneer cameras was derived from a certain variant of the camera obscura, a very heavy wooden box camera that became the model for many early photographic cameras: A box with an open back, and a hole in the middle of the front to mount a lens or a diaphragm and a lens. Shutters were not needed, the lens cap was sufficient. A second box, one with open front side, held in its back the light sensitive plate in its holder, or the focusing ground glass instead. The second box had to be pushed like a drawer into the outer box. Focusing was made with open lens, wide aperture and ground glass in the back by shifting the inner box for- or backward until the image subject appeared sharply on the screen. Since the sliding drawer should not hang in its position the bottom plate of the outer box was of double length so that the inner box was always moved on this plane. Alphonse Giroux was the maker of the biggest series of Daguerre's original camera, "Le Daguerreotype", some made of fine walnut wood. He used the achromatic lenses of the optician Charles Chevalier. Optician Bianchi produced a similar camera, probably with his own lenses, but with the woodwork done by the same craftsmen that made Giroux's cameras. It is supposed that the Susse brothers also made a small series of "Le Daguerreotype". In 2007 such a camera appeared for the first time in a photographica auction, 168 years after its manufacture. The auction's winner must have had a strong belief in its authenticity. Other early makers of sliding box cameras for the daguerreotype or the talbotype process were Gaudin & Lerebours (F), James Ottevill (GB) and John Roberts (USA) as well as many unknown craftsmen of the 1840s.
Boxes as a Means to Popularize Photography
From the beginning amateurs were participating in the photography business, at least as customers for photographic material. But traveling was expensive, and camera equipment was heavy, so that a camera might not be found even in the luggage of a wealthy traveler. Circumstances changed, however, at the end of the 19th Century. Dry plates, roll film, drugstores with darkrooms to rent, material and infrastructure were given to support a wider spreading of amateur photography. And traveling was easy and affordable since the railway networks reached a high density and trains were much faster.
The industry had to offer easy-to-use cameras to all the camera newcomers. Box cameras were one key product in that market. They contained a simple camera technology, the best for mass production. And they offered the convenience of making a whole series of photos without reloading. In 1888 the Kodak No. 1 with built-in 100-exposure paper film roll was only one of many rollfilm box cameras that appeared on the market. With clever marketing and advertising the cameras found more and more customers. But the film plates and sheet film got a chance on that market through another type of box camera, the magazine camera. The related camera makers used their cleverness for several ingenious plate change mechanisms.
Boxes for Beginners
In 1896 Zar made the first very cheap entry level box camera. In 1900, when a Yale plate box camera cost just $2.00, including complete developing/printing/toning kit, and a Kodak rollfilm box (The Brownie) cost only $1.00, the industry sought new customers for its huge production of these simpler cameras. The first new idea came when the international Boy Scout movement was launched. Following this, many camera makers offered "Scout" models: Seneca, Pho-Tak, Kodak, Lumière, Imperial. When Eastman Kodak celebrated its 50th Anniversary in 1930, it even gave away box cameras (the Kodak Anniversary Camera, a re-modeled No. 2 Cartridge Hawkeye) as a gift to 550,000 American children who would have their 12th birthday that year. Kodak assumed, correctly, that by doing this, they'd be buying the loyalty of half-a-million continuing film customers. In Germany in the 1930s, Agfa launched a campaign: People could buy an Agfa Box 44 camera for 4 Marks, below the production price. Agfa regained the lost money by film sales. The Ensign Ful-Vue was a new approach to box camera design, handsome and with a very big viewfinder. With some exceptions all the 20th century box cameras were easy-to-load conceptions with just a few very simple controls.
Boxes could be made of wood, cardboard or metal; and when Bakelite was developed commercially in the 1930s, camera manufacturers jumped on the Bakelite bandwagon. True Art-Deco masterpieces were created in the box camera market: the Baby Brownie and the Agfa Trolix, just to name two.
Agfa Trolix box camera, made of Bakelite, manufactured in Nazi Germany. Photo by Pete Lutz
Special Category Box Cameras
A special category among the box cameras are the pseudo TLRs. Often nothing more than a slightly advanced (and sometimes better-looking) box camera, these cameras generally had features far below the quality and availability of the true twin lens reflex. Still, their top viewing lenses were generally larger and more convenient for composition than a box camera's. In addition, there was the 12-exposure capability of this style over the usual 8-exposure of a standard box. They are very popular among modern-day collectors, generally due more to their design appearance than their optics. Bottom line, the major difference between the mock TLR and the real twin lens reflex camera is that, on the former, the finding lens is generally not linked to the taking lens, and will not allow the through-the-lens focusing that the latter's finding lens does.
Boxes' Legacy
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| Typical rollfilm box cameras of American, French and British makers |
The box cameras for single film plates vanished soon after Kodak's introduction of one-dollar rollfilm box cameras in 1900. The magazine box cameras vanished in the 1920s. The rollfilm boxes stayed popular as beginners' cameras until the 1950s, and finally into the 1960s with a few plastic models. As for modern-day construction, only the wooden pinhole-type box cameras for sheet film are being manufactured today. The legacy of the inexpensive plate and rollfilm box cameras is that they helped to make photography an affordable hobby for everybody. Some of the later Bakelite and plastic models had a built-in flash for flashbulbs, thus being an ancestor of sorts of the modern compact cameras with built-in electronic flash. In spite of the pseudo TLRs' limited features (they were often nothing more than a box camera with a fancy outer appearance), they nevertheless led millions of consumers toward more advanced models. Today's consumers might not choose such a plastic monster, but to draw a parallel, they might start with the cheapest DSLR, which delivers a nice photo quality, then advance to a more sophisticated digital system.
Last but not least, the lasting success of the boxes is represented best by many, many snapshots in countless old family albums: from 1896's first cheap box cameras, to 1963's Instamatics, the final successor to the box camera.
Box Camera Types
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sliding box camera for daguerreotype and talbotype photography makers: most are unknown, the first one was Alphonse Giroux |
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box camera for single plates makers: Zar, Yale, Ernemann |
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box camera for multiple plates or magazine camera makers: Dr. Krügener, Adams & Westlake, Houghtons, Suter, Gaumont, Rokuoh-sha and others |
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box camera for roll film, the most successful box camera conception makers: Emil Wünsche, H.J. Redding, Alfred Kemper, Kodak, Konishiroku, Conley, Houghton-Butcher, Agfa, Lumière and others |
| box camera for roll film with built-in flash, early predecessor of the modern compact camera makers: Kodak, Spartus, Philips and others | |
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pseudo TLR for roll film makers: Voigtländer, Alsaphot, Haking, Kodak, Ginrei and others |
Box shaped cameras with more sophisticated camera technology contents like the early instant camera Appareil Dubroni No 1 or old semi folding SLR cameras or real TLR cameras are not classified as box cameras. So the class of the box cameras is one of simpler camera construction.
One remarkable maker must be mentioned here: Charles Louis Chevalier, who was the first successful maker of collapsible box cameras, a camera type between box and folder, later improved by other makers.