Photography : Kodak And Kodak

George Eastman invented roll film and an easy to operate camera that made photography easier for anyone to experience photography. He founded the Eastman Kodak Company to manufacture cameras and photographic supplies, making the art of photography available to the masses. This talks about his life and how he came about the inventions that made photography easier for people to use and produce their own photographs.

The Kodak Company was undisputed in the photo industry until Fujifilm, a Japanese company, was established in 1934.  Since its inception Fujifilm has become a leader in motion picture photography, audio and videotape and the floppy disc industries.   The company also boasts products such as still cameras, camcorders, photofinishing equipment, paper and chemicals, imaging and information products for the office and health care markets.

The problem in this case is concerned with Eastman Kodak losing its market share in film products to lower-priced economy brands. Over the last five years, in addition to being brand-aware, customers have also become price-conscious. This has resulted in the fast paced growth of lower priced segments in which Kodak has no presence.

It is considered that photography only became widely available to the public when the Kodak Eastman Company introduced the box shaped Brownie Camera in 1900. (Baker, n.p.) Its features became more refined since its original placing on the market; one of the reasons why it has become considered the birth of public photography is because of the processing. Using a similar image capture system, the brownie exposed the light to a 120mm roll of film, which could be wound round, meaning six photographs could be taken before the slides needed removing. The first Brownie used a six-exposure cartridge that Kodak processed for the photographer. (Kodak.com, n.d.) Realistically, the armature photographers did not need to understand darkroom processes,

Introduced in the year of 1952, the “Brownie 127” camera was created in England by Eastman Kodak’s Kodak Ltd. With a simple design, and affordable price for the customers and a catchy slogan “You push the button, we do the rest,” the Brownie became popular for amateur photography. This plastic box camera shoots eight 4x6 cm pictures on a 127 film. A 127 film is a rollfilm created for still photography. From the first release of the “Brownie 127”, over a million sold.

Taking pictures with the Kodak camera was simpler than the earlier camera because first, it did not require a darkroom or chemicals and glass plates. It did not require any of these things because it was not only one person’s job to develop and take the photo. The photographer could send their camera in, and the Eastman Kodak Company would develop the pictures for them. “In the first year, 13,000 people paid $25 for a Kodak; they each took 100 pictures, returned the camera and within ten days, Kodak sent back the prints and camera with film for another 100 pictures,” (Buckland and Lefer 250). This opened up a whole new door for inexperienced photographers. All they had to do was take pictures, and send the camera

When Eastman was twenty-four years old he was planning a trip to Santo Domingo, and taking advice form a friend decided he would document his trip with photographs. There was one flaw in that plan, the photography equipment of the time was bulky and expensive. He did buy all the equipment, but instead of taking the trip to Santo Domingo he began researching how to make photography more accessible to the masses (Biography). He would accomplish his goal. The ability to photograph want you wanted and when you wanted it was not a possibility until George Eastman began producing his rolls of film. These rolls where much more portable and less expensive than the glass plates use in earlier cameras. The use of a roll of film also allowed the photographer to take many pictures in quick succession. Eastman use these rolls as the main selling point of his first Kodak camera. His first camera was a small 100 exposure model that customers would use and then send the film to Kodak to have developed. These cameras were much easier for people to use, Eastman knew this and used it to advertise his cameras by saying, “You press the button, we do the rest” (History). Although his first cameras did not produce the best pictures the ability to take the pictures on your on attracted many consumers to Eastman’s Kodak camera’s.

One of the main technological advancements is digital photography. Digital photography technology has grown by leaps and bounds over the last 20 years. Digital cameras were first introduced to the consumer in the late 1990’s but had the tendency to be grainy and of poor quality. As companies saw the demand grow, so did the technology. Cameras became more advanced, with better quality images, more pixels, and more options. By the early 2000’s, it is estimated that nearly 80% of Americans owned a digital camera.__ Film photography quickly became a thing of the past and was only being used by professional photographers and those who refused to allow technology to interfere with

In 1888, George Eastman made the first light and portable camera under the company name Kodak (Graham 28). These cameras gave people the ability to take a photo almost anywhere. The cameras had to be sent back to the factory so the photographs could be printed. Twenty years after Kodak’s first camera, they produced an improved camera, called “Brownie”. The Brownie was simple to use, making the art of photography boom. Flash cameras did not appear until the 1930s, letting people take pictures in areas with dim or little lighting. In 1947, Edwin Land invented the instant camera. Land got the idea after his daughter asked to see her picture after he took her photo. The next step in improving the camera was by making it digital, which was done in 1975 by a Kodak employee. As the camera gets smaller and simpler to use, the quality of the photographs it produces gets better.

However, Kodak later went on to revolutionise and reform photography. By 1900 Kodak introduced the “Brownie” camera which was cheap, lightweight and portable which made it not only more efficient, but more open to everyone. 308

It was Kodak’s’ strategy to sell the cameras at low prices, and it used to earn revenue from the films; this strategy is called the razor-blade strategy. This model for photography became flop when Sony introduced a camera with floppy disk inside, in which there wasn’t any use of films. As a result of Sony’s introduction of the Mavica in 1981, Kodak took it as a threat and started investing in the digital photography. For this purpose, it has conducted a huge research on the digital photography. As exposed by Fisher in 1997, Kodak’s respond wasn’t appropriate for the digital world: “One of the mistakes we [Kodak] have made is that we [Kodak]’ve tried to do it all. We [Kodak] do not have to pursue all aspects of the digital opportunity and service side.”

a. It initially changed the decision right system to a more decentralized one without making corresponding changes to the evaluation and reward systems.

Eastman’s work continued until the age of 77 when he felt he had successfully accomplished his goal to endow the everyday man with the gift of photography. On March 14, 1932, Eastman left a note to his loved ones saying “My work is done. Why wait?” then the photography pioneer, took out his pistol and fired a single gunshot through his heart which was parallel to shooting the heart of photography (Blitz 1). Many photography icons will continue to emerge over time but the foundation of these icons are built around George Eastman. Roll film is used in many different cameras even today, a basis that was founded by George Eastman. Companies today like Canon and Nikon have based their work off of Eastman’s. The modern day Digital camera made by Canon and Nikon were inspired by George Eastman’s original digital camera. Through the use of his new ideas and inventions, which involved his company Eastman Kodak, the invention of roll film, and the very first camera made for the average person sold at one dollar, Eastman successfully enhanced and improved the photography

Photography is a word derived from the Greek words, photos meaning "light" and graphein meaning "to draw” (History of Photography). The word was first used by the scientist Sir John F.W. Herschel in 1839 (History of Photography and the Camera). It is a method of recording images by the action of light, or related radiation, on a sensitive material. The end of the 19th century was an important time in camera history. Shutters were incorporated into cameras, the size of the devices decreased and these moments set the stage for a new, ever-changing century of innovation in digital photography (From Shutters to DSLR). Digital camera technology was born out of the spy satellite program designed to reduce the difficulties of collecting photographic data from cameras in orbit (From Shutters to DSLR). From these early designs, digital cameras increased in resolution and decreased in size and cost until they gradually became practical for widespread consumer use. Following many years of steady development, Nikon has been contributed to incredible innovations as a leading company in digital camera industry.

The film industry has continuously changed since its inception due to rapid technology advancements. Camera technology has been a key factor that has influenced the growth of filmmaking. The first motion picture in the world was produced in the early 1880s, and the first public screening occurred ten years later. It didn’t take long for the quality of films to improve as new filmmaking equipment emerged. Ever since the first movie was produced, the film industry has been continuously changing in response to emerging filmmaking technology. Introduction of digital photography and digital data storage along with the development of internet significantly influenced the film industry (Barsam, 2015). These technologies contributed