Nadar Tournachon

by Science Photo Library

Title

Nadar Tournachon

Artist

Science Photo Library

Medium

Photograph - Photograph

Description

Nadar (1820-1910), pseodonym of Gaspard-Felix Tournachon, French photographer, journalist, writer, and balloonist. He was a prominent member of the bohemian circle of writers and artists who settled in Paris during the second empire. His interests included the latest ideas in science, literature and politics. As a celebrity portrait photographer his subjects included Daumier, Eduard Manet, and Sarah Bernhardt. In photography, he pioneered the use of artficial light in his photographs of the catacombs and sewers of subterranean Paris. In 1855 he had patented the idea of using aerial photographs from a hot-air balloon in mapmaking and surveying, and in 1858 he took the world's first aerial photograph. This required the use of wet collodion glass plates which had to be exposed and processed whilst airborne.He built a large balloon, Le Geant, which included an onboard darkroom.

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June 29th, 2016

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