Ever wondered what the future of photography might hold? It’s notoriously tricky to pre-empt technological advances but we might get an idea by looking at where we’ve been, where we are, and what we can’t yet photograph—however audacious the expectation that we should be able to might seem. In that spirit, here is the past, present, and future of photography in the weirdest cameras we could find.
10. Camera obscura
The camera obscura was the world’s first camera—first recorded in China in the 4th century BC. Simple yet ingenious, it consisted of a darkened room or box with a small hole or lens in the front. As light passed through the hole into the room or box, it left an inverted image of the outside world on the surface at the back. The image was inverted because light travels in straight lines; it’s easy to understand: imagine someone sitting for a photo in front of a camera obscura, with straight lines (the light) passing from the top of their head and the soles of their feet through the pinhole in the box to the surface at the back. If the hole was as big as the object, the light could travel in parallel lines. But because the hole is so small, the lines each take a diagonal route to pass through it (one slanting down, the other slanting up) so by the time they get to the back of the box, the top line is at the bottom and the bottom line is at the top. As light does the same from every single point on the object, the whole image gets inverted.
Unfortunately, there are no surviving photos from fourth-century China because the photographic process came later. In those days, camera obscura was mostly used for safely observing eclipses. It only displayed an image; it couldn’t print it—although cave paintings may have been traced over camera obscura-type images.
Although there was once said to be a photo of Jesus, the tabloid source was murky on the facts. Some also think the Shroud of Turin, which shows a likeness of Jesus, is a photo from camera obscura. The oldest known photograph, however, was taken much later—in 1826 or 1827—though it did, coincidentally, involve “bitumen of Judea” as a coating for the photographic plate. Taken by Joseph Nicéphore Niépce, it shows his “View from the Window at Le Gras,” the estate he lived on. His so-called “heliography” technique marked the start of modern photography. Niépce also worked closely with Jacques-Mandé Daguerre in creating the daguerreotype process, reducing exposure time from eight hours to just three to fifteen minutes. This breakthrough, together with the French government’s acquisition of its patent in 1839, brought photography into the mainstream.
9. George R. Lawrence’s “mammoth camera”
The world’s largest camera was built in 1900. About the size of a car, its purpose was simple: To capture an entire train in a single shot. It was commissioned by the Chicago & Alton Railway to showcase the “handsomest train in the world” in all its glory: their “Alton Limited” steam engine with its eight passenger cars. At the turn of the century, this was unprecedented. Photography was still new, and there was no way to take an image so big—not without compromising on detail.
The so-called “mammoth camera,” designed by George R. Lawrence, was therefore a marvel of its time, capable of holding an 8-by-4.5-foot image. Lined with heavy black canvas and light-proofed with 40 gallons of glue, it featured an intricate bellows system and innovative plate holder to minimize friction with the massive glass plate, as well as to facilitate ease of handling. On the day of the photo, the camera was delivered by freight car and horse-drawn van to the Brighton Park shooting location. There, it took fifteen men to set up. But the image itself took only two and a half minutes of exposure to capture.
Nowadays there’s a digital equivalent—and it’s pointed at the stars. Also roughly the size of a car, the LSST Camera—the world’s largest digital camera—is set to be installed at the Rubin Observatory in Chile at the end of 2024. Remarkably, its record-breaking 1.57-meter lens contains 189 sensors with more pixels each than the iPhone 13 camera. In total, the LSST has 3.2 gigapixels, which means it’s capable of taking images with a resolution high enough to show a golf ball from 24 kilometers away. Every night, it’s expected to capture 15 terabytes of data, helping scientists study the nature of dark matter and galaxy formation.
8. Zenit Photosniper
The Zenit Photosniper was one of many “gun cameras” made for military use. And by “gun camera,” we don’t mean a gun-mounted camera (or even a camera-mounted gun); we mean a camera shaped like a gun.
Initially developed by the Soviet Union for reconnaissance during World War Two, the Photosniper was designed to leverage snipers’ steady-handedness for the capture of critical intel. One model, the Photosniper FS-2, which featured a wooden rifle stock and reflex viewfinder for high-precision, long-distance shots, later became available to civilians.
Not all gun cameras were rifle-shaped, though. There was also the DORYU 2-16, which looked like a pistol and was designed for use by police, and the Rokuoh-Sha Type 89, which looked like a machine gun. This was produced by Konishoruko (Konica) for the Japanese Air Force, and was designed to be mounted to planes—hooked up to the weapons trigger to evaluate trainee pilots’ accuracy. Instead of firing bullets, the gun took a photo of where the pilot was shooting.
7. DARPA’s mantis eye
In 2013, with funding from DARPA, researchers from the University of Illinois came up with a digital camera based on the multi-lens eyes of arthropods—specifically praying mantises and dragonflies. Earlier designs, they say, had limited resolutions more comparable to the eyesight of a fire ant or bark beetle. Featuring an array of tiny focusing lenses and detectors, the camera boasts an exceptionally wide field of view that researchers say is “nearly infinite.” It also has minimal optical aberrations, all of which makes it virtually unparalleled among modern digital cameras. It even resembles an insect’s eye, with its curved, elastic electronics and microlenses.
You might be wondering what DARPA plans to do (or has already done) with this design. Well, it isn’t clear. But there has been talk in the past of practically undetectable, mosquito-sized assassin drones. It seems an obvious application for the military. Less sinister, though, would be its use in micro airborne vehicles (MAVs) for disaster relief applications, where a multifaceted insect-eye camera would help navigate collapsed, smoky buildings in the search for survivors.
6. OmniVision OV6948
Heralded by Guinness World Records as the smallest commercially available image sensor, the tiny OmniVision OV6948 is a giant leap forward for medical imaging. Measuring 0.575 mm by 0.575 mm, it can be fitted to devices as narrow as a millimeter to help minimize discomfort and recovery time. Plus, the sensor’s low-power backside illumination does away with the need for potentially too-hot additional light sources, which further avoids any discomfort. Its resolution of 200 x 200 pixels is good enough for capturing images of some of the tiniest body parts, so it’ll be invaluable to a wide range of medical fields, including neurology, cardiology, and urology.
Furthermore, because it’s relatively cheap to make, it addresses a growing demand for disposable endoscopes amid concerns over cross-contamination.
5. Panono
Equipped with 36 lenses, each with a quarter-inch 108-megapixel sensor, the grapefruit-sized Panono offers the kind of panorama George R. Lawrence could only dream of: one that captures every angle of a scene. In case you missed the specs there, that’s 36 individual lenses, each with 108 megapixels, which is the megapixellage of a high-end smartphone camera. It gives users an expansive, high-resolution 360-degree image.
It was originally conceived as a thesis project. Thanks to crowd-sourcing, however, the German-engineered Panono rocketed from concept to market in record time. And, for all its technical sophistication, the camera—designed to be held on a stick or thrown in the air like a ball—is activated with a single button push, while its status is communicated by an LED ring. Similarly straightforward, the Panono’s single micro USB port serves as both an accessory connector and charging point. Even the app is optional, although it does enhance shooting, processing, and sharing the photos.
4. Paragraphica
Reflecting our diminishing interest in the outside world, Paragraphica is (probably) the first ever camera without a lens or aperture of any kind. The place where it would usually be is instead fitted with an extraterrestrial-looking, purely decorative 3D-printed spirograph inspired by the star-nosed mole.
Uniquely, Paragraphica takes photos (or rather, creates images) by combining GPS positioning and artificial intelligence. Creator Bjørn Karmann explains how it uses “contextual data” to generate an image: first, it pinpoints the user’s location and surroundings, then it adds in environmental conditions such as weather and time. With this information, it can, fairly convincingly with AI, generate an image of what the user sees in front of him—except in the bizarro style characteristic of AIs like DALL-E.
Pointless? Yes. But it’s only a prototype; it’s not on the market just yet. There is something appealing about it, though. Powered by a Raspberry Pi 4, it has several user-friendly controls, including three dials to fine-tune input data and AI output settings. For those interested, there’s also a virtual version online.
3. Touch Sight
Contrary to what you might expect, photography isn’t out of bounds for the blind. Historically, they’ve used their other senses as a guide for where to point—for example the smell of the sea, the sound of voices, or the feel of an unfamiliar object. Now, though, technology makes it easier.
Apple’s VoiceOver screen reader comes pre-installed on iOS devices and can be used to make the camera more accessible—not only by saying aloud which buttons are which but also how many faces are in the shot, and by guiding the hand for panoramas.
That’s nothing compared to Samsung’s Touch Sight, though, which is a camera designed specifically for the blind. Instead of the usual LCD screen, it features a groundbreaking Braille display—a flexible, embossable surface that represents photos in 3D. Another feature is to record three seconds of ambient sound as an auditory reference for each photo—which is crucial for organizing images. Unlike cameras for the sighted, the Touch Sight is designed to be held in front of the forehead, positioning the lens there like a third eye, and this is where users will also feel the photo they’ve snapped. Inspired by practices at the Beit Ha’iver (Center for the Blind) in Israel, this leverages blind people’s naturally heightened auditory and spatial awareness to help stabilize and aim the camera.
2. Flexible camera
Invisibility cloaks, whereby cameras and screens are used to display what’s behind an object on the front of it, would be easier with flexible cameras. We’d be able to wrap them around objects or make them into clothing. This isn’t necessarily what Columbia University’s Shree K. Nayar had in mind, but it’s probably the use to which his thin, bendable sheet camera will be put. This innovative concept can be adapted to various shapes and surfaces to shoot images that normal cameras cannot.
Crucially, its flexible lens array (made of an elastic material) is responsive, changing optical properties as the sheet bends to ensure high-quality images across a range of deformations. If the lenses were fixed, there would be gaps in the field of view when the lens sheet was bent.
Although it’s just a concept for now, Nayar and his team envision the technology as a low-cost, rollable sheet.
Needless to say, one use they have in mind is surveillance, with the sheet allowing photography from otherwise impossible locations—literally, blanket surveillance. They also have the somewhat less sinister idea of a low-cost credit card-sized camera that changes the field of view when it’s flexed.
1. Quantum camera and holography
With all the cameras we already have and the novel cameras listed above, what could be the final frontier? What can’t we take photos of yet? One answer to this is objects in pitch darkness. Enter the quantum camera, which as the name suggests, relies on the quirks of quantum physics to encode information about an object into light particles that haven’t touched it. Invented in China, it could significantly benefit the study of delicate, light-sensitive materials, including in the body. It’s early days yet, but the concept is sound.
Another concept for the future of photography is synthetic wavelength holography. It’s based on interferometry, a technique for accurately measuring astronomical and microscopic phenomena. Similar to taking photos of objects light hasn’t touched, this basically allows us to take photos around corners (without a long stick). The concept involves firing laser beams with slightly differing wavelengths past obstructions to illuminate objects hidden from view. The reflected wavelengths are then captured and superimposed, creating an interference pattern—a kind of blueprint—showing the location and details of the object in question, with astonishing (and terrifying) precision and speed. It’s able to do this by requiring only two exposures, each lasting just 23 milliseconds, to scan a nearly hemispheric field of view.
Applications are likely to include examining human tissues obscured by bones or detecting tiny imperfections in machinery. It could also be used in self-driving vehicles to help navigate blind corners and fog. Probably, artificial intelligence will be used to filter out “noise” and enhance captured holograms—paving the way for real-time holographic streaming systems. Needless to say, all of these uses mean there’s plenty of funding. So although it’s still a long way off, the dawn of holography is coming—bringing with it a transformation in how we visualize and interact with the world (and a giant leap beyond Orwell in terms of governments’ surveillance capabilities).