History of a Pinhole Camera
The pinhole camera-also known as the camera obscura-wasn't invented, but rather discovered. There are records that suggest 5th century China already knew the effects of shining light through a pinhole and the inverted image it created. The first reference to pinhole cameras was made in 330BC by Aristotle, who noted and observed the optical laws that could make a pinhole camera possible. It was an Arabic philosopher, Alhazen, who in 1000AD discovered the fundamentals of the camera obscura when he invented the first pinhole camera. He then went on to explain why the image produced appeared upside down. Although Alhazen invented the first pinhole camera, in was Joseph Nicephore Niepce who took the first photography using one. In 1827, he took a photograph using a camera obscura. Before his photograph, pinhole cameras were used for viewing and drawing purposes only.