War Photography from the 1800's - Mathew Brady
Mathew Brady was an American
photographer born in New York, in 1822.
He opened his first photographic studio in 1844. He had a vision to do
something that hadn't really been done before; he wanted to bring the reality
of the American Civil War to the public through a collection of photographic
images taken by him and a group of other photographers he had hired. Before the
images were released the newspapers would unrealistically illustrate the war
and they were never a true representation of what was actually happening. But
then the American public could see what was really happening to their sons,
brothers and fathers.
He and his men would travel around the battlefields with travel wagons that doubled up as a darkroom for them to be able to develop the images whilst away. They used large box-like cameras so they were not able to capture actual action shots in the battlefield. They would take photos of artillery, railways, and soldiers at the camp-sites or stood in battlefields, portraits of generals and captains of the armies but also documented the dead fallen soldiers in the battlefields and the general aftermath of war. The public hadn't seen images like this before that showed how brutal the reality of war is.
I think that because of the type of camera equipment he would have been using, the way the pictures were taken for example, the images of soldiers sat around at camp-sites, the soldiers always look as though they are posing, but obviously this would be down to the camera as they had to stand still in order for the image to not come out blurry and that’s also why they didn't take any images during the battles as they wouldn't of actually come out.
I think that as it goes for the beginning of war photography Mathew Brady and his men definitely paved the way for photographers to document war. It bought to light for the first time the brutal consequences of war. I think that back then it would have been a shock for people to see this and when we look back at these images now and compare them to what war is like today, the images just show that war always has a disastrous effect and shows that people die, something that is common in war photography regardless of the war it is covering.
He and his men would travel around the battlefields with travel wagons that doubled up as a darkroom for them to be able to develop the images whilst away. They used large box-like cameras so they were not able to capture actual action shots in the battlefield. They would take photos of artillery, railways, and soldiers at the camp-sites or stood in battlefields, portraits of generals and captains of the armies but also documented the dead fallen soldiers in the battlefields and the general aftermath of war. The public hadn't seen images like this before that showed how brutal the reality of war is.
I think that because of the type of camera equipment he would have been using, the way the pictures were taken for example, the images of soldiers sat around at camp-sites, the soldiers always look as though they are posing, but obviously this would be down to the camera as they had to stand still in order for the image to not come out blurry and that’s also why they didn't take any images during the battles as they wouldn't of actually come out.
I think that as it goes for the beginning of war photography Mathew Brady and his men definitely paved the way for photographers to document war. It bought to light for the first time the brutal consequences of war. I think that back then it would have been a shock for people to see this and when we look back at these images now and compare them to what war is like today, the images just show that war always has a disastrous effect and shows that people die, something that is common in war photography regardless of the war it is covering.
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