Using a mosaic photosensor, Eugene F. Lally of the Jet Propulsion Laboratory wrote a paper describing the concept of producing still pictures in digital format. This was proposed for onboard navigation information during missions to the planets that astronauts would later take.
Still photos would periodically be taken during the trip, and when the planet was actually approached, addition information would be provided for orbiting and landing assistance. These were the first design elements of the digital camera. A filmless analog camera was developed in 1972, but whether it was ever built is not known.
Steve Sasson, working for Eastman Kodak, was the first to record the attempted development of a digital camera. Weighing eight pounds and using a cassette tape, it recorded black-and-white images with a resolution of 0.01 mp. In December 1975 it took 23 seconds to capture its first image. Never intended for production, the prototype was still in existence in 2005 and was merely a technical exercise.
The first handheld digital device was actually an analog camera. Demonstrated in 1981, it was based on television technology and recorded a 2x2 floppy video disc. It was basically a video movie camera that took single frames, holding 50 images per disk. At the time, the quality of the prints was about equal to current television technology of that time.
At the 1984 Olympics, an analog camera was demonstrated for the consumer, printing the images in the newspaper. Widespread acceptance was held back by several factors, including a cost of up to $20,000.00, poor image quality in comparison to film, and a lack of consumer-priced printers.
A frame grabber was one of the items needed to print the photos, the cost of which was beyond that of the normal consumer. Later, several readers were created, allowing the disks to be viewed on screen, but they were never developed into a computer drive.
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