In 2024, producer Maximilien Van Aertryck and colleagues Axel Danielson and Kalle Boman embarked on an eighteen-month quest to pinpoint where Louis Daguerre captured what many consider the world's first photograph. The pair spotted the famous 1838 image of a shoeshiner on Paris's Boulevard du Temple during a night out. Using archival research, drones, and measuring tapes, they analyzed prints, paintings, and topographical maps to reconstruct the historic district.
Despite Baron Haussmann's mid-1800s demolitions altering the landscape, their team identified three surviving 19th-century buildings. Architectural firms used 3-D scanning to triangulate the shoeshiner's location, ultimately marking the spot with a red X on the pavement. Nearly a century after the Bavarian National Museum possessed a damaged photographic plate, the City of Paris will unveil a commemorative plaque on October 15th, celebrating both the photograph's subjects and the pioneering moment in photography history.
Source: Hacker News · Summarized by HeadlinesBriefing