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In 1826 (some say 1827), Niépce finally succeeded in capturing the world’s first permanent photograph, called “View from the Window at Le Gras.” The image was taken from a window of his family estate in Burgundy, France, and shows rooftops, trees, and the surrounding countryside. The process Niépce used was called heliography (Greek for "sun drawing"). It involved coating a metal plate with a light-sensitive substance called bitumen, which hardened when exposed to light. The exposure time? A staggering 8 hours! Imagine waiting that long just to see if your image came out. The long exposure time explains why the shadows in the photo seem a bit strange—because the sun moved across the sky during the day.
