Jun 17,2022 - Written By Ruolin Li

Film Camera Advertisement, 1889-early 1900s.

Introduction

By analyzing several film camera advertisements from 1889 to the early 1900s, this article explores the discourses used to attract people to the advertisements and gives examples of how the advertisements communicated the technical improvements and problem-solving of user needs through almost every detail shown in the advertisements.

The Kodak Camera and “You press the button, we do the rest.”

One of the most famous camera advertisements in history is the Kodak camera and its successful advertising slogan "You press the button, we do the rest". (Eastman Kodak Company, Figure 1, 1889) Not only the introduction of the Kodak camera was an important turning point in the history of amateur photography, but also because the slogan fulfilled a public need. The Kodak Camera, also known as Kodak No 1 Camera, was manufactured by the Eastman Kodak Company in 1889 and was a hand-held box camera that used a film roll. 

The Kodak No1 camera is actually Kodak's second film camera product. The first camera "Kodak" was the first camera for personal use and the first film camera, but failed due to difficult operation, high equipment and environmental requirements and not meeting the needs of the target group of amateur photographers. The film roll is sensitive to light, and exposure of the undeveloped film to the light will damage the film. To open the film and develop it, it needs to be done in a specific room, called a darkroom, and requires a variety of chemicals and equipment to develop. Film processing is complex, and there are at least five basic steps: 1) pour the developer; 2) pour stop bath; 3) pour fixer; 4) wash film negatives; 5) hang the negative to dry. Also, printing and scanning photos from negatives is another process that also requires being in the darkroom and requires a specific device called an enlarger to enlarge the negative to the proper size. The high demands and knowledge requirements of using a film camera have resulted in its unpopularity with the general public, with fewer and fewer people using the product. So when Kodak said in the advertising slogan "You press the button, we do the rest." It separates the joy of taking pictures from the tedious and complicated process of developing and printing photos, lowers the entry level for amateur photographers, and changes and encourages public use of Kodak cameras and photo-taking behavior by simplifying the process (Fogg, 2009).

In the Eastman Kodak Trade Circular (Eastman Kodak Company, 1909, February), it mentioned that the advertisement with the phrase “You press the button, we do the rest” is the most longevity one they run in the Life magazine. Life was founded in 1883 in New York City and Eastman Kodak Company headquarters is also located in Rochester, New York, so Kodak has been advertising in life magazines for a long time. Among them, the one “You press the button, we do the rest” first appeared in the January 17, 1889 issue of Life magazine (Figure 2). Interestingly, the first version of the "Kodak Camera" was different from the now popular version. The famous slogan was just one of the sentences in the first versions of the Kodak camera ad, which relied on a lot of text, compared to the popular version of "Kodak Camera" (Figure 1), which had a neat layout to emphasize a succinct slogan. One reason for the heavy use of text is the influence of other advertising in Life magazine, the mainstream is the use of text-based advertising, another reason is that the idea that Kodak publishes whether it is a film camera, a camera for personal use, or the separation of the process of taking pictures and developing them is a novel idea. These are new to most people, it require written words to describe to the public, Kodak camera ads use discourses such as "ANYBODY," "making a picture.. simply of pressing a button," "no darkroom or chemicals are necessary," and "need not learn anything about photography" promises that anyone can photograph, attracting more users by simplifying the photography process for hobbyists and the general public.

In fact, as the most famous and longest-lived commercial, the ad with the advertising slogan "You press the button, we do the rest" has had multiple versions throughout history. There were four versions in 1889. The first version (Figure 2) ran from January 17, 1889, to May 23, 1889 (Life, 1889, May 23). The second edition of the ad (Figure 3) was published in Life magazine on June 20, 1889 (Life, 1889, June 20). This version is more like the popular version, and its layout is divided into three sections from top to bottom. At the top is "The Kodak", the text is in bold and the text is larger than the other. On the left of the middle part, there is an illustration that the hands holding a Kodak camera in the taking picture gesture. Center right, the slogan "You press the button, we do the rest" is italicized and is the second large text. Also, below the slogan, Kodak uses discourse like “only,” “anybody,” and “without instruction” to emphasize that it's a camera for anyone, for amateur photographers. In general, the second edition of the ad was much clearer and more straightforward, it was used from June 20 to October 10, 1889 (Life, 1889, Oct 10).

The third and fourth editions of the ad are variants of the second version. The third edition (Figure 4) combines the second edition "Kodak Cameras" with an advertisement for a new type of transparent film designed for Kodak cameras. Interestingly, either the third edition or ad for Kodak transparent films only ran in the July 4, 1889 issue of Life magazine. The fourth edition of the ad (Figure 5) has the same content as the second edition, but the layout has been adjusted as the ad size is smaller than usual. Illustrations of hands and holding Kodak cameras in the dominant space, text crowding in the rest. The fourth edition lasted from October 17 to December 26, 1889 (Life, 1889, Dec 26).

Not only in the year that the Kodak Camera was invented had ads with the slogan “You press the button, but we also do the rest," and the ad's longevity and popularity are indicated by repeated releases. It becomes a representation of Kodak and Kodak's company culture. In 1893, the ads with the slogan were advertised three times (Figure 6). The pictures show that the price dropped from $25 in 1889 to $6. One of the reasons is that camera products are usually updated very quickly, and at the same time as the update, the old version will reduce the price. Another reason is that the Kodak No 1 camera was no longer Kodak's only product, Kodak already had No. 4, No. 5, and No. 6 at the time (Life, 1893, Nov 30). The "Kodak Camera" was released again and again in 1893, it is because there was a competing camera company that published advertisements for similar cameras called No.1 Trokonet and similar formats in Life magazine beginning on August 17, 1893 (Figure 7). No.1 Trokonet is also a black box, holding a film camera, the advertisement of No.1 Trokonet also has illustrations of hand-holding camera gestures, the only difference from the Kodak camera is that the illustration is on the right side of the advertisement and the camera is facing the other side. The text in the "No. 1 Trokonet" ad is the idea of conversational discourse, which sees Kodak products as the antagonist, using words like "best and most reliable hand camera ever made," "no faculty rolled film," "no glass plates to break," and "slightly touch the lever and a picture is taken." Thus, the "Kodak Camera" of 1893, with the incisive slogan "You press the button and we do the rest", was firstly more of a response to competing products, but more importantly, it represented the fusion of Kodak's brand culture, not only means to enhance brand competitiveness but also to arouse consumers' identification of Kodak's clear brand identity and image, so that certain groups of people can approbation with.

The early 1900s

Film cameras developed rapidly in the 1900s, inventing various types of cameras and related products such as lenses, light bulbs, and buttons. While the Kodak Brownie was one of the most influential cameras of the 1900s, brands like Argus, Leica, Hasselblad, and others also became popular and attracted a certain group of people.

The main difference between camera ads and other product ads is how they use images in their ads. With the exception of a few early camera ads that used paintings or illustrations, most camera ads mostly opted to use images captured by their camera products to advertise their new-looking camera, new camera lens angles, or novel camera modes.

For example, catch something unusual! (Figure 8) is a photo of a moth. The subject matter is very common in life, but Argus chose to shoot it with an extreme close-up lens. The pictures show that the lens gave us a chance to look at the moth more closely, an unusual perspective from our human eye's perspective. The Argus C-3 is capable of 1/300th shutter speed so that it easily captured the movement at one moment.

In the Obscure? Be Sure! (Figure 9), Argus introduced a new camera Argoflex, and its two new functions are presented by straightforward pictures. The first function is focusing,  Argofelx has two lenses, one of which is a focusing lens, throng turn the lens can adjust the sharpness of the image. Argus uses two football game pictures, one fuzzy and another clear to show the improvement of the new lens on the pictures. The second feature is that Argofeldx adds a viewer screen on top of the camera, which is a waist-level viewfinder. The new viewer is better than older cameras like the rangefinder-equipped Argus C-3 because the design and principles of rangefinder cameras cause people to take slightly different pictures than they see from the viewer. As with the picture advertised, a rangefinder-equipped camera may result in results that are not vertical or horizontal, or it may only capture part of the picture you see from the viewer. The waist-level viewfinder effectively solves this problem, and what you see on the viewer screen will be exactly what you took and presented in the finished photo, as in the Argus advertising slogan “Argofelx shows you the picture before you take it” and “just the way you want to it.”

Snap life-like pictures-in full color (Figure 10) is a color advertisement for film cameras in 1940. Interestingly, while the adverts are colorful, the camera models they advertise are nothing new, such as the Argus C-3, the picture is also tagged as "taken with Argus C-2". This is because, unlike today's digital cameras, which rely on the camera's sensor for color pictures, color pictures on film cameras rely on the film, not the camera itself. The first color film was invented by Kodak in 1936, called Kodachrome, and it was the first mass-produced color film. Color photo advertisements before 1936 were either hand-colored or not easily handled by amateur photographers. As advertised (Fig. 10), now you can "just load your Argus with color film--and shot". The purpose of color advertising is firstly to attract more people and secondly to repackage old camera products, provide new value by taking color photos, and sell existing products in new formats.

Reference

Argus. (1942). Capture the Unusual! [Digitized to Argus Capture the Unusual!]. Popular Photography Magazine 1942, February (page 71). Internet Archive https://archive.org/details/pp-42-2-b-71/mode/1up

Argus. (1947). Obscure? Be Sure! [Digitized to Argus Obscure? Be Sure!]. Popular Photography Magazine 1947, November (page 33). Internet Archive https://archive.org/details/pp-47-11-33/mode/1up

Argus. (1940). Snap life-like pictures-in full color [Digitized to Argus Snap life-like pictures-in full color]. Popular Photography Magazine 1940, February. Internet Archive https://archive.org/details/pp-40-2-ibc/mode/1up

Eastman Kodak Company. (1889). Advertisement for ‘The Kodak Camera’, 1889 [paper].

Digital Museums Canada, Canada. https://www.communitystories.ca/v2/advance-with-courage_avancer-avec-courage/gallery/1889-advertisement-for-the-kodak-camera/

Eastman Kodak Company. (1909, February). Eastman Kodak Trade Circular [Digitized to Eastman Kodak Trade Circular, 1909, February, Vol. X. No.3.]. Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/eastmankodaktrad1909eastuoft/page/n5/mode/2up

Fogg, B. J. (2009, April). A behavior model for persuasive design. In Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Persuasive Technology (pp. 1-7).

Life. (1889, January 17). The first version of “The Kodak”, 1889, January [Digitized to Life 1889-01-17: Volume 13, Issue 316.]. Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/sim_life_1889-01-17_13_316/page/n13/mode/2up

Life. (1889, May 23). The first version of “The Kodak”-2, 1889, May [Digitized to Life  1889-05-23: Vol 13 Iss 334.]. Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/sim_life_1889-05-23_13_334/mode/2up

Life. (1889, June 20). The second version of “The Kodak”, 1889, Jun [Digitized to Life 1889-06-20: Vol 13 Issue 338]. Internet Archive https://archive.org/details/sim_life_1889-06-20_13_338/page/n15/mode/2up?view=theater

Life. (1889, Oct 10). The second version of “The Kodak”-2, 1889, Oct [Digitized to Life  1889-10-10: Vol 14 Iss 354]. Internet Archive https://archive.org/details/sim_life_1889-10-10_14_354/page/n15/mode/2up?view=theater

Life. (1889, July 4). The third version of “The Kodak”, 1889, July [Digitized to Life  1889-07-04: Vol 14 Iss 340]. Internet Archive 

https://archive.org/details/sim_life_1889-07-04_14_340/page/n19/mode/2up?view=theater

Life. (1889, Oct 17). The fourth version of “The Kodak”, 1889, Oct [Digitized to Life 1889-10-17: Vol 14 Iss 355]. Internet Archive 

https://archive.org/details/sim_life_1889-10-17_14_355/page/n15/mode/2up?view=theater

Life. (1889, Dec 26). The fourth version of “The Kodak”-2, 1889, Dec [Digitized to Life  1889-12-26: Vol 14 Iss 365]. Internet Archive 

https://archive.org/details/sim_life_1889-12-26_14_365/page/n17/mode/2up?view=theater

Life. (1893, Sep 21). Kodak, 1893 [Digitized to Life 1893-09-21: Vol 22 Iss 560]. Internet Archive 

https://archive.org/details/sim_life_1889-12-26_14_365/page/n17/mode/2up?view=theater

Life. (1893, Nov 30). Kodak, 1893 [Digitized to Life 1893-11-30: Vol 22 Iss 570]. Internet Archive

https://archive.org/details/sim_life_1893-11-30_22_570/page/n15/mode/2up

Figure 1

Advertisement for ‘The Kodak Camera’, 1889

Note. From Digital Museums Canada, by Eastman Kodak Company, 1889,

Figure 2

The first version of “The Kodak”, 1889, January

Note. From Internet Archive [Digitized to Life 1889-01-17: Volume 13, Issue 316], by Life, 1889, January 17th.

Figure 3

The second version of “The Kodak”, 1889, Jun

Note. From Internet Archive [Digitized to Life 1889-06-20: Vol 13 Issue 338], by Life, 1889, June 20.