Although science has never authenticated a single ghost, spirits of the dead have posed for elaborate studio portraits, strolled casually into mundane photographic scenes, and darted into the snapshots of hopeful ghost hunters—or so it seems. Initially, however, ghosts were reticent to appear before the camera.
Advent of Spirit Photography
The earliest practical photographs—daguerreotypes (process announced in 1839)—failed to record any ghosts. The same was true for the later images known as ambrotypes (from 1855), as well as their successors, the misnamed “tintypes” (patented in 1856). It was not until the advent of glass-plate negatives (about 1859), which made double imaging easy, that “ghosts” began seemingly to materialize in front of the camera.