Text A: "Early Photography"

Text A: "Early Photography"

1     Hundreds of years’ worth of scientific discoveries resulted in the development of photography. The notion that images could somehow be captured had long inspired scientists. Greek philosophers had studied optics as early as about 350 BCE. These curious people wanted to understand how the properties of light affected different materials. During the eleventh century, a scientist named Alhazen applied what he learned studying the skies to better understand how vision works.

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In addition to investigating how to magnify objects using a lens, he developed the camera obscura. This device projected images through a pinhole onto a screen. During the seventeenth century, Sir Isaac Newton made the important discovery that white light is composed of different colors. About a hundred years later, Johann Heinrich Schulze learned that silver nitrate, when exposed to light, would darken.

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2     These important discoveries propelled the science of photography rapidly forward. In the 1820s, Joseph Niépce tested how metal plates coated with chemicals might capture images. On a hot summer day in 1826, Niépce used a camera obscura to project the view outside his window onto a pewter plate covered with chemicals. After eight hours of exposure, Niépce soaked the plate in more chemicals, and the result was a faint, silvery image of some farm buildings. Niépce had produced the world’s first photograph! This process was not very efficient, however.

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3     Shortly after Niépce recorded this image, he met Louis Daguerre, a fellow Frenchman. Daguerre, a painter and stage director, had used a method called diorama in his set design, whereby the background image on stage could be manipulated so that it appeared to be either daylight or nighttime. He used tricks of lighting and glass panels to achieve this effect. Niépce was fascinated by the realism Daguerre’s method produced. Likewise, Daguerre wanted to learn how to better preserve the images produced by the camera obscura.

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4     What resulted was a partnership between Daguerre and Niépce that led to the development of heliography. Derived from the Greek roots helio, meaning “sun,” and graph, meaning “write,” a heliograph is what Niépce called his first image. However, together, the inventors were determined to quicken the process by which an image could be produced.

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5     Niépce died shortly after they formed their partnership. Within a few years, Daguerre had refined the process using different chemicals. Daguerre’s images became known as daguerreotypes. Because the images it produced were clear, did not easily fade, and required only minutes, not hours, of exposure time, daguerreotypic technology made cameras more popular.

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6     These cameras, however, were cumbersome and inconvenient. If the subject moved during the exposure time, which could be many minutes, the image would be blurry. Also, thin metal sheets were the only means of making early photographs. Subsequent refinement of photographic processes involved shortening the time needed for exposure and ways to produce multiple copies of the same photograph. In 1885, American George Eastman invented flexible, paper-based photographic film. A few years later, Eastman, the founder of Eastman Kodak, invented the Kodak camera. This revolutionized photography. Eastman’s camera used a roll of film, leading to the invention of the Brownie, the first mass-produced camera, in 1900.

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7     Advancements in twentieth-century photography included improvements in processing and efficiency. This led to the first flashbulb; high-speed and color film; and, in 1978, the first one-step, point-and-shoot camera.

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8     Considering that Earth was photographed from the moon’s surface in 1966, it is remarkable that only one hundred years prior, cameras were still in their infancy. Early photography was a time of great experimentation that rapidly improved the way people have been able to chronicle the world around them.

What would we do without cameras today?

How would anyone take selfies for insta to post or record tik toks?

Open Ended

In the space provided, compose an objective summary of Text A. Use complete sentences.

Text B: "Sound Recording: Better Listening Through Technology"

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1     Sound recording has come a long way since its beginnings in the 1870s. Scratchy, faint sounds recorded on wax cylinders played on large, cumbersome machines have been replaced with small, state-of-the-art devices that can store thousands of songs and fit in the palm of a person’s hand. How did sound recording evolve to where it is today?

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2     In 1877, Thomas Edison first discovered the secret to recording sound. Edison, who had been trained as a telegraph operator, was watching a telegraph machine when he noticed something peculiar. As the paper tape in the transmitter moved through the machine, it produced noise similar to the words on the tape. Curious, Edison used a stylus (a needlelike instrument) on a cylinder of tinfoil. He recited the rhyme “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” and it was recorded. Sound had been captured for the first time, and Edison’s discovery set the stage for other innovators.

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3     The biggest obstacle with Edison’s phonograph, an early machine for playing music, was that the cylinders could not be mass-produced easily. Also, once a cylinder was played on the phonograph a few times, the stylus would rip the tinfoil. Emile Berliner wanted to improve the phonograph. His gramophone, introduced in 1887, played back sounds that had been recorded onto flat discs. Because the discs were easy to mass-produce, this technology became popular.

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4     Guglielmo Marconi was also interested in sound recording and worked with radio waves and frequencies. He discovered how to operate radio stations so that the sound frequency from one would not disrupt the sound frequency of surrounding stations. In 1901, Marconi’s work with wireless signals culminated in the first transmission of wireless sound signals over the Atlantic Ocean, at a distance of 2,100 miles.

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A short time later, his work would prove to be lifesaving. The RMS Titanic was outfitted with the very latest in wireless equipment. Sending messages by wireless signal was still very new in 1912. That spring, during the Titanic’s maiden voyage, some first-class passengers sent messages to loved ones, as one would text or tweet someone today. When the Titanic began to sink, operators sent distress signals via the wireless messaging system, which alerted a nearby ship to rescue survivors.

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5     During the early twentieth century, sound was captured on flat discs called records. These discs were at first covered in shellac but later were vinyl-coated. People were able to listen to records on home record players, and for many years, this was the predominant form of recording and listening to audio and music.

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6     In the 1940s, scientists discovered the advantages of using magnetic tape to record sound. While the sound quality was not as good as that of vinyl records, tape allowed for much longer recordings. Vinyl records continued to be popular, however. In the 1950s, stereophonic sound was introduced. With stereo sound, a listener could hear different parts of a song playing from different speakers, which resulted in a high-quality listening experience. Tapes were available, but many people still preferred the more sophisticated sound quality captured by vinyl records.

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7     With the introduction of the personal cassette tape player in the 1979, vinyl records plummeted in popularity. These portable devices allowed people to bring their music with them everywhere. The quality of tapes had vastly improved since the 1940s, and people appreciated that cassette tapes allowed them to record and re-record what they liked.

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8     The superior sound quality of compact discs (known as CDs), which store music digitally, persuaded people to switch to yet another sound-recording medium. By the 1990s, most consumers preferred CDs to cassette tapes. With the availability of personal computers and their CD drives, people began to “rip” the content of their CDs onto computers in a digital format called MP3. Now people can easily transfer music across devices digitally. The next time you see an MP3 player, consider that it was only a little more than one hundred years ago that the bulky phonograph was a technological sensation!

Multiple Choice

What is one claim the author makes about music players in Text B?

• The use of loud music-playing devices has caused many people to suffer hearing loss.

• Music players have greatly improved since Edison’s phonograph.

• Vinyl records have better sound quality than CD players.

• Digital devices are too expensive for the average person to buy.

Multiple Choice

Which statement best helps the reader understand the meaning of the word medium as it is used in paragraph 8 of Text B?

• “The biggest obstacle with Edison’s phonograph, an early machine for playing music, was that the cylinders could not be mass-produced easily.”

• “The quality of tapes had vastly improved since the 1940s . . .”

• “With the availability of personal computers and their CD drives, people began to “rip’ the content of their CDs onto computers in a digital format called MP3.”

• “The next time you see an MP3 player, consider that it was only a little more than one hundred years ago that the bulky phonograph was a technological sensation!”

Multiple Choice

Which of the following conclusions is best supported by the information in both passages?

• Computers have helped to advance how images are captured and how sounds are recorded.

• Inventors are always looking for new ways to improve current technologies.

• Older forms of photography and sound recording were more affordable than today’s.

• Modern forms of photography and sound recording will no longer exist one hundred years from now.