Louis Daguerre

Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre was a French theatrical painter, lighter and creator of dioramas and illusions who in 1829 partnered with Nicéphore Niépce to create a photographic process. When Niépce died of a stroke in 1833, Daguerre continued experimenting, arriving upon a method which produced results by 1837 and which he made public in 1839. Daguerreotypes, as they were called, were very sharp images created on polished silver-plated copper sheets which were sensitized to light with iodine fumes. One of Daguerre's greatest findings was that of latent images - that a photographic plate given a short exposure would not show an image, but if it was "developed" (in this case using mercury fumes - what could possibly be toxic about that?) the light's effect would be amplified and the hidden image made visible. This reduced exposure times from hours to minutes. William Henry Fox Talbot, spurred on by news of Daguerre's process, independently discovered latent images and a means of developing them for his calotype process.

Louis-Jacques-Mandé Daguerre, sounds something like dagger - a French theatrical painter with a Frenchy theatrical name - and a mustache. Imagine it curled into sharp silver dagger-like points like his hair, and him sitting in his chair holding a polished silver plate up to it, engraving an image with one tip.