The Pencil of nature, the first commercially printed book illustrated with photographs, explained Talbot's development of the calotype process which had been used to produce the 24 calotypes included with the text. "Although not as dazzlingly precise as the contemporaneous daguerreotype process (examples of which are displayed in the nearby case), William Henry Fox Talbot's photographic process had the great advantage of producing multiple positive prints from a single negative made in the camera. To promote his invention and demonstrate its utility, Talbot produced The Pencil of Nature, the first commercially published book illustrated with photographs. Like Gutenberg's invention of moveable type, photography forever changed the transmission of knowledge, and The Pencil of Nature represents a revolution in the history of publishing and the art of the book."--Malcolm Daniel, Gus and Lyndall Wortham Curator, MFAH Department of Photography.
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