Most 20th-century photographs were made using real silver.

The foundation of modern photography dates back to the 1830s with Louis Daguerre and Henry Fox Talbot, who discovered that silver salts are light-sensitive. Traditional film consists of a plastic base coated with an emulsion containing millions of microscopic silver halide crystals. When the camera shutter opens, photons strike these crystals to create a 'latent image' that is invisible to the naked eye.During the development process, a chemical reducing agent converts the exposed silver halide grains into black metallic silver. This silver remains embedded in the gelatin layer of the film to form the final image. In color photography, the silver is eventually bleached away and replaced by organic dyes, but silver is still essential for the initial light capture.According to the Silver Institute, the photography industry was once the largest consumer of silver worldwide, using over 200 million ounces annually at its peak in the late 1990s. Even with the rise of digital technology, high-end filmmakers like Christopher Nolan and Quentin Tarantino continue to use Kodak's silver-based film stocks. They prefer it for its unmatched dynamic range and a resolution equivalent to roughly 6K or 8K digital sensors.