When did the first photograph get taken?

The image, called View from the Window at Le Gras, was made by Joseph Nicephore Niepce using a process he called heliography. He coated a pewter plate with a light-sensitive form of bitumen and exposed it inside a camera obscura. Because the material reacted so slowly, the exposure lasted several hours, which is why the sunlight appears to fall on both sides of the courtyard. The result is a faint, grainy image, but it is the earliest surviving photograph made in a camera. Niepce later worked with Louis Daguerre, whose daguerreotype process made photography far more practical.