Tar_alcaran, 1 year ago

Yes. Or rather, it was flashlight photography, as opposed to “old fashioned” photography where you had to hold perfectly still for several seconds. Of course, flash powder existed before, but it was messy, dangerous, flammable and left a layer of white ash everywhere. Most people today would only recognise the pan full of magnesium flash powder from cartoons, but you can probably guess it wasn’t popular at parties or with hobbyists.

In the 1920s, flash bulbs were the awesome new thing, meaning you could take split second photos, and those could be action shots, and not staged and posed portraits. Taking a flashlight was doable quickly and easily, and of course as we all know, most random photos by random people aren’t great.

The name photograph was already used for the old thing, so “flashlight” became the obvious abbreviation.