What looks like a toaster and shoots 0.01MP images?

Answer: the first digital camera - John Wade explains how it all began

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Eminent American inventor Thomas Edison said it best: 'To invent, you need a good imagination and a pile of junk.' Edison died in 1931 and the first digital camera didn't appear for another 44 years. But his words might have resonated with electrical engineer Steven Sasson, the man credited with inventing that first digital camera, cobbled together from a miscellany of seemingly disassociated parts.

But to begin at the beginning, let's talk about Albert Einstein. During the early years of the 20th century, scientists had already discovered that when certain metals such as selenium are exposed to light, an electrical current is generated. The problem was, they didn’t know why. Light, they reasoned, was in the form of waves and surely lacked enough power to energise electrons in the way needed to produce a current. Einstein thought differently. Suppose light didn't come in waves, but instead behaved like particles that contained their own energy? If the frequency of these light particles was high enough, they could transfer their energy to electrons in the atoms of some metals, causing them to be ejected. Thus, when light hit the right metal, it would result in the generation of a weak electric current.