Photography turns 170-odd years old in this six-part BBC Four series, which traces the medium from the daguerreotype to digital manipulation by asking what the camera actually does to reality. Episode one, "Fixing the Shadows," covers the earliest processes; later episodes work through photojournalism, art photography, portraiture, and the family snapshot, tackling questions like why some news images become icons and others vanish. William Eggleston, Nan Goldin, William Klein, Martin Parr, Sally Mann, Robert Adams, Juergen Teller, Andreas Gursky, and Jeff Wall all appear on camera, talking through specific photographs and how they were made. The series moves between interviews, archival stills, and location visits rather than reenactment, letting the photographers argue their own cases about intention, luck, and manipulation. Episode titles like "Right Place, Right Time?" and "Snap Judgements" signal the running argument: how much of a great photograph is skill versus accident, and who decides which images matter. Six episodes, each built around a different function photography serves, from documentation to family memory to fine art.