
163Evaluating Critical Parameters in the Process
Customizing Products for Niche Markets
The more alternatives, the more difcult the choice.
Abbe’ D’A llanival
In the late 1870s, George Eastman was a well-paid banker in Rochester,
New York. As an amateur photographer, he made an investment in time and
money to learn the intricate methods for preparing, exposing, and develop-
ing photographs with the wet-plate techniques of that time. Dissatisfaction
with the incumbent techniques led him to investigate improvements to
image-processing technology.
He rst studied the literature and came across a British publication that
described a photographic plate ...