Where it all began:

"In 1952 a Swedish mining engineer with an interest in photography, Mats Haglund, developed a new principle for a drillhole dip and direction at the LKAB mining company." (Björn Tornqvist, Geodrilling 14, 1982 in How crooked is a straight borehole - The benefits of drillhole surveying).
Mats Haglund had extended the old miners practise of lowering a torch or lamp down a hole facing up so that they could get an indication of the bend of the hole as the light moved along the curve. However, after the light was no longer visible they could no longer judge the hole deviation. This method could only be semi-quantitative at best and gave no true indication of dip. Mats idea was to develop an instrument that acted as a light indicator within a short fixed distance.
However, in 1952, the technology was not available to realise his concept.

Björn Tornqvist again: "It was not until 1971 that design and construction of the new instrument could be undertaken. First trials were successfully carried out in February 1972 - twenty years after the idea had seen the light of day and fifteen years after the initial testing of the idea itself." and "The new instrument was given the name REFLEX-FOTOBOR DIP and DIRECTION INDICATOR (R-F DDI)."

According to the Reflex website (at the time of writing in November 2007):

"It all started in 1974 (sic), at the LKAB Malmberget Mine in northern Sweden. One of the engineers, Mats Haglund a keen photographer, toyed with the idea of a long probe holding a miniature camera that would photograph the actual bending of the probe from the inside. Tests were made, the feasibility of the idea was proved, and a patent applied for." ... "With help from one of Sweden's high speed photography specialists within the Defence Research Authority and precision manufacturing resources of a Stockholm company, Fotobor saw the light of day. It was an instant success, even though film handling and interpretation took time."

Part of this statement is factually incorrect (the year) which shows how the true story has been lost. The date 1974, however, is significant as will be seen later. But at this point, just a reminder that the original ideas were developed in 1952 and the Fotobor was developed and field tested by 1972.

In summary, the FOTOBOR, the first relatively inexpensive, non-magnetic borehole survey instrument was born thanks to the ideas and tenacity of mining engineer Mats Haglund.

In November 1987 Mats Haglund wrote in his introduction to The Fotobor System (a 42 page document describing the use and theory of the Fotobor method):

"The Mining engineer of yesterday, who had the task to make mining plans for a new deep level, very soon found that the technical and economical realities to a great extent was a question of the accuracy of investigation drilling.
Bore hole measuring equipments were defective and seldom used. One way to solve the problem was to arrange drilling places so close to the goal that bore hole deviations were kept within acceptable limits.
A list of development wishes was long. In the first place a simple, fast and accurate equipment, insensible to geophysical disturbances in the rock.
It showed that solving of the problem did not demand for a high grade genius, but perhaps a unique combination of fairly elementary knowledge and interest within different sectors of general technics.
Technical imagination makes possible in such cases a synthesis of known parametres to working units. If the imagination includes a capability to understand one's own limitations, a step is short to find skilled colleagues.
Thus the bore hole camera Reflex-Fotobor was created together with Trygge Ramqvist and Sture Örtenblad.
In the course of time many bore hole measurements have increased the knowledge of hole curvature factors - knowledge which has made possible the development of new technics within the field of diamond drilling.
The mining engineer of today can thus make safer mining plans with better economy.
Malmberget, November 1987
Mats T Haglund"

Text has been produced verbatim. Bold italics are the authors to emphasize the point made or the people involved.

Sture Örtenblad was an engineer and owner of Reflex AB Industri which specialised in automatic and precision timepieces and clocks. The following is noted from the web link: http://www.antikurmakaren.se/svenska-ur.html

The Reflex Robot Clock
Engineer Sture Örtenblad released the Reflex Clock in 1951, after 5 years of development work. The Reflex Clock was a connection (coupling?) clock with, for that period in time, unique characteristics; it was possible to program the clock to turn on and off electrical devices based on a weekly schedule. At that time, it was only possible to set clocks for 12 hours. The Reflex Robot Clock was not only a "connection" clock but also a nice table clock for the home.
(Thanks to Lotta Tuvstedt of InfoTechnica for the translation).

It seems likely that Sture Örtenblad would have supplied the expertise to develop the timing, mechanical and probably housing for the Fotobor.
At the time of writing no further reference can be found for Trygge Ramquist. But it is a reasonable assumption that he provided the high speed photography expertise mentioned on the Reflex web site.
Mats Haglund provided the original idea and probably the majority of the mathematical and trigonometrical background to the data processing.

Thus, as is often the case in technical development, the Fotobor came about because of the timely meeting of people with the skills, knowledge, expertise and tenacity required and the development of appropriate external technologies.
What is also interesting is that, in his introduction quoted above, Mats Haglund quite specifically credits the three people who developed the Fotobor system, though he appears to be modest about his part in it.
However, he is claiming the development and stating their part in it as late as 1987 (probably at the point when the Maxibor was first being considered). I believe this indicates a feeling that the part he and the others played in the development of the Fotobor (and thus Reflex) was in danger of being lost.

The importance of the development of the Fotobor for the Reflex company cannot be over-emphasised. Up until 1992 Fotobor and it's successor, Maxibor, were the major products that drove the growth and development of both Industri AB Reflex and Reflex Instrument AB.

What was special about the Fotobor survey tool?

The Fotobor was one of the first of a generation of relatively low-cost survey instruments that were not affected by magnetism. Any existing tool that used magnetometers would not report the direction correctly (the same as using a compass near magnetic rock). The non-magnetic tools that were available were Gyro based systems - these were expensive, could only be hired and required highly skilled operators.

The significance of 1974:

In GeoDrilling International (January/February 2007, pages 18 and 19) Claes Ericsson states:

"I started working with Industri AB Reflex in 1974. Here I pioneered the non-magnetic instrument market around the world with the development of the Fotobor borehole survey tool. Before the release of the Fotobor only gyro survey systems were available."

Claes Ericsson, who had married Birgitta Örtenblad (daughter of Sture Örtenblad), was taken into his father-in-laws company to market the Fotobor.
Also on the FlexIT web site (at the time of writing this item):

"Claes introduced the session by showing the original Fotobor system, which he had launched at the PDAC in 1974."

To re-iterate, the Fotobor had been tested and launched in 1972. However, there is repeated usage of 1974 as "Year Zero" for both Fotobor and Reflex in much of the available information about the company. The previous 22 years and the original developers story appear to have been forgotten.

Claes Ericsson was successful in marketing the Fotobor into many areas worldwide. The 1974 PDAC (Prospectors and Developers Association Conference) in Toronto would probably have introduced the Fotobor to a much larger international market than it had previously attained.

From 1974 onwards it is likely that a number of improvements were made to the system, particularly in the area of data processing. The original Fotobor used a manual calculation process only. Later improvements (as the technology became available) included processing using a Hewlett Packard programmable calculator (using magnetic strips for the programs) and software for the Apple II computer.

Next - Practical Fotoboring.