Edweard Muybridge

Edweard Muybridge

Often referred to as the " Father of Moving Image", Edweard Muybridge was a photographer, born in 1830 in kingston Upon Thames , England Eadweard immigrated to New York at age 20 where he became a successful bookseller. In 1830, when travelling to England in a stagecoach Muybridge received serious head injuries which left him with double vision, After his accident Muybridge decided to take up photography under the pseudonym "Helios", he travelled to record the scenery of the West of North America and captured photos and panoramas with his mobile dark room.

Edweard Muybridge-

By the late 1800's Muybridge's reputation as a photographer had grown quite significantly and the former governor of California, Leyland Stanford contacted him to help settle a bet. The bet was over the speculation that when running a horse has all four of its hooves in the air with in its stride, the Governor believed they did. Muybridge took photographs of a horse running and after reviewing the photos he came to the conclusion that a horse did have all of its hooves in the air however, due to the imperfections of the method Muybridge used to come to the conclusion, he could not confirm the fact with certainty.

The Horse In Motion-1878- Edweard Muybridge-

Muybridge continued his work on this theory at the University of Pennsylvania in 1883, their he took many different photographs of humans and animals in motion. Near the end of his life he released many books which contained images of his photographs and he also toured America showing his photographic method using a projection device he created called the Zoopraxiscope.

Animal Locomotion-1877- Edweard Muybridge

Edweard is important to animation because of one of his inventions, called the Zoopraxiscope, created by Muybridge in 1834. The Zoopraxiscope was a motion picture device,  that consisted of glass discs which had images projected of them. It was created by Muybridge to prove that when moving at top speed his picture sequence of a horse would move. the way in which Muybridge's device works is very similar to the way traditional animation worked, images were created and sequenced in a particular order to create the illusion of movement.

Zoopraxiscope & Disk-

Animal Locomotion-1877- Edweard Muybridge-

References-

• https://www.kingston.gov.uk/info/200246/museum_collections_and_exhibitions/539/eadweard_muybridge/4
• http://www.biography.com/people/eadweard-muybridge-9419513#synopsis
• http://precinemahistory.net/1885.htm
• https://www.imaging-resource.com/news/2012/11/27/eadweard-muybridge-the-photographic-pioneer-who-froze-time-and-nature