Evening star., 1950-10-15
Camera Angles
Motion Pictures Outdote Photography

Motion
The motion picture has travelled
long and tortuous road. The
movie camera and its companion
piece, the movie protector, were
not the brain children of one man
nor yet did they appear overnight
to amaze the world with their
magic. Over a century elapsed
from the genesis of the motion
picture to its fruition. The story
begins in the year 1924.
One Peter Mark Roget of Lon
don, better known or his Thesau-
rus, noticed a peculiar phenome-
non as he glazed from his study
window to observe an approaching
vehicle. The window was screened
by a partly opened Venetian blind
and, as his line of vision crossed
the series of obstructing Stats, he
received the distinct impression
that the vehicle was moving for
ward in series of jerks. Through
each of the apertures, despite the
movement of the vehicle, he saw
phase of the forward motion at
rest and through each of the sue
ceeding apertures he saw still an
other phase of motion.
Interested in this discovery,
Roget prepared and read before
the Royal Society a paper which
carried the ponderous title, Per-
sistence of Vision with Regard to
Moving Objects" 1T appears that
Roget turned his attention to
other pursuits and left the devel-
opment of his discovery to others.
One, Sir John Herschel, pointed
out that it was possible to see
both sides of coin at once" and
Illustrated his idea by spinning a
coin on a table so that the image
on one side blended with that on
the other. 7,
Bird in Cage Proof.
This, in turn, brought about the
development of a device which was
given the name "Thaumatrope."
Although there is some confusion
as to who should receive credit for
the Thaumatrope arrangement,
credit is generally given to a
Briton, DR.. John Ayrton Paris who
coined the name and began a
commercial manufacture of the
device in 1925. 1t consisted of a
cardboard disc on one side of
which appeared a drawing of
bird while the other or diverse
side there was drawn a bird cage.
There were strings attached to
the disc to twirl it and when the
disc was revolved between the
strings the bird seemed to be in
the cage.
But the Thaumatrope was only
a top that was limited in scope
and served only as proof of the
persistence of vision theory. How
ever, this theory took hold of the
imagination of several scientists
who determined to put the idea to
a more practical use by the way of
the motion picture. The year
1882. seven years before the dis
covery Of photography, saw the
first motion picture machine that
worked. 1t was invented in the
same year by two men working
Independently. One. DR.. Joseph
Antoine Ferdinand Plateau, called
his device the "Phenakistoscope." :"
The other, DR.. Simon Ritter Won
Stampfer. named his machine
The Stroboscopic Disc" Both
inventions were identical.
This forerunner of today's mo-
ton picture machine in fact bore
little resemblance to its successor.
And it was entirely dependent on
the work of artists who supplied
the series of pictures that were
then used to simulate motion by
means of the device. Call it what
you like, Stroboscopic Disc or
PhenakistoScope, the invention
was a pasteboard disc pierced
around its circumference by a Ger
tain number of small slots and
bearing figures drawn on its in
terror surface. When this disc
was turned around its center, op-
posite a mirror and one eye ap-
piled to the slots, the figures
viewed by reflection in the glass,
instead of blending in their regu-
lar rotation as viewed on turn
ing the disc in any other manner,
seemed, on the contrary, to cease
participating in the rotation of the
circle. and become animate and
execute normal motions.
Plateau Gave Basic Theory.
Plateau's theory in his own
words is as follows: When sew
eral objects differing from each
other, in graduated form and posi-
ton, present themselves success
sively to the eye at very short
intervals of time and close to each