Locomotion, Plate 55 "Walking, Turning Around, Action of Aversion"
date: label: date made
content: 1885-07-28
name: label: maker
content: Muybridge, Eadweard
notes: label: Description
content: Eadweard Muybridge's cyanotypes are working proofs (contact prints) made from the more than 20,000 negatives he took at the University of Pennsylvania from 1884 to 1886. There Muybridge photographed human and animal subjects in motion from lateral (parallel), front and rear positions. For the lateral views he used up to 36 lenses in 12 to 24 cameras placed at 90-degree angles to his subjects. Muybridge added two more cameras, each holding up to 12 lenses and placed at 60-degree angles, for the front and rear "foreshortening" views.
label: Description
content: Since the original negatives no longer exist, the cyanotypes record complete images before Muybridge edited and cropped them for publication. The mounted cyanotypes for plate 55 represent one of over 750 sets of proofs in this unique collection of early photography of motion at the Smithsonian. Comparisons between Muybridge's working cyanotype proofs and his final collotype prints prove that he freely reprinted, cropped, deleted or substituted negatives to make the assemblage of 781 collotype in the portfolio "Animal Locomotion."
label: Description
content: In plate 55, frame 3 of the rear views is blank and crossed out, indicating a camera malfunction. The remaining 11 frames were reassembled and renumbered for the final print.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Pennsylvania, Philadelphia
topic: label: Subject
content: Science & Scientific Instruments
setName: label: See more items in
content: Work and Industry: Photographic History
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content: Photo History Collection
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content: Photography
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content: Art
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content: Eadweard Muybridge Cyanotypes
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: PG.003856.0049
label: accession number
content: 98473
label: catalog number
content: 3856.0049
label: maker number
content: 1017
objectType: label: Object Name
content: cyanotype
label: Object Name
content: photograph
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: paper (overall material)
label: Physical Description
content: board (overall material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 13 in x 21 1/2 in; 33.02 cm x 54.61 cm