| Photochronography | |
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The long-time desire to capture movement can be traced back to the first pre-historic drawings, to painting, and Chinese shadows, is made possible by photography. In 1874 the French astronomer Jansen, taking advantage of the recently invented supersensitive film, invented photochronography on a single plate. |
 Jansen's photographic revolver |
 Cameras for photochronography |
Black absorbs light rays, it does not reflect them. Thus, Jansen, aiming his "photographic revolver" at the firmament, recorded all the phases of an eclipse of the moon on just one plate. Years later Marey perfected the system inventing a curious "photographic rifle" which allowed him to photograph on a moving plate the sequence of a pigeon's flight. |
 Muybridge's line of cameras |
| In the United States, the Englishman Muybridge photographed a galloping horse sequence using twenty-four lined up cameras simultaneously, which were triggered by the horse's galloping movement which in turn broke the strings attached to the shutters. |
 Marey's rifle |
| Dumont made important contributions to photochronography as regards the systems of advancing the film, substituting the plates with sensitive strips that allowed him to take, for the first time, photographs in fractions of a second. |
 Marey's photochronographies |
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In 1864 Ducos du Hauron perfected a machine which, apart from taking photographs, could project images. Thus, the partial capture of continuous movement was of tremendous use to many areas of human activity. However, photochronography suffered from insuperable limitations that only cinema could overcome. |