Daily Archives: February 18, 2022

Now, I’m not sure if these two inventions are considered to be from a different era, given that they were created in the same era of the nineteenth century, but two pre-cinema animation devices that I find to be a lot similar in functionality, but have major distinctions between each other are William George Horner’s Zoetrope and Emile Renaud’d Praxinoscope. As I mentioned, both were created in the 1800s but it seems Horner’s modern zoetrope was created in 1834, a whole 34 years before Reyfaud invented his praxinoscope in 1877. Both inadvertently perform the same function, with both contraptions being able to create the illusion of animation by having mini frame-by-frame reels, or sequenced drawings, circle throughout the interior of the cylinder. However, what differentiated the two was that rather than having narrow slits on the internal surface of the cylinder to create a sequence of animation through distorted moving images as the zoetrope did, the praxinoscope instead replaced the zoetropes slits on the side in exchange for mirrors set edge to edge around the revolving center, with each subsequent image on the outer rim reflecting on one of the inner mirrors to create a moving image. Nonetheless, I still absolutely adore these two creations, both nearly perform the same function, but still have their own distinctive style that makes both all the more unique.