Muybridge: Man in Motion

by Robert Bartlett Haas

Eadweard Muybridge (1830-1904) was an English photographer important for his pioneering work in photographic studies of motion, and early work in motion-picture projection. He earned his placed in history mainly as the godfather of moving pictures – the man who first captured instantaneous motion on film and project it on a screen – though the invention of modern movie technology was done by other hands. Muybridge was, however, a more complex and mysterious figure than one would gather from the film histories. Born in England as Edward Muggeridge, he changed his name, his country, and perhaps his character. He traveled widely, became an eminent still photographer in San Francisco, and figured in a sensational trial for the murder of his young wife’s lover – a dashing major. (Muybridge got off.) The author of this biographical study spent 0 years tracing Muybridge’s curious career. He untangles different versions of Muybridge’s work for Governor Leland Stanford, intended to settle an apocryphal $25,000 wager as to whether a trotting horse can have all four feet off the ground at once. By devising a bank of sequentially triggered still cameras, Muybridge settled the question (in the affirmative). Muybridge also open up a new technique for capturing movement in humans and animals, which led him into an incredibly extensive effort of documentation that has remained a classic achievement in photography.

207 pages, Hardcover

First published February 1, 1976