Jump Photography evolved over decades as scientists and artists alike dreamed of capturing subjects in mid-motion. Like so many forms of technology through the Industrial Era, progress was the result of contributions from many great minds and more than a few failed experiments. These photos prove that our great Victorian ancestors were anything but stodgy and sedentary. More than a few of them displayed impressive hang time.
In The Beginning, We Had Only Blurs
The first cameras were miraculous technological developments, but with slow shutter speeds, Jump Photography with crisp lines remained decades in the future.
Following are a few highlights of the progression toward Jump Photography.
1826 or 1827–Joseph Nicéphore Niépce took the first known photograph. Titled View from the Window at Le Gras, it’s a grey-hued pewter plate with the blurred shadow-shapes of tree lines and buildings.
Chief Blur Buster of BlurBusters Forums explains that early shutter times wee too slow to capture humans sitting still, let alone anything in motion. In this early photo, pedestrian traffic and horse carts are:
“motionblurred because camera exposure (persistence) was a full 7 minutes! At this level, blurring becomes so faint and prolonged that moving objects are rendered imperceptible.” (BlurBusters Forum)
Eventually people realized that a subject had to remain still to be captured in a photograph.
“In this early photography era, people such as Sameul Morse (inventor of morse code) apparently thought it was very strange/amazing that moving objects were rendered invisible in photography.” (BlurBusters Forum)
As exposures shortened to less than a minute, photos recorded moving objects as faint motion blurs. Eventually, photographers could minimize or eliminate motion blur with fast shutters or flash photography.
“But when image persistence is several minutes, most moving objects becomes invisible to the human eye!” (BlurBusters Forum)
1838– Louis Daguerre (1787-1851) took an image of the Boulevard du Temple in Paris (below), unintentionally capturing the first human in a photograph. The person (in the bottom left of the photo) stood still during the long exposure while his shoes were shined.
1882— William Jennings captured one of the first known shots of lightning.
1884— This is one of the first photos of a tornado, taken 22 miles southwest of Howard, South Dakota on August 28, 1884. The photo is provided by Nate Mayes. (weather.gov)
Edward Muybridge Caught Horses In Motion, Four Hooves At A Time
1878–Edward Muybridge (1830-1904) developed a process for making rapid sequences of photographs of motion.
A native of England, Muybridge built an extensive catalogue of images of the American west. In 1872 he received a commission from former governor and presdient of Central Pacific Ralword Leland Stanford. To win a wager, Stanfird wanted scientific evidence that a horse in motion had four feet off the ground at one time. To that end, Muybridge made several negatives of Stanford’s horse as it trotted laterally in front of his camera.
In 1877 he explored Oscar Gustav Rejdlander’s idea to employ twelve electrically tripped cameras in a line to get a succession of exposures at regulated intervals.
According to the Science Museum Group, six of thee views were published in 1878 under the title of The Horse in Motion. Muybridge patented his ‘method and apparatus for photographing objects in motion’.
He doubled the number of cameras to 24 and included other animals in his studies.
By 1879 he was capturing humans in motion.
“A decade later Muybridge, using a device he called the Zoöpraxiscope, became the first to exhibit photographic motion pictures taken from life. It was a direct step towards modern film-making, and was a popular device.” (Science Museum Group)
Muybridge’s Jump Photography of bodies in motion attracted the attention of the French scientist and photographer Étienne Jules Marey, professor at the Collège de France. Marey helped to establish Muybridge’s work in the scientific world.
In 1881 Muybridge lectured before the assembled men of science with his newly animated illustrations for the first time in Europe. He then lectured in London, before the Royal Institution, the Royal Academy of Arts, the Royal Society of Arts, and the Royal Society.
Étienne Jules Marey Caught Motion In One Plate
Marey (1830-1904), a French scientist, physicist, engineer and student of physiology, had been studying motion for two decades. While Muybridge’s work inspired him, it was not precise enough for his scientific mind. Unlike Muybridges, Marey recorded the successive phases of motion on single plate.
By 1882, he developed a single camera method that he called chrono-, or time-, photography. Chrono-photography was so precise, Marey could take scientific measurements from its images.
“Marey used dry photographic plates, faster than the wet plates Muybridge used, and an ordinary camera with its lens left open. Behind the lens, Marey put a rotating metal disk that had from one to ten slots cut into it at even intervals. As the subject moved in front of a black background, the rotating shutter exposed the glass plate, creating a sequence of images.” (AmericanHistory)
Marey’s chronophotographs were the first images that promised to explain exactly what happens when the body moves. They also gave us some of the best examples of early Jump Photography.
This device is considered by many to be the forerunner of motion picture cameras.
Wallace G. Levison Captured Victorian Hang Time
Wallace G. Levison (1846-1924) was a chemist, inventor and lecturer who founded the Departments of Mineralogy and Astronomy at the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences. He used evolving photographic technology both as a tool for science and recreation.
Thanks to faster shutter speeds, he captured actions that had only been recorded as blurs by earlier photographers. Yes, Spirit photographers of the time capitalized on blurred images. And Eduard Spelterini was busy taking crisp aerial photographs from hot air balloons. Another contemporary, Carl Størmer, was capturing candid expressions with his Victorian Era spy camera,
Meanwhile, Levison was experimenting with the latest sensitive film emulsions that allowed him to take pictures with faster and faster shutter speeds. Levison left us some of the best examples of early Jump Photography of his subjects in Manhattan and Coney Island among others.
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