The History of Stop Motion & Time-lapse Photography

Photography Tips  •  Time-lapse Photography

Many may think of stop motion and timelapse photography as modern techniques, perhaps something that came along with the advent of digital photography. But, you may be surprised to learn that they date all the way back to the 1870s when a photographer by the name of Eadweard Muybridge set up a series of 24 cameras and photographed a galloping horse. After he animated the images together, the first photographic stop motion film was birthed. Thomas Edison used elements of Muybridge’s work to develop the first timelapse videos. Take a look at the historic video below for an in depth look at the inventors’ work and the primitive equipment they used:

Muybridge helped to advance photographic techniques by his studies in animal and human motion. Below is a single photo taken from a sequence images of a woman dancing.