Rudge inventor of the Biophantascope - New Bond Street Place - Bath, Somerset
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SMacB
N 51° 22.979 W 002° 21.625
30U E 544508 N 5692609
A brass plaque marking the place where John Arthur Roebuck Rudge, inventor of the Biophantascope, precursor to the Kinematograph, lived. The building is now a bakery.
Waymark Code: WMWYPZ
Location: South West England, United Kingdom
Date Posted: 10/31/2017
Views: 2
"John Arthur Roebuck Rudge was born in Bath, the son of a wood-turner and antique dealer. As well as making scientific instruments, he was an entertainer who put on countless shows, earning the nickname 'Wizard of the Magic Lantern'.
Rudge met William Friese-Greene about 1880, the latter having a photographic shop nearby in Bath, and they formed a close association. Rudge did most of the technical work whilst Friese-Greene helped with the photography and put on some public demonstrations.
Friese-Greene was fascinated by the Biophantic Lantern and in 1886 he began work with Rudge on enhancing it in order to project photographic plates. They called the device a Biophantascope. Friese-Greene realised that glass plates would never be a practical medium for true moving pictures and in 1885 he began to experiment with oiled paper and by 1887 was experimenting with celluloid as a medium for motion picture cameras."
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Thge plaque reads:
Here lived,
worked and died
Rudge
inventor of the
Biophantascope
the precursor
of the
Kinematograph
b. 1837 d. 1903