Not long after Kircher’s death his magic lantern projector was in use everywhere in Europe but the apparatus did not do all that was desired. The goal of motion pictures was still around a corner. Pieter van Musschenbroek (1692–1761), a Dutch natural philosopher and mathematician, was the first to successfully simulate motion with the aid of the projector and glass slides.

The effects of motion produced on the screen through the system developed by Musschenbroek were crude but progress was made. There was also further concrete evidence that the primitive urge of the first painter to re-create nature with all its life and movement was still powerful and had not been forgotten.

Previously Zahn, as we have seen, mounted a series of glass slides on a circular disk which could be revolved before the lens of the projector. But there the method really only assured quick changes from one still picture to another. In the very beginning Kircher also had the disk idea and in other models of his lantern arranged the glass slides on a long panel so the successive views could be changed rapidly.

Musschenbroek, working in Holland in the early part of the 18th century, achieved his effect of motion by fitting two panels of slides into the same lantern for simultaneous projection. One slide was stationary and usually depicted the background; the other was mobile and was set in motion by means of a cord. With a skilled manipulator the effects were certainly wonderful—for that period.

The motion magic lantern projector was developed as a hobby by Musschenbroek, who was unaware of its importance until he had a visit in 1736 from the French scientist, or more accurately popularizer of science, Abbé Nollet (1700–1770).

Abbé Nollet corresponded with scientists throughout the world and his salon in Paris was crowded each evening with French and visiting scientists and the hangers-on of the great. While in Holland, Nollet visited Musschenbroek. One evening after a pleasant dinner and much serious conversation on educational and scientific matter, the host, Musschenbroek, proposed a bit of entertainment. He may have told his distinguished French visitor, “I have a surprise for you. I will show you something that is as yet unknown in your wise Paris.” It is certain Abbé Nollet’s curiosity was stirred up and he looked forward with keen anticipation to the demonstration. He was that kind of a person—eager for any new scientific development or application.

Musschenbroek’s show that evening in Holland included, according to Abbé Nollet, magic lantern views of a wind-mill whose arms revolved—wonder of wonders! Also a lady bowing as she walked along the street. And a cavalier removing his hat in courtesy. That would seem to prove that Musschenbroek, the staid scientist, in his idle moments had attempted to create the first “boy-meets-girl” motion picture.

The magic lantern with movement of Musschenbroek’s description was brought back to Paris by Nollet who started its popularization. The system became wide-spread following the publication of a book, Nouvelles Recréations Physiques et Mathématiques, by Abbé Guyot which went through several editions in Paris and was translated and published also in at least two editions in England by W. Hooper, M.D. under the title, Rational Recreations in which the Principles of Numbers and Natural Philosophy are Clearly and Copiously Elucidated, by a Series of Easy, Entertaining, Interesting Experiments. Hooper copied even the plates from the French book of Guyot.

The projections of the magic lantern, it was said, “may be rendered much more amusing, and at the same time more marvelous, by preparing figures to which different natural motions may be given, which everyone may perform according to his own taste; either by movements in the figures themselves, or by painting the subject on two glasses, and passing them at the same time through the groove (of the lantern).” It was noted by Guyot-Hooper that in Musschenbroek’s Philosophical Essays there are many methods of performing all these movements, “by some mechanical contrivances that are not difficult to execute.”

An illustration of the Musschenbroek system was given. The subject sought to portray how, “To represent a tempest by the magic lantern.”

Precise instructions were set down for this first “motion picture” storm effect:

With Musschenbroek the magic shadows began to have real motion and the effect on the audience consequently was much greater. Kircher’s projector was growing up.

In the Guyot-Hooper book it was also noted, “By means of two glasses disposed in this manner you may represent a battle, or sea fight, and numberless other subjects, that everyone will contrive according to his own taste. They may also be made to represent some remarkable or ludicrous action between different persons, and many other amusements that a lively imagination will easily suggest.”

Complete details were given for a “magical theatre” in which regular magic shadow plays could be presented. An elaborate lantern with a number of grooves for slides was proposed. The clouds, palaces of the gods and the like were dropped down from above; the caves and infernal places rose from below; and earthly palaces, gardens, characters, etc. came in from either side—all, of course, on glass slides. Projection was provided by a lamp with a dozen flames. As an illustration a play based on the siege of Troy was suggested. Slides included the following: walls of Troy, the Grecian Camp, the background atmosphere, the Grecian and Trojan troops, ships, the wooden horse, palaces and houses, temple of Pallas, fire and smoke for the conflagration, individual characters, etc. Screen directions were given for a complete magic shadow play in five acts. This surely was among the first—if not the first—motion picture scenario. The screen was then about three feet wide.

Musschenbroek, in addition to being the first credited with introducing effective, though very artificial, motion into light and shadow entertainment and instruction, was said to be the first man to create the illusion of white light by revolving very rapidly a disk painted with seven colors. That effect must have been as magical to Abbé Nollet as his “moving” pictures. It also indicates that considerable advance was being made in the knowledge of vision and the means to create optical illusions, upon which the principle of the motion picture rests.

As many other men in this story, Musschenbroek covered the whole field of science. He studies our old friend, the camera obscura, mirrors, prisms, the eye, the microscope in many forms, winds, waterspouts, magnetism, capillary tubes, the size of the earth, sound and pneumatic machines. It is easy to determine from that list of serious studies that Musschenbroek’s moving shadow projection was the purest kind of an avocation.

Abbé Nollet who helped to introduce Musschenbroek’s novel movement magic lantern is not credited with any great scientific discovery in any field but he served as a clearing house of scientific knowledge in his day. He traveled widely, to Italy and England as well as to Holland.

So far as this tale is concerned, Nollet’s name is of significance, after his part in making known the Musschenbroek device, by the fact that he also popularized a very simple little toy—“The Dazzling or Whirling Top.”

This little children’s plaything helped to stimulate the study of the persistence of vision and led to a better understanding of motion. This in turn resulted, within a half century, in learning a way to re-create actual motion effects. Around 1760 Nollet developed the top which, though only an outline in form, when whirled rapidly appears to be a solid object. Nollet also described the use of the camera obscura and the various types of lanterns for entertainment and teaching purposes.

Benjamin Franklin (1706–1790), famed American statesman, writer and scientist, corresponded with Abbé Nollet. Franklin, though disagreeing with Nollet on electricity, admired him, calling him “an able experimenter.” Nollet marveled that such science as manifest by the publication of certain of Franklin’s works in Paris could come from America. At first he conceived that his enemies in Paris had falsified the papers to cause his embarrassment. Franklin made no direct contribution to the art-science of magic shadows but had a pertinent remark to make about the medium—light itself—which is nearly as true today as when he wrote it in 1752 for a paper read to the Royal Society in London: “I must own I am much in the dark about light,” he said.