The Horse in Motion
Photographer: Eadweard Muybridge
Date: June 15, 1878
Location: Palo Alto Stock Farm, Palo Alto, California, USA
Eadweard Muybridge created 'Sallie Gardner at a Gallop' (also known as 'The Horse in Motion') on June 15, 1878, at the Palo Alto Stock Farm in California, commissioned by former California governor and railroad magnate Leland Stanford to determine whether all four of a horse's hooves leave the ground simultaneously during a gallop — a question that could not be resolved by the human eye. Muybridge set up 24 cameras with trip wires across a 40-foot track. The 24 photographs, taken in less than half a second, proved definitively that all four hooves do leave the ground simultaneously at one point in the gallop. The sequence was later animated using Muybridge's zoopraxiscope, a device he invented to project the images in rapid sequence — making it a direct precursor to motion picture cinema. The work is considered a foundational moment in both the science of motion and the history of cinema.
← Explore all photos on the map
