The invention of the thaumatrope, whose name means "wonder turner," has often been credited to the astronomer Sir John Herschel. However, it was a well-known London physicist, Dr. John A. Paris, who made this toy popular. Thaumatropes were the first of many optical toys, simple devices that continued to provide animated entertainment until the development of modern cinema.
A Thaumatrope is easily made using;
-2 rubber bands
- piece of card
- pen
- Scissors
An image is drawn on each side of the disc, but in a way that when it spins it seems superimposed into each other. To spin the disc, one string is held in a hand, and the disc is rotated to wind the string. Then, both strings are held, and the disc is allowed to rotate. This motion causes the disc to rotate, first in one direction and then in the opposite. The faster the disc rotates, the greater the clarity of the illusion. For example:
Although the thaumatrope does not produce animated scenes, it relies on the same persistence of vision principle that other optical toys use to create illusions of motion. Persistence of vision is the eye's ability to retain an image for roughly 1/20 of a second after the object is gone. In this case, the eye continues to see the two images on either side of the thaumatrope shortly after each has disappeared. As the thaumatrope spins, the series of quick flashes is interpreted as one continuous image.
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