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June 1895: Big Is Not So Beauiful
1895 was a busy year for W. K. L. Dickson. As well as being involved with the Lathams' new camera and projector, he was also working with Herman Casler at Henry Marvin’s company in Casrastota, NY, to develop a camera that would produce films for Casler’s Mutoscope, a peepshow device in direct competition to Edison’s Kinetoscope. By June 1895 a prototype had been successfully constructed and tested. Initially called the Biograph, this new camera was eventually re-named the Mutograph, and was an absolute brute of a machine. Weighing in at close to 300lbs, it required two men to manoeuvre it. Even simply tilting the device called for one man to lever the camera at the desired angle while the other tightened a massive nut screw with a monkey wrench to hold it in position. The camera used 70mm film, which it actually perforated as the image was being recorded. While the picture produced was exceptionally clear, the perforating device was cumbersome, and broke easily. Some of the first films produced on the camera are believed to have been made by Dickson. Even as the camera was being tested, however, it was becoming increasingly clear that film projection would soon supercede the peepshow device, and so Dickson and Casler began work on a projector in mid-1895. [ADD]
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