Wesentliche Vorläufer des Films sind optische Spielzeuge, welche die Trägheit der Wahrnehmung oder den stroboskopischen Effekt ausnutzen, wie Thaumatrop, Phenakistiskop oder Lebensrad, Zoetrop oder Wundertrommel, Praxinoskop, später kommen Daumenkino, Kinora und Mutoskop hinzu.
Other essential predecessors of film were those devices that created the illusion of motion by taking advantage of the persistence of vision and the stroboscopic effect, such as the thaumatrope, phenakistoscope or wheel of life, zoetrope or magic drum and praxinoscope and later on, the more sophisticated flip-books such as the kinora and the mutoscope.
In 1896 the Lumiére brothers combined the principle of the Camera Obscura, which takes the picture, with that of the Magic Lantern, which reproduces the picture, to construct the cinematograph. But movies are first made possible by after-image effects and stroboscopic effects.
Many early scientists had already studied this phenomenon by using revolving objects and discs and thus prepared the way for the cinematograph. The thaumatrope is a rotating disc with pictures on both sides; when it is rapidly revolved, both picture sides melt into one.
