Athlete Running 6

Athlete Running 6 (1881) reuses the same format as Athlete Running 4 (1881), except that the main protagonist here is a leaner, and possibly younger, sprinter. From a technical standpoint, this series of photographs suffers from increased contrast, leaving the male body to appear more as a silhouette, without many discernible features. It is clear that Eadweard Muybridge was in search of the most effective approach to illumination suitable for images in motion. These outdoor experiments suggest that moving pictures had to be filmed in controlled light. Given the technology available in the early 1880s, this ambition was not fully realised until later in the decade. This short, among many, is a testament to the multitude of factors contributing to the development of a successful moving picture.