Illustration of a young girl watching a man using a praxinoscope. Invented by M. Reynaud of Paris, France, the praxinoscope was a nineteenth century novelty item that was a precursor to modern cinematography. As with cinematography, the praxinoscope depended on persistence of vision. 16 pictures of a movement that occurred in one second, such as a galloping horse, were mounted in sequence onto a revolving drum (centre left). When viewing the revolving drum though a slit (upper right), the pictures appeared to move.