Customer Reviews

Animals in Motion (Dover Anatomy for Artists)

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Muybridges momumental work photographing animals in all different gates and poses and tests of ability. Using sometimes up to 100 cameras for a single set up to gain what is now the definitive guide for animators in understanding the motion of animals. It all started with a $25,000 bet: Eadweard Muybridge and a friend argued whether all four of the horses hooves leave the ground completely at any point during a gallop. Being funded for the project, Muybridge proved to be the winner in saying that horses do in fact leave the ground for a momentary second in their strides. The book begins with an anlaysis of locomotion, going over the walk, the amble, the trot, the rack (or pace), the canter, the transverse-gallop, the rotary-gallop, and the richochet, along with the leap and buck and kick. There are roughly 4,000 photos in this collection which claims to be the largest collection of animals in motion. It features not only horses but lions, deers, oxen, elephants, birds and kangaroos. From this development, Muybridge not only discovered that horses gallop with no feet touching the ground, but his discovery led to motion pictures, in which his photos is a very crude version of cinema today. Later he designed a viewer called a Zoogyroscope (or Zoopraxiscope) which, similar to a Zoetrope, was a carousel with slits which you look through while it is spinning to give the illusion of motion (or persistence of vision). Today these pictures are looked at for a couple of reasons, mostly as nastolgia for one to have wonder and excitement of this simple cinema, but it also is a great reference for modern animators. In fact, for those looking at animation, I can tell you that if you ask for an application to Walt Disney Animation Studios, they will give you their requirements and texts, this will be on the list. Highly reccomended for the artist, graphic, fine arts or animation or anything else you can dream of.

The images of the dray horses pulling heavy loads is worth the price of admission for me. This is a great reference for artists who want to create realistic images of animals in motion. It's a fabulous settler of bar room bets. It's a source of animated gifs for web designers (I have the running cat image that's been going around.)

For people who want to understand animals in general, this is a good reference. I never thought that all the ways an animal can go from point A to point B each had a name to it and that a quadruped can have so many ways to move.

Its an interesting historical piece, too. People do not see horses doing useful work any more and it's a reminder that we all had a life before internal combustion. Its an interesting chapter in the history of photography and the history of art, too. (Painting was never the same after people figured out how animals really moved.)

I only needed to consult this book a few times for projects with Animals involved, but it was definitely worth it.

You could get video footage of YouTube, convert the video, freeze frame and dissect it, but I found this book quicker and less hassle.

Well, this book is a classic and at the time it came out, a revolutionary one! From today's modern technology perspective it has limited value simply because there is SO much out there in the world wide web to show an artist the human form in motion.
However, from a historical viewpoint it changed the way artists painted animals in motion, most notably, the horse! In spite of today's equipment being used easily by the average consumer to slow and stop motion, the results discovered and published in this book were the result of ingenious deduction and long, hard work to dispell previously held conceptions! For that reason it deserves a place on the shelf of every artist's book shelf!

I bought this book specifically to aid in animal locomotion and animation and I was very happy. I specifically needed animation for a dog and the images were perfect for my purposes. There are over 120 different animal actions. This is a must for the animator's reference library.

This is a must reference book for the artist,animator or photography student or film historian. Muybridge is the true father of motion pictures. Even George Lucas has a statue dedicated to Muybridge at his San Francisco Presidio headquarters.