Anschütz Drum Schnellseher(1890–1890)

[This entry is a continuation of Anschütz Electrical Schnellseher.]

In 1890, as Ottomar Anschütz began work on turning photographic moving pictures into a public entertainment, he constructed a new version of his Schnellseher in the form of a long semi-circular cylinder with six viewing ports, each served by a single set of chronophotographs depicting a recognizable movement. This was a transitional device, between the Electrical Schnellseher with its 130cm (51.18 in) ring and the Automat Schnellseher with its 90cm (35.43 in) disc, and was exhibited only four or five times in 1890, before it was fully superseded by the Automat Schnellseher. 

This model did away with the need for the partitioned and darkened room for viewers that was required with the original model Schnellseher – it was a fully self-contained, transportable unit that could be exhibited anywhere. Further improvements towards commercial exhibition included lower personnel costs, and six viewing ports for simultaneous use, with each accommodating 4–7 viewers, so that audience throughput was faster and more efficient than with the original model. The disadvantages of the Drum Schnellseher included its inflexibility in showing movements of varying numbers of phases (sequences of different lengths) and its large physical footprint, which required significant space for operation. 

When Anschütz began commercial development of this new apparatus, he also increased his production of entertainment chronophotographs that were not related to either physiological subjects, or the prior chronophotographic work of Étienne-Jules Marey and Eadweard Muybridge. Several of the new entertainment series were small narrative scenes involving assembled properties and personnel, such as Einseifen beim Barbier (Lathering up at the Barber’s), Zwei Zimmerleute früstückend (Two Carpenters Breakfasting), or Lustige fahrt (Funny Journey).  

The drum-form Schnellseher would most likely have quickly disappeared from history if it had not been exhibited to photographic chemist Josef Maria Eder, and a distinguished audience, at his k.k. Graphischer Lehr- und Versuchsanstalt (Imperial and Royal Graphic Teaching and Research Institute) in Vienna, on April 21 & 22, 1890, which ensured its documentation in the photographic literature of the time. After the demonstration for Eder, the apparatus moved to a tavern at Parkring 2, at the corner of the Wollzeile in Vienna, where it ran for a month from July 1, 1890, open every day from 10 am through to 8 pm for an admission price of 30 Kreutzer, and was advertised regularly in both the Neue Freie Presse and the Neues Wiener Tagblatt. The Drum Schnellseher was also seen at a meeting of the German Photographic Association in Weimar (Photographische Correspondenz, 1890), before ending its days in late September as a brief ancillary exhibition in the permanent Kaiserpanorama installation in Leipzig at Grimmaische Strasse 24 (Leipziger Tageblatt, 1890). 

With the advent of the Automat Schnellseher in July 1891, Anschütz finally achieved his goal of finding a way to exhibit moving pictures as a public entertainment, and the Drum Schnellseher was fully retired. There was probably only ever a single example constructed, which is not known to survive.

[This entry is followed by Anschütz Automat Schnellseher.]