Shadows in a Phantom Eye, Volume 1 (1872-1907): Attractions & Aberrations In The Moving Image 1872-1949

By Nocturne Group

Since the late 19th century, film has been the ultimate medium by which to express and illuminate the darker, wilder recesses of man's imagination. An alchemical convergence of magic lantern experiments and new photographic technology led to the production of the very first moving images, including visual captures of magic, mystery, violence, cruelty, crime, sex, nudity, devilry and death.

SHADOWS IN A PHANTOM EYE is an extensive and unprecedented 15-volume book series for those wishing to explore an alternative global history of the moving image in its inaugural decades - a history that reveals a wild, often disturbing and provocative world which includes Hollywood but also stretches far, far beyond.

SHADOWS IN A PHANTOM EYE Volume 1 reveals a flickering carnival of attractions and aberrations, from the ground-breaking motion capture experiments conceived by Eadweard Muybridge in 1872, through the first protean film eruptions of Georges M li s in the 1890s, and up to 1907 when Path Fr res led the world in the realm of film exploitation. This volume references well over 1,000 films from all countries and reproduces around 250 rare photographic images, posters and illustrations, many newly unearthed from international film archives and never before published.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1917285000
• ISBN13: 9781917285001
• Release Date: May 2026
• Publisher: Black Gas Books
• Length: 218 Pages
• Weight: 1.52 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 8.5" x 11.0"