Louis Le Prince

French artist and cinematographer, pioneer of cinema

Louis Aimé Augustin Le Prince (French: [lwi lə pʁɛ̃s]; 28 August 1841 – vanished 16 September 1890) was a French artist and inventor. He filmed what may have been the first moving picture sequences to use a single lens camera and a strip of (paper) film.[1]

Louis Le Prince
Born
Louis Aimé Augustin Le Prince

(1841-08-28)28 August 1841
Metz, France
Disappeared16 September 1890(1890-09-16) (aged 49)
Dijon, France
StatusVanished
Occupation(s)Artist, Art teacher, inventor,
Spouse
Elizabeth Le Prince-Whitley
(m. 1869)

Le Prince was never able to perform a planned public demonstration in the United States because he mysteriously vanished from a train on 16 September 1890.[1] His body and luggage were never found, but, over a century later, a police archive was found that had a photograph of a drowned man who could have been him.

In the years after his death, his son Adolphe was in a court. He was representing Louis, in a battle against Thomas Edison to name the true inventor of motion pictures.[2] Edison won the case and a few months later, Adolphe was killed in a hunting accident.

References

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  1. 1.0 1.1 "BBC Education – Local Heroes Le Prince Biography". Archived from the original on November 28, 1999. Retrieved 2022-03-12., BBC, archived on 1999-11-28
  2. "Pioneers of Early Cinema: Louis Aimé Augustin Le Prince (1841–1890?)" (PDF). National Media Museum. June 2011. Retrieved 2014-08-02.