Joseph Plateau (1832)

Joseph Plateau was a begin physicist, who invented a phenakistoscope, in 1832. This device  created an illusion of motion. The phenakistoscope uses the persistence of motion principle to create an illusion of motion, it has two disks that spin on an axis. The first disk has slots in round the edge, and the second contains a series of drawings, drawn around the disc in concentric.

After going to market, the phenakistoscope received other names, including Phantasmascope and Fantoscope (and phenakistiscope in Britain and many other countries).  It was quite successful for two years until William George Horner invented the zoetrope, which offered two improvements on the phenakistoscope.  First, the zoetrope did not require a viewing mirror.  The second and most influential improvement was that more than one person could view the moving pictures at the same time.  

Here is a Video showing you what the Phenakistoschop looked like to watch.