Simon von Stampfer

Simon Ritter von Stampfer (26 October 1792 (according to other sources 1790)), in Windisch-Mattrai, Archbishopric of Salzburg, today called Matrei in Osttirol, Tyrol – 10 November 1864 in Vienna) was an Austrian mathematician, surveyor and inventor.

He chose, however, to stay in Salzburg, where he was assistant teacher in mathematics, natural history, physics and Greek at the high school.

After several unsuccessful applications, in Innsbruck, Stampfer was finally promoted to full professor of pure mathematics in Salzburg.

One of his most famous students include Christian Doppler, known for his work in the Doppler Effect In 1832, Stampfer became aware through the Journal of Physics and Mathematics of experiments by the British physicist, Michael Faraday, on the optical illusion caused by rapidly rotating gears, in which the human eye could not follow the movement of the gear.

From these experiments he eventually developed his Stroboscopische Scheiben (optische Zauberscheiben) (Stroboscopic Discs, or optical magic discs, or simply Stroboscope ), coining the term as a combination of the Ancient Greek words στρόβος - strobos, meaning "whirlpool" and σκοπεῖν - skopein, meaning "to look at".

In a pamphlet published in July 1833, Stampfer mentioned that the sequence of images could be placed on either a disc, a cylinder (much like the Zoetrope, introduced in 1866) or longer scenes on a looped strip of paper or canvas stretched around two parallel rollers (somewhat similar to film on spools).

[3] Plateau mentioned in 1836 that he thought it difficult to state the exact time when he got the idea, but he believed he was first able to successfully assemble his invention in December.

He stated to trust the assertion of Stampfer to have started his experiments at the same time, which soon resulted in the discovery of the stroboscopic animation principle.