The Kammatograph was a ‘filmless’ camera and projector invented in 1898 as an alternative to the celluloid-based cinema technology (UK 6515 of 1898). Instead of celluloid film, it recorded its images on a circular glass plate or disc, which was 12 in (30.5cm)  in diameter. The disc shape makes the technology similar in design to nineteenth-century optical toys like the phenakistoscope. Depending on the specific camera model, the disc held either 500 smaller frames, or 300 larger frames (as quoted in the Kammatograph sales catalogue), although some modern historians suggest the smaller-frame discs may have actually contained between 550 and 600 images (Herbert, 2004; Lipton, 2021). Both models were presented with the same sized disc and the 300-frame version was also specifically recommended for shooting groups of people (the larger frame size allowed greater resolution). The images were photographed in a spiral fashion, akin to the arrangement of grooves on a vinyl record. 

The Kammatograph’s inventor was the Bavarian-born Leonard Ulrich Kamm and his firm L. Kamm and Co. manufactured the apparatus at 27 Powell Street, London. Much like the film pioneer R. W. Paul, Kamm ran an engineering business and film equipment – lanterns, projectors, screens, arc lights, etc. – formed a part of a larger range of machines he designed and sold. These included the Zerograph, a telegraph machine that immediately transcribed the message it received (Bioscope, June 9, 1910: p. 7; Herbert, 1996). While Kamm produced films of notable sporting and historical events – such as Edward VII’s coronation procession – unlike Paul, his focus seems to have been more on the apparatus manufacturing side of the film business.

In a 1909 interview with the Kinematograph Weekly, Kamm said he designed the Kammatograph “for the use of the amateur photographer”. Keeping this amateur in mind, he “abandoned altogether the celluloid film and by substitution of an ordinary circular glass plate coated with emulsion”, achieved “better results at a smaller outlay.” (Kinematograph Weekly, 5 August 1909, 613). For this at-home use, the Kammatograph disc also circumvented one of the major dangers surrounding celluloid film – its flammability – which among other things had resulted in significant municipal regulation of film exhibitions in Britain. The glass-based technology was much safer in this regard. Finally, the cost of a Kammatograph disc was minimal compared to cinematograph film. Where a roll of raw film stock cost 20 shillings, plates for the Kammatograph (both negative and positive) cost 2 and a half shillings , with pre-printed positive plates at 3 and a half shillings. Therefore, Kamm saw an opportunity to cater to a home-viewing market (already familiar with handling photographs on glass plates) and make his machine as convenient for such use as possible. Indeed, as one news story – reprinted in Kamm’s catalogue – states, the glass-based technology would allow every mother to possess “animated photographs of baby in every conceivable pose” (Kammatograph Catalogue, 1901; Daily Mail, January 3, 1901: p. 3). 

The Kammatograph was used by amateurs to record a variety of activities such as boxing matches, parades, historical events and processions, and many other scenes from daily life. The machine was used outside of Britain as well. In a 1909 interview, Kamm mentions that Madho Rao Scindia, the Maharaja of Gwalior in India, had bought a machine alongside “no end of plates” (Kinematograph Weekly, August 5, 1909: p. 615). Bioscope also suggests that the Kammatograph was used in Egypt by travelling showmen (Bioscope, June 15, 1916: pp. 1240–41). While not much more is known about the Maharaja’s possession of the discs or the Egyptian exhibitions, such stories suggest that there is scope for further investigation. 

The Kammatograph machine is also part of the history of colour in cinema – though Kamm himself was not directly involved. Early colour film and photography pioneers William Norman Lascelles Davidson and Benjamin Jumeaux both purchased a Kammatograph and used it as part of their experiments in natural colour, animated photography. Jumeaux and Davidson added a disc with red and blue-green colour sections to their Kammatograph and used it to demonstrate two-colour-based moving image projection – notably at the 1903 Inventors’ Exhibition in Brighton. As Luke McKernan notes, Davidson and Jumeaux’s work “anticipates” the film pioneer George Albert Smith’s work with Kinemacolor. However, it is moot whether their Kammatograph experiments influenced Smith’s own disc-based colour system (McKernan, 2005, 210-211).

Perhaps the Kammatograph’s greatest success – and the reason behind most of the scholarly attention the machine has received – was its use for scientific demonstrations by the botanist Henderina ‘Rina’ Scott who chose the technology to record the growth of plants in a stop-motion fashion. In a 1903 paper based on her scientific demonstrations published in the Annals of Botany, Scott wrote,

“I at first experimented with a small film kinematograph, but the results were not satisfactory, as the machine was not suitable for making time exposures, and the makers were unwilling to help adapt their machine for scientific work. Also the life of the films when obtained was so short” [i.e. the film stock did not do well in the climate in which the exposures were made].

However, Scott expressed appreciation towards Kamm for “providing every possible help” in her scientific use of the machine (Scott, 1903: p. 772). All of this points to her as a film pioneer. Thus, the Kammatograph represents a part of the intertwining histories of gender, science and cinema (Bethel, 2013; Jones, 2017: pp. 165–7; Ayres, 2020: pp. 103–9; Long, 2021).

These instances of use notwithstanding, the Kammatograph did not commercially establish itself. Kamm himself acknowledged that the public was “not yet ready for animated pictures in their homes”, and his own film focus shifted to designing equipment for celluloid film (Kinematograph Weekly, August 5, 1909: p. 613).  A major reason for the Kammatograph’s limited appeal was likely that a single plate ran for less than a minute. At 12 frames a second, a “500 picture” disc would run for a mere 45 seconds. This coupled with the fact that the glass disc made it impossible to edit the exposed images meant that the instrument had very limited use. The technology clearly left an impact as a form of scientific creativity though, as every time Kamm and his company were mentioned in the press there was always a nod to the innovative Kammatograph (Kinematograph Weekly, December 11, 1930: p. 51). 

Interestingly, in later years, the press often discussed the Kammatograph as a moving image technology that existed “before the films” (Western Daily Press, December 11, 1932: p. 11). Such stories mythologise celluloid film as an advancement on ‘primitive’ moving image technologies. As noted here though, the Kammatograph was developed contemporaneously with celluloid-based moving image technologies. Furthermore, for certain purposes – like Rina Scott’s – the glass disc was better-suited than perishable (and potentially flammable) celluloid. One might even see the glass-disc technology as a precursor to 16mm, 9.5mm and other later-developed non-flammable film formats, that were designed specifically for non-theatrical exhibition. The Kammatograph is a reminder that the film and other forms of moving image media emerged in what Andre Gaudreault refers to as the “culture broth” of visual media, technologies and viewing practices (Gaudreault, 2012: p. 16). While not literally the ‘film’ of film history, the Kammatograph was part of an environment where people attempted to make moving images valuable (and sustainable) for different modes of pleasure and learning. The technology’s importance to film and media, technological and scientific, and gender-based histories should be valued in this regard.