Eidoloscope
Originally known as the Panoptikon, it was the first projector to be used for commercial film shows. The result of a collaborative effort by the Lambda Company formed in 1894 by retired chemistry professor Woodville Latham and his playboy sons, Grey & Otway.
In their employ was a remarkable French technician named Eugene Augustin Lauste who did most of the actual designing and construction.
Additional help,of a clandestine nature, came from William Kennedy Laurie Dickson. He had been largely responsible for the kinetoscope and was still working for Edison.
A demonstration of the Panoptikon took place on the afternoon of April 21,1895 in the company's workshop at 33 Frankfort Street in lower Manhattan. The above drawing is from the New York Sun article.
A month later, the Lambda Company installed their projector in an empty store at 156 Broadway where they showed an 8 minute film of a fight that they had staged on the sunlit roof of Madison Square Garden.
The
Lathams continued filming a variety of subjects, presenting them at vaudeville
houses, dime museums, and expositions.
The Eidoloscope's depiction of a bull fight was added to the fourth act of Rosabel Morrison's production of Carmen. Two separate reviews in the New York Dramatic Mirror, November 28, 1896, describe the film footage as an "attractive feature" and a "revelation."
Despite these efforts, the inefficient Eidoloscope, with its dim image, was not very succesful. The Lathams were forced to abandon motion pictures in 1898 and soon after lost their patents.
 | The Eidoloscope did have one important feature that would figure in patent litigations until the 1910s. Lauste and/or Dickson had added a simple, but effective loop to reduce stress on the film, allowing for longer motion pictures.
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