Titled ‘The horse in motion’
(Source)
The purpose of the 24 rapidly taken photographs of a galloping horse was to see whether a horse lifts all four of its feet off the ground during a gallop, which human eyes cannot see at a certain speed. The images showed that a horse sometimes has all 4 feet off the ground simultaneously.
The late 19th century saw nascent motion picture technology develop at a rapid pace as cameras and other technology slowly became mainstream. One of the earliest attempts at a moving image was the result of a test by the film pioneer Eadweard Muybridge.
In 1880 Muybridge showed the images at the California School of Fine Arts – the first-ever motion picture exhibition.