Optical toys

thumb|A toy kaleidoscope

optical device that projects an image of its surroundings on a screen

thumb|upright=1.35|Example of mirror anamorphosis

early type of image projector

thumb|Animated GIF of ''Prof. Stampfer's Stroboscopische Scheibe No. X (Trentsensky & Vieweg 1833) thumb|A family viewing animations in a mirror through the slits of stroboscopic discs (detail of an illustration by E. Schule on the box label for Magic Disk - Disques Magiques'', )

thumb|300px|Old Zeiss (company)|Zeiss pocket stereoscope with original test image right|thumb|A common Underwood & Underwood Stereoscope

thumb|A replica of a Victorian zoetrope

optical toy

A thaumatrope is an optical toy that was introduced in 1825. When the strings attached to the small illustrated disk are twirled quickly between the fingers, the depicted elements on either side of the disk appear to blend into one image. It was explained as the result of visual impressions lingering in the mind for about one-eighth of a second after the image has been removed.

thumb|right|An 1879 illustration of a praxinoscope thumb|250px|A projecting praxinoscope, 1882 right|300px|thumb|The Théâtre Optique, 1892. This ultimate elaboration of the device used long strips with hundreds of narrative images.

View-Master is the trademark name of a line of special-format stereoscopes and corresponding View-Master "reels", which are thin cardboard disks containing seven Stereoscopic 3-D pairs of small transparent color photographs on film. It was originally manufactured and sold by Sawyer's.

parallel mirrors, creating reflections that appear to recede to infinity

thumb|A drawing of a Kaiserpanorama with 25 viewing stations. The Kaiserpanorama (or Kaiser-Panorama) is a form of stereoscopic entertainment medium used chiefly in the 19th and early 20th centuries, and is considered a precursor to film. It was invented by August Fuhrmann (1844–1925), and patented by him in 1890. It consisted of a number of viewing stations from which people would peer through a pair of lenses to view a number of rotating stereoscopic glass slides. By 1910 Fuhrmann is said to have controlled exhibitions in over 250 branches across Europe, and to have held up to 100,000 slides

thumb|upright|Large table-top viewer for vue d'optique prints. Late 18th century thumb|right|An example of a picture designed for viewing under a zograscope equipped with a mirror, its text mirror writing|written right-to-left.

A cosmorama is an exhibition of perspective pictures of different places in the world, usually world landmarks. Careful use of illumination and lenses gives the images greater realism.

form of visual entertainment

An anorthoscope is a device that demonstrates an optical illusion that turns an anamorphic picture on a disc into a normal image by rotating it behind a counter-rotating disk with four radial slits. It was invented in 1829 by Belgian physicist Joseph Plateau, whose further studies of the principle led him to the 1832 invention of a stroboscopic animation that would become known as the phénakisticope (commonly regarded as a pinnacle in the development of cinematography, and thus as an important step in the history of modern media).

thumb|Kaleidophone on display at Palais de la Découverte in Paris.The kaleidophone is a "philosophical toy" that produces moving optical figures.