Skip to content
Skip to main content

Notes from the John Martin Rare Book Room, August 2010

stereoscope

Sir Charles Wheatstone  (1802-1875) was an English scientist and inventor of many scientific breakthroughs of the Victorian era, including his 1838 invention of the stereoscope (a device for displaying three-dimensional images). Stereopsis, was first described by Wheatstone  in research which led him to make stereoscopic drawings and construct the stereoscope. He showed that our impression of solidity is gained by the combination in the mind of two separate pictures of an object taken by both of our eyes from different points of view.