Kazimierz Prószyński – Inventor

Polish inventor Kazimierz Prószyński invented the Pleograph motion picture camera in 1894 (its name derived from the phonograph), which was both a camera and a movie projector. The Pleograph debuted a year before the Lumiere brothers’ Lumière Domitor camera.

In 1909, Prószyński invented the Aeroscope, a handheld film camera powered by compressed air. Until that time, cameras had to be hand cranked. With the Aeroscope, the cameraman had both hands free, which made it possible to film in most difficult circumstances and from airplanes. Hundreds of the light and relatively compact Aeroscope cameras were used by British Army combat cameramen during World War I and later by newsreel cameramen until the late 1920s, when more modern cameras took over. However, there are archival photographs of Aeroscope cameras in use by British combat cameramen as late as 1940, at the beginning of World War II. 

Born in Russian-controlled Warsaw on April 4, 1875, when Poland was still under the Partitions, Prószyński was educated in Poland and Belgium. He spent many years abroad, primarily in France and England. When Poland regained its independence in November 1918 at the end of World War I, Prószyński returned to Poland with his British wife and two children.

During World War II, with Warsaw under German occupation, Prószyński was arrested, released and harried by the Gestapo, who suspected him of conspiracy. During the 1944 Warsaw Uprising, Prószyński was arrested by the Germans and sent to Mauthausen concentration camp, where he died March 13, 1945, shortly before liberation.

Prószyński is regarded as one of the most important pioneers of cinematography and Polish cinema.