. . . over 18 years of seeing things!
Optical Toys is a company devoted to producing a unique array of pre & proto-cinematic toys as well as an ever growing array of paper toys. I produce both antique reproductions as well as put some "new wine" into the old bottles. The above image is from a phenakistascope disc from Germany. It is one of the earliest movies known to exist, dated 1833 and was part of my earliest product first published in 1988. Since then I have published a wide array of optical toys, such as thaumatropes, zoetropes and flipbooks. Over the years I turned the focus of the business towards publishing paper toys and antique book reproductions in general.
Although Optical Toys as a business remains small by design, I take pride in its having a relatively much larger effect. The Eadweard Muybridge flipbooks, first introduced in 1991, are now in their 5th edtion, with over 200,000 copies sold. The "Ole Million Face" toy has proven to be tremendously popular, and has brought back some very fond memories for "boomers" who loved a version of it called "Changeable Charlie". In 1998 the first of many Peter Markey paper automatons was published, and I take pride in being the exclusive publisher of many of his unique creations. I take particular satisfaction in knowing that the unique, amazing, beautiful or just plain weird toys that I have chosen to publish have connected with people all over the world. Our toys have sold in countries all over the world including every major European country as well as such diverse places as Luxembourg, Dubai, Brazil, Korea and Turkey. (Russians, you don't know what you're missing!)
Optical Toys primarily sells on a wholesale basis to specialty and museum stores in North America, Europe and Japan. I encourage you to patronize the stores that carry our products and we'd be happy to tell you where you can find our products in your area. But when that is not possible, I am happy to sell direct to you. Most of the toys are shown on this site but a complete listing can be found on the product list page,or you can download a complete PDF version of the price list or catalog. Please click below for information about online ordering.
- Andy Voda, Owner
If you are the owner or buyer for a retail store, please inquire for getting to the wholesale and buying information on this site, or for a complete catalogue. For inquiries about custom work, please contact us, but read this first .