thrumirror.com A different way of seeing
Original plan-view diagram of Pepper’s Ghost: a hidden figure is reflected in angled glass, appearing as a virtual figure on the visible stage.
Look closely. Let the image settle.

See the historical stage illustration ↗

See a real display and a historical stage arrangement
A Pepper’s Ghost workshop display using a video screen and reflective glass.
A modern workshop demonstration by the Swedish Exhibition Agency: a video screen supplies the reflected image. Image: Riksutställningar / Swedish Exhibition Agency · Source · CC BY-SA 3.0. Photograph of a Pepper’s Ghost workshop display using a video screen.; viewing previews may be resized.
Bertrand’s 1865 engraving showing a Pepper’s Ghost stage, audience sight lines and the concealed illuminated figure beneath it.
Bertrand, Pepper’s Ghost stage arrangement, Le Monde Illustré, 21 January 1865. A historical engraving rather than a performance photograph. Image: Bertrand (no first name given) · Source · Public domain. Bertrand’s 1865 engraving of a Pepper’s Ghost stage arrangement; a historical illustration.; viewing previews may be resized.
Holography & tricky projections / 1862 · Royal Polytechnic Institution, London

Pepper’s Ghost

Score 0

A figure appears on an empty stage, transparent enough for the scenery to show through. Its real source is hidden elsewhere.

TRY THIS

Trace the light from the hidden figure to the glass and then towards the audience. Imagine dimming the hidden figure: its reflection fades while the visible stage stays in view.

FOLLOW THE SOURCES

History, evidence & image credit

THE IMAGE IN THIS ARCHIVE

Through Mirror · original explanatory diagram

Original file & attribution · CC0 1.0

Original explanatory diagram created for Through Mirror. It illustrates the optical principle and is not a photograph of a performance or installation. Gallery previews may be resized or converted to WebP; animated previews show the first frame.

Download image

Phantasmagoria & ghost shows

Explore stage illusions →

Follow the history from projected lantern apparitions to Victorian reflected performers.

Historical engraving showing Robertson’s phantasmagoria, with lantern operators, an apparition and spectators in a dark theatrical setting.

Phantasmagoria — magic-lantern ghost shows

Étienne-Gaspard Robertson and other lantern showmen

Ghosts and skeletons appear in darkness, grow larger and seem to approach the audience. Hidden magic lanterns turn painted slides into an unsettling moving spectacle.

Score 0
Bertrand’s 1865 engraving showing a Pepper’s Ghost stage, audience sight lines and the concealed illuminated figure beneath it.

Victorian ghost shows — Pepper at the Polytechnic

John Henry Pepper; optical arrangement developed with Henry Dircks

A ghost shares the stage with a living actor, then fades away. Victorian ghost shows turned hidden performers and sheets of glass into public spectacles of apparent presence.

Score 0

Frequently asked questions

What is Pepper’s Ghost?

A figure appears on an empty stage, transparent enough for the scenery to show through. Its real source is hidden elsewhere.

What should I look for in Pepper’s Ghost?

Trace the light from the hidden figure to the glass and then towards the audience. Imagine dimming the hidden figure: its reflection fades while the visible stage stays in view.

What explains Pepper’s Ghost?

An angled sheet of clear glass transmits the view of the stage while reflecting a brightly lit figure concealed beside or below it. The audience combines the transmitted scene with the reflected image and sees an apparent figure behind the glass. Carefully controlled lighting hides the glass and the source, and makes the figure appear or disappear.

Another way to see it

Explore this category
Original two-panel diagram showing an object wave and reference wave meeting at a holographic plate, then a developed transmission hologram reconstructing a virtual object for a viewer on its opposite side.

Transmission holography — Optical Interactions

Gary Fisher · Optical Interactions

A flat glass plate reconstructs light from a still life. Move sideways and the objects reveal a different view, as though you were looking through a window.

Score 0
Original reflection-hologram diagram showing a lamp and viewer on the same side of a plate, with selected light returning to the viewer and dashed extensions locating a virtual image behind the plate.

Reflection holography — Cassadaga (Spirit Pond)

Matthew Schreiber · Cassadaga (Spirit Pond)

A lamp illuminates a flat plate and an image appears to occupy depth. The light returns towards the viewer from a recorded structure inside the holographic material.

Score 0
Original comparison of rainbow-hologram viewing: two side-by-side views of a generic sphere show horizontal parallax, while vertically stacked views change from red to green to blue without adding a new vertical perspective.

Rainbow holography — Benton’s Sphere

Stephen A. Benton · Sphere, made at Polaroid

A hologram becomes visible in ordinary white light. Move sideways to explore depth; move vertically and its colour changes through the spectrum.

Score 0
Original plan-view diagram of Pepper’s Ghost: a hidden figure is reflected in angled glass, appearing as a virtual figure on the visible stage.

Pepper’s Ghost