English by birth (1830), Eadweard Muybridge moved to New York in 1850 where he worked as a bookseller. In San Francisco, he opened a bookstore and began to take an interest in photography in 1860 and learned the technique that was in use at the time. His photos of the coasts of California, Yosemite and the growing city of San Francisco, as well as Alaska, the west side of Canada and Central America reveal his sensitivity and his artistic nature.

He took his life with passion and an adventurous spirit; however, his long seasons away from home caused his wife to have a lover. He searched for his rival (Harry Larkins), traveled great distances, found him and killed him in 1874. He was tried for his crime and declared innocent; the jury ruled justified homicide despite the fact that, in his own defense, Muybridge himself pointed out his guilt.

Leland Stanford, his friend, and sponsor of his inventions paid Muybridge's defense at his trial and helped Muybridge travel to Central America and leave behind that dark episode. The Pacific Mail Steamship Co. sponsored his trip with the aim of photographing these unexplored lands and encouraging travel and investment in the region. That is maybe why many of his shots in Guatemala focus on the coffee growing cycle. Las Nubes, the coffee farm of William Nelson, a commercial agent in Guatemala of the Pacific Mail Steamship Co., was one of the most photographed sites.

He was in Guatemala for six months, had the unconditional support of President Justo Rufino Barrios and then he returned to San Francisco with 260 photos of different countries of the isthmus. He also made stereographic postcards and created albums of 120 images that he put on sale for $ 100 each.

At the end of his life, Muybridge returned to his hometown in England, Kingston upon Thames, where he died in 1894. Since 1904, his house became a museum that exhibits his work.