Transcript camera obscura

FILM HISTORY
 No one person created the art of movie
making
 As early as the Renaissance period Italians
(Da Vinci) were experimenting with camera
obscura (dark room)
Camera Obscura
 is an optical device that projects an image of its
surroundings on a screen. It is used in drawing
and for entertainment, and was one of the
inventions that led to photography. The device
consists of a box or room with a hole in one side.
Light from an external scene passes through the
hole and strikes a surface inside where it is
reproduced, upside-down, but with color and
perspective preserved. The image can be
projected onto paper, and can then be traced to
produce a highly accurate representation.
 Using mirrors, as in the 18th century
overhead version, it is possible to project a
right-side-up image.
 jacked from wikipedia
 19th century inventors discovered how to
make lasting copies of the image. This advent
lead to the creation of photography
 In 1820 Englishman William Talbot
experimented with images on paper
negative, trying to “write with light”.
 By 1839 Frenchman Louis Daguerre perfected
the process of reproducing sharp permanent
images on metal plates called
daguerreotypes.
 Inventors experimented with the “persistence
of vision”
 What happens when the retina retains the images
of an object for a fraction of a second in the dark
 Because the view of objects persists, a succession
of till images can appear if properly presented
 Inventors gave devices Greek names like
thumatrope, zoetrope, and phenakistacope
 These were little more than curiosities
 A combination of camera obscura,
persistence of vision, and daguerreotype led
to the creation of motion pictures as we know
it.
So when was the motion
picture invented?
 When this advent occurred is a matter of
debate among film historians.
 As early as 1888, Frenchman Louis Le Prince
produced several strips of film in Britain.
 Little is known of Le Prince. He vanished in 1890
after boarding a train to Paris
In 1881 Thomas Edison’s assistant William K.L.
Dickson used a roll of celluloid film to record
sequential photographs in his Kinetograph
 Perforated edges in film allowed for it to be
lifted and exposed to light frame by frame
 When viewed through a peep-hole device, he
persistence of vision created the illusion of
movement.
 Since peepholes are not film, some credit
Frenchmen August & Louis Lumiere with
creating the motion picture.
 The Lumiere brothers created the
cinematographe.
 The borthers began showing films to
audiences in 1895.
-Georges MeliesFrench Magician
 Fascinated by films’ capacity for trickery and




spectacle.
Was filming traffic in Paris when his machine
jammed.
He fixed it and continued filming.
Later, during playback, he noticed that the
taxi had morphed into a hearse.
Began experiments in stop-motion
photography.
Films of Melies
 A Trip to the Moon (1902)
 The Palace of Arabian Nights (1905)
Lumiere Brothers
 Filmed trains entering and leaving the station
 Film split into reality and fantasy
 It is uncertain who developed each new film
technique
 Early film makers expanded the language of
film (deliberately and trial-and-error).
Edwin S. Porter
American
 Life of an American Airman – built with a
sequence of individual shots.
 The Great Train Robbery – cut between
indoor and outdoor scenes, without playing
each scene out to its dramatic conclusion
(unthinkable on stage).
D. W. Griffith
American
 Discovered innovative uses of close-ups, long
shots, pans, and cross cutting through the
course of his career.
 The Adventures of Dollie (1908)
 Intolerance (1916)
 Film was growing away from its dependence
on staged action to become an independent
art form.
Rise of a New Art Form
 Was considered ‘cheap’ entertainment for the
masses well into WWI
 Most run-of-the-mill leaned heavily on
theatrical models and inexpensive formulas.
 Became more widely accepted by the middle
class as new studios began turning out fulllength features.
Rise of a New Art Form…
 Hollywood moguls got their start during this
time (Carl Cammle, Jack Warner…)
 Shrewd business deals led to the
development of these major studios:
Universal, Paramount, MGM and Warner
Brothers