Film and media studies slides 2015-16 Mrs Hill CCA

“....WHENTHE FIRST IMAGE PERISHES AND
A SECOND ISTHEN PRODUCED IN
ANOTHER POSITION,THE FORMER SEEMS
TO HAVE ALTERED ITS POSE. OF COURSE
THIS MUST BE SUPPOSEDTOTAKE PLACE
VERY SWIFTLY; SO GREAT ISTHEIR
VELOCITY, SO GREATTHE STORE OF
PARTICLES IN ANY SINGLE MOMENT OF
SENSATIONTO ENABLETHE SUPPLYTO
COME UP”
Titus Lucretius Carus
98-55 BC
Saturday, August 29, 15

FATHER ATHANASIUS KIRCHER
Invented the Magic Lantern in 1646 in theory. It was a drawing of a box that could reproduce
images by a means passing through a lens. First working model was created by
Christiaan Huygens 1659
The ﬁrst images produced by the Magic Lantern were pictures of The Devil.

EADWEARD MUYBRIDGE
First to break a continuous action into discrete photographic units in 1872. He invented the
“Zoopraxiscope” which means “life-constructing viewer” in Greek. He mounted his photos on a
wheel and used the magic lantern to project the images on the wall.

EMILE REYNAUD
Invented the Praxinoscope in 1877 and combined it with the magic lantern, mirrors and
sequential paintings.The miniature paintings were painted on long transparent strips of paper and
rolled on to a reel.

THOMAS ALVA EDISON 1847-1931
Famous inventor-businessman and considered the “Father of the Movies.”After seeing Muybridge’s
Zoopraxiscope, he begin to work on a device that he described as “....doing for the eye what the
phonograph does for the ear.” His lab workers actually invented the ﬁrst “motion pictures” but he
used the concept with his phonograph and a projector to create one and two cylinder machines that
held both images and music and turned in sync in 1890.

GEORGE EASTMAN AND WILLIAM HEISE
Eastman perfected celluloid film and mass produced it naming his company Eastman Kodak Company
in 1892. William Heise built a camera that used Eastman’s celluloid film and ran horizontally through
the camera.When Edison saw it he secured the patents and rights to the first movie camera.
George Eastman on left and one of the first movies by Heise called “The Kiss” 1896.

THE KINETOSCOPE
From the Greek meaning “motion writer.” Patented and mass produced by Edison. He opened the
ﬁrst Kinetoscope Parlors in America in 1894. People would put a nickel into a slot in the side of
the machine and watch one of Heise’s little movies.They lasted only about 20-30 seconds and were
ﬁlm strips of famous people, animals, clowns, staged events or people dancing or moving.

THE BLACK MARIA
The first movie studio,West Orange, New Jersey 1893. Owned by
Edison, Heise filmed the first studio film here called
“Blacksmithing Scene”

THE LUMIERE BROTHERS
Auguste and Louis Lumiere began experimenting with Edison’s Kinetoscope and developed their own
machine within a year. Unlike Edison’s that was restricted to indoors the brothers invented a portable
camera that could be carried anywhere.Also even more important the same machine that shot the
pictures also printed and projected them.They called it the Cinematographe and in 1895 they
ﬁlmed their ﬁrst movie called,“Workers leaving the Factory.”

GEORGES MELIES
A magician by trade, Melies was fascinated by the idea that the camera could start and stop and start
again. He developed “stop-motion photography” an effect achieved in the camera rather than by
cutting the ﬁlm. Melies combined his love for magic and the technology of the moving camera to
make movies creative and enjoyable beyond the marvel of technology. One of his most famous
movies is “ATrip to the Moon” 1902.

EDWIN S. PORTER
Porter was one of the first to move the camera, show time transitions, use close-ups, build scenes out
of multiple shots and create a real narrative story line. One of his later films “The GreatTrain
Robbery,” 1903, created an interplay between filmed event and mental connection. It was the most
popular movie until 1912. The GreatTrain Robbery made the audience ask,“what will happen next?
who did it? and how will the hero get out of that?”The final scene is a close up of a bandit shooting at
the camera.

CECIL MILTON HEPWORTH
“Rescued by Rover” 1905 ﬁrst use of “plan-sequencing” the
complicated blocking of a lengthy shot.

FILM TIMELINE
• The Kiss- William Heise 1896
• ATrip to the Moon- Georges Melies 1902
• The GreatTrain Robbery- Edwin Porter 1903
• Rescued by Rover- Cecil Hepworth 1905

FILMTERMS
• the shot- the unit of film
• unity of action- a succession of images that produces the desired narrative continuity, the intended
meaning and the appropriate emotional tension.
• auteur- the director, producer or writer whose work expresses the complete vision of the film or group
of films.
• celluloid- transparent material chemically derived from cellulose; cut into strips to be used as film sheets
called cels
• close-up- a shot whose field of view is very narrow; in terms of the human figure a face or hand will fill
the entire frame.
• plan sequence or sequence shot- a scene that is covered in a single long take whose camera
movements are, in most cases, intricately blocked.
• stop action photography- also known as stop motion; stopping the camera, making a change or
letting a change happen in the action area and then restarting the camera, creating what appears to be
continuous shot within which everything suddenly shifts position or something is changed into something
else.

BIOGRAPH VS VITAGRAPH
The Business wars begin.While filming a fight, a fight
breaks out among the filmmakers.

The Nickelodeon is Born
* originally movies were shown in Kineticscope
machines inVaudeville theaters or amusement arcades
*In 1902 a Los Angeles entrepreneur opened the ﬁrst
theater “Thomas L.Tally’s ElectricTheater. This was
the ﬁrst permanent movie theater in the U.S.
* In 1905 a Pittsburgh theater showed its movies
with an upscale lounge area and live piano music.
Customers paid a “nickel” for the night.
* Nickel theaters or Nickelodeons were so popular
that in 1908 they were serving 80 million viewers a week
in 5000 theaters.

FILMTERMS
full reel- 1000 feet of 35 mm film. 16 frames per foot. It takes 16.67 minutes to project the reel.
However, today a full reel is actually 2000 feet.
reel of sound- the sound that is mixed and edited to to go with the film.
* Films are still measured in reels.
Three level structure of the film industry- The early Nickelodeons required about 6 films
of one or one-half reel a week. In order to keep customers coming back there was a lot of turn over
and the theater owners had no interest in owning the films, just renting. This created the 3 level
structure of the film industry. The film producer made the film, a middle-man or distributor who bought
the film or leased it from the producer.This middle man made sure the film got the most effective
circulation to the public.The last person in the structure is the exhibitor. He showed it in his theater
and made money.
That structure is still basically the same today.

Film d’Art
In 1907 French film companies intended to use
the film strip to record famous artists, actors,
dancers, musicians, composers and playwrights of
the day. The first Film d’Art shown in America was
“Queen Elizabeth” 1912 featuring Sarah Bernhardt.

Film and media studies slides 2015-16 Mrs Hill CCA

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Film and media studies slides 2015-16 Mrs Hill CCA