Cine 201 8/27

1895 “birth year” of movie

Scientific impulses instead of interest in new form of storytelling


PRE CINEMA EXPERIMENTS

  • Optical principles and toys

    • Based on scientific principles, developed by scientists

    • Persistence of vision, flicker fusion

      • How brain retains images

    • Phi Phenomenon, or stroboscopic effect

      • How human eye sees individual parts as a whole when moving at a certain speed

      • Thaumatrope (1825), Phenakistoscope (1823), Zoetrope (1834)

  • Series photography

    • Capturing live movement continuously

    • 2 main people: Eadweard Muybridge (1878), Etienne Jules Marey (1882) she used one single camera

    • Chronophotographic Gun

  • Glass Plate Photography

  • Celluloid roll film

    • Slightly less bulky and time consuming

    • Reverend Hannibal Goodwin

    • George Eastmans Kodak roll-film hand camera

      • 1892: Eastman Kodak Company

    • 1889: mass production of celluloid roll film

  • Motion Pictures

    • Thomas Edison and WKL Dickson

  • 1891: Kinetograph and Kinetoscope

    • First motion picture camera

    • Used celluloid roll film

    • Kinetoscope: Individual viewing machines

      • No public screenings

      • watch through a peephole

    • 1893-1985- Black Maria, films for edison and Kinetoscope parlors

  • 1895: American Mutoscope and biograph company

CINEMA DEVELOPMENTS

  • 1895: image quality and film breakage

    • Latham Loop

      • Rolled film would loop around the machine in a steady pace to prevent tearing

      • No tears = longer takes

      • C. Francis Kenkins and Thomas Armats improved loop system

    • 1896: Edison Vitascope Projector

    • Robert W. Pauls Theatographc (Animatograph)

    • Skladanowsky Brothers Boiskop and public screenings

    • Lumiere brothers: Cinematograph camera

      • Portable camera

      • All in one camera, film printer and projector

CINEMA AND “NARRATIVE"

  • 1985-1907 Brighton School

    • Exploration of mechanical and aesthetic capabilities

    • Innovations of the close up shot and intercutting/cross-cutting

  • George Melies (1896)

    • Helped establish a longer film run time

      • a few minutes → 10-15 minutes

    • Used an animatograph

    • Established Star Film Company

    • 1897-1913 studio and 500 films

      • A trip to the moon (1902)

  • Alice Guy-Blache

    • 1896: first woman to direct films

    • 1896-19087: Gaumont

    • Screenwriter,

  • Edwin S. Porter

    • Join Edison in 1900

    • 1903: developed cutting between scenes

      • Life of an American Fireman

      • The Great Train Robbery

    • Nickelodeon era and one reeler standard

      • White sheets and showing movies

      • Cost one nickel to get in

  • Tom Gunning “Cinema of attractions”(1895-1906)

    • Deliberate and transparent play to the camera/viewer to “attract”

      • “Breaking fourth wall”

    • Came from Vaudeville (live entertainment shows)

    • Relevance to present day image making/displaying platforms

      • Short form content

      • People performing for camera (social media)



  • 1986-1908 “technological phase”

  • 1908-1916 “uplift” phase

    • Contained some nudity

    • Backlash from religious groups

    • Had to adjust storytelling and mural/cultural legitimacy

    • Concept of film censorship issues developed

      • Certain film rules in different states

    • Cinema work culture became more collaborative in terms of gender

      • “Film industry offered women opportunities that existed in no other workplace”

        • Directors, writers, actors

  • 1916-1928: “Big business” phase

    • Professionalization of movie making

    • Hollywood


LOIS WEBER

  • Her and her husband: “The Smalleys”

    • Co directors and co actors

  • 1914-1914: one/two reel- films

  • 1914-1916: Multiple reel films (30 mins or longer) and solo directorial efforts

  • First female honorary member of Motion Picture Directors Association

  • 1917-1918: Lois Weber Production (via Universal)

  • 1919-1920: Contracts w/ Louis B Mayer and Famous Players-Lasky

  • Early 1920s: box office decline and last Lois Weber productions feature