The beginning of cinematography is somewhat debatable but most will agree that it can be traced back to October of 1888 when a man named Louis Le Prince would record The Roundhay Garden Scene it was filmed at 12 frames per second with a sixteen lense camera and only lasted for 2 seconds.
Although the film is to say the least "short" it would be the starting point for the moving picture and the Art of photography in film.
Something very mysterious would happen to Le Prince however when in September of 1890 while on a train from Dijon to Paris to patent his invention, he would disappear without a trace! He had planned to patent his camera in Paris and then continue on to New York to give a demonstration of his new invention.
An extensive search would be conducted but nothing would turn up that is until 2003 when a photograph of a drowning victim who had been pulled from the Seine river around the same time of Le Prince's disappearance would surface.
Although no positive Id was ever made on the drowning victim he does bear a striking resemblance to Le Prince.
Around the time of Le Prince's disappearance Thomas Edison had been working on a similar camera and the race was on to get a patent on the invention.
The two sides, Le Prince's family and Edison would wind up in court in a dispute over patent rights in a case that would become known as Equity 6928.
Both sides would plead their case but in 1908 Edison would be awarded the patent(in the U.
S) for the invention of the motion picture.
Another mysterious event would happen to a member of the Le Prince family when Louis's son Adolphe, who had testified in the case was found shot to death on Fire Island, New York.
The assailant(s) were never caught.
The next step would be to take this new invention and begin using it in a creative and entertaining way, and that way would be the Silent Movie.
A good starting point for silent films is D.
W Griffith's 1915 landmark movie The Birth Of A Nation (Director D.
W Griffith, Cinematographer G.
W Blitzer).
The film would be based on the U.
S Civil War(1861-1865) with an emphasis placed on the root cause of the war slavery but the way that African-Americans were portrayed in the film would unleash a tidal wave of controversy.
Riots broke out in Philadelphia and Boston and other cities such as Chicago and Kansas City refused to show the film due to it's racists overtones.
This front page publicity only added to people's curiosity about the movie and they were willing to pay the $2.
00 for the price of a ticket to see what all the uproar was about.
The film would be a huge success taking in over $10 million on a budget of $110, 000.
The Birth Of A Nation would also be the testing ground for some new techniques in cinematography for example Deep Focus which keeps objects near and far in a shot in focus also the Facial Closeup which can be used as a dramatic effect to show emotions.
The movie would be shot on 35mm film using the Pathe camera and be filmed mainly in the Southern California area.
The film to this very day still stirs up controversy but it also serves to show the hatred that is bred through ignorant thinking and that humans are not commodities that are to be bought and sold and treated worse than animals.
I don't know if this was the message that D.
W Griffith intended but it certainly should have been.
Another film that would break new ground in cinematography would be the 1927 Silent movie Wings (Directed by William A.
Wellman, Cinematographer Harry Perry).
The film is the story of two men competing for the affection of the same woman and the unexpected friendship that develops between the two men as they become comrade in arms while serving in the Army Air Corp during World War 1.
William and Perry did a fantastic job with the aerial photography scenes, using the Eyemo camera and 35mm film they were able to give a realistic sense of aerial combat this was complemented by the Thomas Morse MB3 and Curtis Pw8 aircraft that were used.
These open cockpit planes allowed the cameraman to get great closeup shots of the intensity on the pilots faces as they faced their enemy.
One of the interesting things about this film is that the two main characters David Armstrong (Played by Richard Arlen) and Jack Powell (Played by Charles "Buddy" Rogers) both did their own flying scenes.
Arlen was an experienced pilot who had flown in World War 1 and Rogers who had no previous flight experience was given flying lessons as the film was being produced.
The movie was filmed on location at Kelly Field in San Antonio, Texas between Sept of 1926 and April of 1927 and premiered at the Criterion Theater in New York City on August 12th, 1927.
Wings is the 1st motion picture to have ever received the Academy Award (now known as the Oscar) for Best Motion Picture and is the only Silent film to have ever won that award.
The Birth Of A Nation and Wings are two fine examples of the early strides that were made in cinematography and they also showed that people were willing to spend their hard earned money to be entertained.
These early pioneers of the Motion Picture were on to something, and before long, the advancement of technology would take their ideas to a whole new level.
In part 2 we'll look at the merger of sound into the full length motion picture and two early films that used sound and had an impact on the Motion Picture Industry, The Jazz Singer (1927) and All Quiet On The Western Front (1930).
Although the film is to say the least "short" it would be the starting point for the moving picture and the Art of photography in film.
Something very mysterious would happen to Le Prince however when in September of 1890 while on a train from Dijon to Paris to patent his invention, he would disappear without a trace! He had planned to patent his camera in Paris and then continue on to New York to give a demonstration of his new invention.
An extensive search would be conducted but nothing would turn up that is until 2003 when a photograph of a drowning victim who had been pulled from the Seine river around the same time of Le Prince's disappearance would surface.
Although no positive Id was ever made on the drowning victim he does bear a striking resemblance to Le Prince.
Around the time of Le Prince's disappearance Thomas Edison had been working on a similar camera and the race was on to get a patent on the invention.
The two sides, Le Prince's family and Edison would wind up in court in a dispute over patent rights in a case that would become known as Equity 6928.
Both sides would plead their case but in 1908 Edison would be awarded the patent(in the U.
S) for the invention of the motion picture.
Another mysterious event would happen to a member of the Le Prince family when Louis's son Adolphe, who had testified in the case was found shot to death on Fire Island, New York.
The assailant(s) were never caught.
The next step would be to take this new invention and begin using it in a creative and entertaining way, and that way would be the Silent Movie.
A good starting point for silent films is D.
W Griffith's 1915 landmark movie The Birth Of A Nation (Director D.
W Griffith, Cinematographer G.
W Blitzer).
The film would be based on the U.
S Civil War(1861-1865) with an emphasis placed on the root cause of the war slavery but the way that African-Americans were portrayed in the film would unleash a tidal wave of controversy.
Riots broke out in Philadelphia and Boston and other cities such as Chicago and Kansas City refused to show the film due to it's racists overtones.
This front page publicity only added to people's curiosity about the movie and they were willing to pay the $2.
00 for the price of a ticket to see what all the uproar was about.
The film would be a huge success taking in over $10 million on a budget of $110, 000.
The Birth Of A Nation would also be the testing ground for some new techniques in cinematography for example Deep Focus which keeps objects near and far in a shot in focus also the Facial Closeup which can be used as a dramatic effect to show emotions.
The movie would be shot on 35mm film using the Pathe camera and be filmed mainly in the Southern California area.
The film to this very day still stirs up controversy but it also serves to show the hatred that is bred through ignorant thinking and that humans are not commodities that are to be bought and sold and treated worse than animals.
I don't know if this was the message that D.
W Griffith intended but it certainly should have been.
Another film that would break new ground in cinematography would be the 1927 Silent movie Wings (Directed by William A.
Wellman, Cinematographer Harry Perry).
The film is the story of two men competing for the affection of the same woman and the unexpected friendship that develops between the two men as they become comrade in arms while serving in the Army Air Corp during World War 1.
William and Perry did a fantastic job with the aerial photography scenes, using the Eyemo camera and 35mm film they were able to give a realistic sense of aerial combat this was complemented by the Thomas Morse MB3 and Curtis Pw8 aircraft that were used.
These open cockpit planes allowed the cameraman to get great closeup shots of the intensity on the pilots faces as they faced their enemy.
One of the interesting things about this film is that the two main characters David Armstrong (Played by Richard Arlen) and Jack Powell (Played by Charles "Buddy" Rogers) both did their own flying scenes.
Arlen was an experienced pilot who had flown in World War 1 and Rogers who had no previous flight experience was given flying lessons as the film was being produced.
The movie was filmed on location at Kelly Field in San Antonio, Texas between Sept of 1926 and April of 1927 and premiered at the Criterion Theater in New York City on August 12th, 1927.
Wings is the 1st motion picture to have ever received the Academy Award (now known as the Oscar) for Best Motion Picture and is the only Silent film to have ever won that award.
The Birth Of A Nation and Wings are two fine examples of the early strides that were made in cinematography and they also showed that people were willing to spend their hard earned money to be entertained.
These early pioneers of the Motion Picture were on to something, and before long, the advancement of technology would take their ideas to a whole new level.
In part 2 we'll look at the merger of sound into the full length motion picture and two early films that used sound and had an impact on the Motion Picture Industry, The Jazz Singer (1927) and All Quiet On The Western Front (1930).
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