A2 Unit 3

Research Project: Spectatorship and Early Cinema

What we will look at

The Historical development of primitive and early cinema The pioneers of early cinema The development of film form from primitive to recognisable to the modern audience Technological developments Development of national cinemas Industrialisation of film

How did Film develop?

The cinema developed out of the experiments of a group of individuals from pre-existing technologies. Photography The Camera Obscura The Fantasmagorie

The Camera Obscura

Magic Lanterns & Fantasmogorie

The First Photograph and the Dauerrotype

The first permanent photograph was an image produced in 1825 by the French inventor Nicphore Nipce. Working in conjunction with Louis Daguerre, they experimented with silver compounds based on a Johann Heinrich Schultz discovery in 1724 that a silver and chalk mixture darkens when exposed to light. Nipce died in 1833, but Daguerre continued the work, eventually culminating with the development of the daguerreotype in 1837. Daguerre took the first ever photo of a person in 1839 when, while taking a daguerreotype of a Paris street, a pedestrian stopped for a shoe shine, long enough to be captured by the long exposure (several minutes).

Louis Daguerre

William Fox Talbot

Muybridges Horse

commissioned by the governor of California in 1872 to see if a horse ever had all of its feet off the ground at any one time.

George Eastmen & Film

Many advances in photographic glass plates and printing were made through the nineteenth century. In 1884, George Eastman developed the technology of film to replace photographic plates, leading to the technology used by film cameras today.

 Etienne Marey - Chronophotographic Camera and Pull down mechanism W.K.L. Dickinson - Realised by punching sprocket holes in Eastmans film and by using Mareys pull down mechanism system he could create moving images by capturing them on film. He Developed the Kinetograph an early camera and the Kinetoscope an early projector to view them on. Thomas Edison - Realised the commercial value of making films for exhibition and built the Black Maria an early film studio that was fixed on wheels so that it could turn and catch the

Other Key Names

Kinetoscope

Kinetograph

The Black Maria

Vaudeville

Edison used performers from Vaudeville or theatre acts for his productions which were now in high demand.

Edison kinetoscope films 1894 -1896

Lumiere Bros Actualities

The Lumiere Bros patented a dual camera and projector in 1895. They were the first to present projected, moving photographic pictures to a paying audience in the same year At first, films were very short, sometimes only a few minutes. They were shown at fairgrounds, music halls or anywhere a screen could be set up and a room darkened. Subjects included views of foreign lands, short comedies and events considered newsworthy. The films were accompanied by lecturers, music and a lot of audience participation - although they did not have synchronized dialogue they were not 'silent' as they are sometimes described

The Lumiere Brothers' - First films (1895)

International development.
By the end of 1896 the Lumieres cinematographie was being used across Europe, Russia and India. In the next two years its use had spread across the world. The reason for this was financial at the time film was cheap to make and increasingly popular as audiences would watch films more than once.

Drama and the Development of the Fantasy Film

George Albert Smith & James A Williamson (The Brighton School) Development of Film Language

George Albert Smith

James Williamson

George Melies - The Conjuror 1899

Georges Mlis (December 8, 1861 January 21, 1938) was a French filmmaker famous for leading many technical and narrative developments in the earliest cinema.

He was very innovative in the use of special effects. He accidentally discovered the stop trick, or substitution, in 1896, and was one of the first filmmakers to use multiple exposures, time-lapse photography, dissolves, and hand-painted color in his films.

An Impossible voyage 1904

Transformation of Primitive Cinema Films developed on from the early

actualities Audience expectation changed as they grew used to film, building a demand for more complex films Development from the real/documentary to drama and fantasy Film language develops so that by the early 1900s we already have recognisable codes and conventions (close-ups etc)

Tasks
Write up notes onto blog Look at a film by Cecil Hepworth or Edward S Porter. What differences do you see in their films from the early films that we have looked at? Divide your findings into two headings 1. Story 2. Techniques Put your findings onto your blog with a clip from youtube from the relevant film.

 By 1914, several national film industries were established. Europe, Russia and Scandinavia were as important as America.

Growth of National Film Industries

Films became longer and story telling, or narrative, became the dominant form. As more people paid to see movies, the industry that grew around them was prepared to invest more money in their production, distribution and exhibition - large studios were established and special theatres built.

The FirstWorld War disrupted the film industry in Europe, and the American industry grew in relative importance.

The first thirty years of cinema were characterized by the growth and consolidation of an industrial base, the establishment of the narrative form and refinement of technology. (Light weight mobile cameras, lighting,