From the beginning: A Brief History of Film Film Spark:

Ground Rules Coming in and sitting in our assigned seats. Listening to directions clearly. Respecting each other. Being very careful when we use the equipment.

Early Cinema No one person invented cinema. However, in 1891 the Edison Company in the USA successfully demonstrated a prototype of the Kinetoscope, which enabled one person at a time to view moving pictures. The first to present projected moving pictures to a paying audience (i.e. cinema) were the Lumière brothers in December 1895 in Paris.At first, films were very short, sometimes only a few minutes or less. They were in black and white and had no color.

Rise of the Film Industry By 1914, several national film industries were established. Europe, Russia and Scandinavia were as important as America. Films became longer, and storytelling, or narrative, became the dominant form.As more people paid to see movies, the industry which grew around them was prepared to invest more money in their production, distribution and exhibition, so large studios were established and special cinemas built. The First World War greatly limited the film industry in Europe, and the American industry grew in relative importance.

The addition of color Color was first added to black-and-white movies through tinting, toning and stencilling(colored in). By 1906, the principles of color separation were used to produce so-called ‘natural color’ moving images with the British Kinemacolor process, first presented to the public in 1909.

The Addition of Sound The first feature-length movie incorporating synchronised dialogue, The Jazz Singer (USA, 1927), used the Warner Brothers’ Vitaphone system, which employed a separate record disc with each reel of film for the sound.This system proved unreliable and was soon replaced by an optical, variable density soundtrack recorded photographically along the edge of the film.

The Camera through the Years The Standard Cinematograph Type 2709 hand-cranked camera (used in early silent films, used 35 mm film and individual lens to go from wide shots to closeups. Also made of hard metal, the material of its time.

1980’s VHS Camcorders Transforming into a digital format, the Beta camcorder recorded on a VHS tape. New camera technology allowed one lens to switch focus from wide shots to close-ups.

The Red One was Red Digital Cinema’s first production camera and is what is used today. Able to shoot in 1080p and 4K picture resolution, which is the highest picture quality seen in iMAX movie theaters. The Red One has been reviewed as having effectively the same quality as 35mm film. The Red One was made out of cast iron and the body alone weighs in at 10lbs (4.5kg). Footage is digital captured on memory disks so no more film reels or tapes making it easier to put footage on the computer for editing. The Red One

Part 2: Hollywood

Hollywood The town started around 1853 as a very small area in what is now Los Angeles, California. During the 1870's, an agricultural community formed around the community. The city quickly grew over time. In 1902 the Hollywood Hotel was built that is now the Kodak Theatre and home to the Academy Awards. Hollywood was an independent city for a while in 1903, but primarily because of a lack of water, it was forced to become part of Los Angeles in 1910.

Why Go There? While electric lights existed at that time, the best source of light for filming came from natural sunlight and Southern California had plenty of it along with moderate dry climates, and a variety of natural scenery for creating different movie scenes without needing to relocate for filming which was costly. Places ranging from Africa to Alaska could all be filmed in one city.Another reason film studios originally moved to Hollywood was that it was far away from New Jersey that at the time had a monopoly of over the entire film industry. This was because Thomas Edison had a motion picture patent for his Kinetoscope in 1897 and they were actively suing other studios that were using a similar technology. The Kinetoscope is considered to be the first motion picture machine.

The Famous Sign The now famous "Hollywood Sign" was put up in 1923 with very big letters that could be seen from a distance. It originally read "Hollywoodland" to advertise a new housing development in the hills above it. It used to be lit up by 4,000 light bulbs and would flash in segments to draw attention. In 1949, the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce took over the sign and removed the "land" part to reflect the city more and not the housing development group. They also removed the lights from it.

The Golden Age of Hollywood The Golden era, about 1927, to around 1948, the Hollywood movie studio system controlled what films were shown across the country. Five major Hollywood-area studios owned large, grand theaters where they would show only movies produced by their studios and made with their contracted actors. These studios were Paramount, RKO, 20th Century Fox, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), and Warner Bro Also known as the Golden Age of Hollywood, stars had little choice but to contract with those studios. Among these leading men and ladies were: John Wayne(left), Clark Gable(center), Judy Garland(right).

Hollywood Today Hollywood has been through a lot of changes. While the studios have relocated to other Los Angeles areas, most motion picture production still occurs within the district. Other parts of production industries such as film editing, effects, props, post-production, and lighting companies remain in Hollywood. The only movie studio remaining in Hollywood today, however, is Paramount Studio Walk of Fame Academy Awards Editing studios