History of Moving Image

Optical Toys Some of the first forms of using time as a tool in art were seen in the development of childrenʼs toys, such as the thaumatrope, phenakisticope, and praxinoscope.

Created in 1826 by John Ayrton Paris, the thaumatrope was a round card on a string that had a picture on each side and when spun would animate the images.

Optical Toys In 1832, Belgian physicist, Joseph Plateau, invented the phenakisticope which was a slotted revolving disc with a sequence of painted images that when spun in front of a mirror and peered through revealed a mini animation.

Optical Toys Emile Reynaud developed the praxinoscope in 1877. It used a candle, box, drum, and mirrors to create the illusion of moving images. Similar to the phenakisticope, it involved a sequence of painted images reflected by a mirror and viewed through a slot. The difference was that this was a strip of images placed in a drum that one would spin and view through one stationary slot. He later expanded this invention into a projecting device he called the “Theatre Opitque,” which was very similar to a modern movie projector.

Photography Photography was another early invention of recording time and space. French physicist, Joseph Niepce, took the earliest known photograph in 1826. He achieved this by experimenting with sunlight, glass plates, and chemicals. The photograph required an extremely long exposure time of fourteen hours before the image could be recorded.

In 1839, Louis Jacques Daguerre and Henry Fox Talbot, simultaneously experimented with speeding up this process and ended up recording the images on silver-plates and creating a chemical solution that made several copies of one exposure. Exposure times were reduced to a few seconds and this lead to the advancement of modern photography and film.

Photography In 1872, according to legend, Leland Stanford, U.S. tycoon, bet $25,000 that a galloping horseʼs four hooves leave the ground all at one time. He called upon known photographer, Eadweard Muybridge to prove this spectacle true. Muybridge attached twelve strings to twelve cameras along a racetrack and as the horse raced down the track it pulled on the strings triggering the cameras one by one to create a sequence of a fast-moving subject. He continued these motion studies with humans and animals with an improved and more accurate process by doubling the number of strings and cameras and angles. Muybridgeʼs studies helped lead to the first movies.

Photography Double Jump, 1885, Another Motion Study Optical Print Thomas Eakins

Photography and Motion Pictures American dry-plate manufacturer, George Eastman, put the power of photography into the hands of the public by introducing the box Kodak camera with flexible light- sensitive celluloid film in 1889.

Thomas A. Edison then set Eastmanʼs film rolls into motion in 1891, with the first motion picture camera, the kinetograph. It had a sprocket and the film had holes punched in either side of it. An electric motor turned the sprocket, which would hook the perforations on the film and pull it through the camera.

Motion Pictures This lead to the invention of the “Cinematographe” and creation of thousands of short films by Louis Lumiere and brother August Lumiere. In 1895 they combined a camera, projector, and printer to create this hand-cranked invention utilizing the strong lamp and lens function and shutter-and-film reel mechanism. Most of their films were real-life footage or news events from around the world.

Motion Pictures During the same time period George Melies developed his own “Cinematographe” and was the first to explore the possibilities of film beyond simply recording reality. By an accidental camera jam, he discovered the magical transformation capabilities of stop-motion photography. He was also the first to use dissolves and double exposures. In 1902, Melies produced the unforgettable science fiction classic “A Trip to the Moon,” using numerous special effects and fantastical treatments. I find this an interesting evolution of the visual moving narrative before digital technology. Artists explore the possibilities of whatever medium they have available at that time.

Animation Shortly after this film revolution, in 1906, a film was shot of a J. Stuart Blackton vaudeville act where letters, words, and faces came to life drawn on a chalkboard by an unseen hand. This first animated cartoon is called “Humorous Phases of Funny Faces.” A few years later, the then renowned newspaper comic artist, Winsor McKay, created the first successful animated cartoons. He animated thousands of drawings and made characters come to life like “Gertie the Dinosaur” and “Little Nemo.”

Animation The field of animation was rapidly advancing. One of the most important inventions was that of cel animation in 1914 by John R. Bray and Earl Hurd. This created a much simpler way to make a cartoon than drawing the same image over and over. Drawing different parts of a cartoon on different sheets of celluloid saves production time. An animator only has to draw each section once and can animate particular sections instead having to re-animate the entire drawing with each new frame.

Animation The next most monumental achievements in animation were by Walt Disney throughout the 1920ʼs and 1930ʼs. He rendered smoother frame actions, created more depth through his multi-plane camera setup, synchronized music, sound, and dialogue, and included color.

In the 60ʼs and 70ʼs, animators really began to experiment. Caroline Leaf created sand animations, Frank Mouris explored collage, and Will Vinton made claymation.

Title SequencesIt was not until the 1950 s and 1960 s that artists began to explore the combination of time with letterform. Innovators such as Saul Bass, Norman McLaren, and Pablo Ferro used animation techniques to hand-render seamless compositions of type and image for television and film. In the late 1950 s Saul Bass designed title sequences for “Anatomy of a Murder”, “The Man With the Golden Arm”, “Psycho” and “Vertigo.” He created them with the idea that the film begins with the first frame and needs to grab the audience s attention and establish the mood of the film.

Title Sequences Another innovative moving type designer worth mentioning is Pablo Ferro. He brought his talents to this new field in the 1960ʼs. He was known for his ʻquick cutʼ style which consisted of a fast-paced barrage of exploding type and imagery. He did the title sequence for “Dr. Strangelove” and some say he is the ʻFather of MTV,” with the influence of his rapid-fire style.

Video ArtAlso during the 1960 s, video technology became available to the common man through the Sony Portapak video camera. Artists could now afford a new medium that could alter time right before your eyes. It expanded the possibilities of the narrative producing linear and non-linear works. It could be used to extend, repeat,fast forward, slow down, speed up and stop time.