Magic Shadows: The Story of the Origin of Motion PicturesQuigley, Martin
History
Magic Shadows: The Story of the Origin of Motion Pictures
Quigley, Martin
Lantern projection; Motion pictures -- History
Greene had an unhappy, ill-starred life and though not a great
inventor deserved better. About 1899 he made attempts at color motion
pictures, using a rotating lens with a filter, but here again he was
unsuccessful. About 1911 he was brought to the United States to testify
in the motion picture patent suit but he did not impress the American
attorneys representing Edison’s opponents, and he never was called to
the witness stand. About 1915 it was reported that he was destitute and
Will Day, English motion picture expert, and others, organized a relief
fund in his behalf and later he had a minor position with a color
photo-engraving firm. At a dinner in his honor in 1921, just after he
had once again told the story of his pioneer work on motion pictures,
he dropped dead. Apparently his projection efforts were doomed to
failure, because they never were based on sound principles. The double
lens system has never been made to work satisfactorily.
Marey, who was now using strips of coated celluloid for his
instantaneous photographs, sought to devise a suitable projector. This
he accomplished in 1893 with what was perhaps the first efficient
motion picture projector which could handle more than one brief scene,
using long strips of coated celluloid film instead of pictures set on
a disk. In order to obtain sufficient illumination, it used sunlight
instead of an electric arc or other source of light. This limited
Marey’s projector to laboratory use, though as late as 1915 some
experts claimed that sunlight was better than the electric arc for
magic lantern projection.
An available illustration of Marey’s projector shows the path of the
rays which are reflected from the sun by a heliostat. That device
was invented by the Dutch scientist, Willem Jacob, and is simply a
mechanically driven reflector which keeps the light of the sun focused
on a single spot by compensating for the movement of the earth. In
Marey’s projector the sun’s rays are interrupted by a hand driven
shutter wheel and reflected by two mirrors through the film, the light
then passing through the projection lens and throwing the pictures onto
the screen.
“The motion of the film,” Marey wrote, “as it halts at each flash, is
brought about by an apparatus not shown in the figure. It is similar
to that of the simple chronophotographic apparatus (camera), with the
difference that the positive film, having its ends fastened together to
make an endless belt, passes over a series of rollers which stretch it
taut.” This roller system was probably similar to that used by Edison
in his peep-show Kinetoscope.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account