early film industry

Early films were shown in France in 1895 using a movie projector invented by the Lumière brothers. At first, footage of simple scenes was shot and provided to the audience. After that, feature films were produced and the film industry developed rapidly. The early film industry developed primarily in the United States, with Hollywood as the center of the film industry.

silent movies

During the 1910s and 1920s, films were produced as silent films. Due to the absence of voice, the film’s music played an important role. In the movie theater, live musicians played music from the film to entertain the audience. During this period, film studios were established and film production improved dramatically.

talkie movie

In 1927, the American film studio Warner Bros. produced a movie with sound, The Jazz Singer. The film was a huge success and became known as a talkie film. Talkies add sound to movies to make the movie experience more realistic.

color movie

In the 1930s, movies began to be produced in color. The first color movies were produced with a technique called Technicolor. Color movies were able to make the experience of cinema more realistic and give films a deeper feeling.

modern film industry

The modern film industry has dramatically changed due to technological advances. Evolving. Today, CGI (computer graphics) and 3D technology are used in film production, making it possible to express more realistic images. In addition, with the spread of digital cinema, the methods of film production, distribution, and screening have changed significantly. “Streaming services” that distribute movies via the Internet have also appeared, and the ways to watch movies are diversifying. The film industry is developing as a big business. Film production and advertising costs can be huge, and film companies can make big profits. In addition, taking advantage of the popularity of movies, goods sales and movie-related events are also actively held.

Movie roles are more than just entertainment. Films also play a role in conveying social and cultural messages, such as films that address social issues and films that depict historical events. In addition, since movies can be seen all over the world, they are also used as a means of cultural exchange. The movie industry will continue to evolve. With the introduction of new technology and the production of more diverse works, the way we enjoy movies will expand even further. However, it is necessary to convey the appeal of movies to more people without forgetting the important role of movies, which is to convey social and cultural messages summary

So far, I have introduced the history and evolution of the film industry. Films are constantly changing due to the evolution of technology, production methods, and visual expression. In modern times, movies are produced using CGI and 3D technology, and with the spread of digital movies, the methods of producing, distributing, and showing movies are changing dramatically. Movies are not just entertainment, they also play a role in conveying social and cultural messages. Through movies, you can learn about different cultures and histories and make new discoveries. In addition, since movies can be seen all over the world, they are also used as a means of cultural exchange.

The film industry will continue to evolve. With the introduction of new technology and the production of more diverse works, the way we enjoy movies will expand even further. However, it is necessary to convey the appeal of movies to more people without forgetting the important role of movies, which is to convey social and cultural messages. Also, many people are involved in the film industry from production to screening. In addition to directors and actors, there are many types of jobs such as screenwriters, film crews, editors, and music staff. Movie theaters, distribution companies, and film-related companies also play a role in the film industry. However, the movie industry has been hit hard by the impact of the corona misfortune. There were many restrictions, such as closing movie theaters, canceling film production, and changing screening schedules. However, the film industry is facing new challenges such as new formats of film screening and online distribution. Movies are an entertainment that gives people dreams and hopes. Many people can come together and share their emotions through movies. The movie industry will continue to evolve and be enjoyed by more people.

The post Development of the Film Industry: Its History and Future appeared first on Dream&West.

Today, to shoot three-dimensional images, two cameras are used at once, which are placed close enough to each other and at the same height. Both cameras are shot simultaneously, thereby creating a three-dimensional image.

A revolution in the film industry has revived interest in creating three-dimensional movies, and Dolby Laboratories and RealD have introduced their own technologies under the brands Dolby 3D and RealD-Cinema. The latter is currently the most widespread, as it works on the basis of polarization method, according to which the picture is shown by the projector alternately, with each frame using light waves of different polarization of the light stream. Special polarization glasses contain filters which pass certain light waves, allowing each eye to receive images with different information which forms the basis of a 3D image. The viewer receives a full-color picture, and shades of red and blue, as was the case with the outdated anaglyph format. On big screens, especially IMAX-3D, movies in this format create an ineffable depth of immersion.

Computer technology in recent decades has taken the film industry to a whole new level. Today it’s not just explosive special effects in action movies, but also significant savings in the design of the pavilions, sets, transportation costs and even the cast. The software giants have not only created everything necessary to reveal the unlimited talent and imagination of graphic animators Hollywood, but also allowed to surprise the audience incredible realism. And it can be unequivocally stated that as long as technology develops, with the release of each new blockbuster or disaster movie visiting the cinema will become more and more interesting.

The post 3D: A Well Forgotten Old Thing? appeared first on Dream&West.

The preparatory stage includes the development of the script, casting (selection of actors), the choice of the main shooting location and other organizational activities. The shooting process was until recently considered the main stage in the production of a film, but today it is markedly different from how it was approached in the last century. The sets have been replaced by large pavilions with monochrome surroundings, usually blue or green. The actors interact with “conventional” objects: roads, vehicles and furniture. Even their clothes may differ from those in which you see the characters of the film on the screens. Of course, this is not the case with all scenes.

For example, dinner at a restaurant is easier to shoot in natural surroundings. But shooting complex scenes that endanger the health of the actors and crew, which previously required the involvement of specialized equipment, stuntmen, has now moved almost entirely to the monotonous pavilions. This technology is called “Chrome Key” (Chrome Key) and has its roots in the 30’s of last century, when the engineer Linwood Vann suggested its use. There have been several attempts to use chromakey in cinematography, but the first successful realization can be considered the English film Baghdad Thief directed by Ludwig Berger, Michael Powell and Tim Whelan, shot in 1940, where scenes with a flying magic carpet were filmed on a monochrome background. The picture won three Academy Awards, including Best Visual Effects.

Chromakey Chroma KeyThe essence of chromakey, which is also sometimes called keying (from the phrase colorkey – key color), is to impose on the objects of the foreground required background scene (static or dynamic), which displaces the monochrome color. It is obligatory that foreground objects do not contain chromakey colors. In exceptional cases, the traditional blue or green colors are replaced by other colors. This relatively inexpensive method allows combining scenes of practically any complexity. However, just drawing the right background is not enough. After all, the main action takes place in the foreground. And if you add to the frame three-dimensional model of the car and the plane can even beginner 3D-designer, then, when it comes to computerization of the current characters and protagonists require accurate technology to capture.

You’ve probably wondered how Gollum was created in “The Lord of the Rings” and what resources, tools and efforts it cost James Cameron to bring his legendary “Avatar” to life.

To help in these cases came the technology Motion Capture (motion capture), which is a system consisting of dozens of light sensors connected to the desired object (usually a person in a special suit) and connected to a computer through a special interface. This allows real-time animation previously drawn in a graphics program character, which receives information from the sensors, exactly reproduces the movements of the person on his simulated character. The developer of the motion-capture technology is considered to be Digital District. Using its methods were filmed animated movies “The Last Fantasy” (2001), “Polar Express” (2004) and others.

Every year the technology has improved, and in 2009 allowed Cameron to shoot “Avatar”, which made another revolutionary breakthrough in movie-making technology. Here, for the first time, a specially developed motion capture system (Performance Capture) was used, and while previously the motion capture system was shared, for this picture Cameron divided it up. A camera mounted on the head was responsible for capturing facial expressions, and body movements were captured by a separate remote camera.

For the 20th Century Fox film studio, Sony developed special cameras that were aimed at the actors’ faces (Facial Camera) and were attached to special helmets. The camera on the hero’s head no longer followed the sensors, but special markers in key places on the character’s face, which were driven by the facial muscles. It allowed to make the characters absolutely realistic: the suspended apparatus recorded facial expressions, muscle movements and eye pupil movements with unprecedented accuracy (with this method approximately 95% of the actors’ actions were transferred to their digital copies) and make the avatars and inhabitants of the alien people of Navi so realistic. And the remote camera gave the film crew a much wider space for motion capture (up to 6 times the previous capability).

Unlike previous motion-capture systems, where the digital environment was added after the actors’ movements had been captured, the new virtual camera allowed Cameron to monitor from the monitor how the virtual copies of the actors interacted with the digital world of the movie in real time. The director could adjust and control scenes just as he would in a conventional shoot, seeing not the actors against the backdrop of a film set, but the film’s characters in a rainforest. The new approach allowed the crew to partially forego the makeup artists and technicians responsible for creating alien images. Now you can recreate any fairy tale or fantastic character in any environment, choose your age, without wasting time on complicated makeup, which in addition causes discomfort for the actors.

Avatar” movie consists of 40% of live shooting and 60% of computer graphics. It was a new level of interaction between game and computer cinema. But this is by no means all the technological innovations we can find in Avatar.

The film is made in stereoscopic three-dimensional format (we will return to this in more detail below), for which the director used his own technology Reality Camera System with two high-resolution cameras, increasing the depth of perception. To create the world of Avatar, more than a petabyte (1000 Tb) of digital disk space was needed to store all of the film’s graphic files (plants, animals, insects, rocks, mountains, clouds).

In comparison, when working on the film “Titanic”, also filmed by Cameron, it took only 2 Tb to create and then sink the ship and thousands of passengers. Although the filming of Titanic required much more scenery, including an almost full-size replica of a ship over 200 meters long.

Currently, when creating a fully realistic action of a virtual character, you can’t do without Motion Capture technology. But at the same time, you can not allow mistakes in the implementation, because the slightest defect and the wrong move will look unnatural and destroy the effect of immersion in the film. That’s why animators are trying to make the movements of its characters more pronounced, it allows you to increase perception. A similar problem, although to a lesser extent, is the animation of various animals and fictional characters. Producer has to look for real-life analogues animated creatures, to carry out their shooting, and already on the basis of the collected material trying to embody the fantasy writers.

In the computer industry there are many animators who have succeeded in creating three-dimensional computer graphics (CGI – Computer Graphics Imagery). One of the most popular companies for the development of CGI-effects in Hollywood is Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), created by famous director George Lucas in 1975, at the time of filming “Star Wars”. The company has created special effects for several hundred of Hollywood’s highest-grossing blockbusters over the last 35 years. ILM alumni founded such studios as Pixar and Kerner Technologies, specializing in physics simulations.

Ellen Page and William Defoe on the set of clips for Beyond The SoulsIn 1993, Steven Spielberg’s Jurassic Park was released, a film that could also be considered revolutionary. Initially the authors of the film were not planning to use computer graphics in so many scenes and were supposed to recreate the dinosaurs using traditional and tried before methods: puppet animation and controlled robots. However, it turned out to be not so simple and without computer graphics the director would not have been able to achieve such a high level of realism. Of course, computer graphics were used in cinematography before “Jurassic Park”, but in a slightly different way. For example, they drew a virtual computer world in the film Tron (1982), or created special effects depicting things that usually have no analogues in reality. Think of the T1000 liquid metal robot in the second episode of Terminator (Judgment Day, 1991). Prior to Jurassic Park, no one used computer graphics in big cinema to depict realistic objects, much less animate animals, let alone extinct ones. No one had any idea how possible it was or what it might entail, so Steven Spielberg originally wasn’t going to spend the budget on risky experiments. But after ILM Studios drew a test sample of a dinosaur, animated it and combined it with nature photos, Spielberg opted for computer graphics, and subsequently all the scenes that were going to be shot with frame-by-frame puppet animation were drawn on the computer.

As production capacity increased, it became possible to computerize modern cinema on a larger and larger scale. But to design a scene on the computer is not the whole process, as you still need to give the picture an artistic and realistic look. To do this, teams of graphic specialists are put to work after the movie is shot. Post-Production also involves several stages of work, involving not only the manipulation of the footage, but also the creation of various objects and the environment, seeming to the viewer natural and obligatory when viewing the film. In the final version of the film, the appearance of the actors is often heavily redrawn, and some quite natural scenes are almost entirely created by 3D-artists. First of all, a rough version of the footage is collected in a software package for video editing. Unlike amateur home editing, which consists mainly of slicing clips with the addition of a few effects, professional filmmakers carefully evaluated and processed each frame. Editing takes place during the whole process of Post-Production, from the initial processing of the footage and ending with mastering the final media (cinema film or DVD/Blu-ray discs), which uses professional and expensive software.

The recognized industry standard in film editing software is the American corporation Avid Technology. Many ordinary users working with camcorders and video capture cards, it is familiar from its subsidiary company Pinnacle, which produces software consumer and consumer level. Most popular with filmmakers is Avid Media Composer, which won the ACE Technical Excellence Award from the American Association of Film Editors after the release of Avatar. Also increasingly popular in recent years is Apple’s Final Cut Studio software package. In the first stage, the footage is subjected to rough editing in order to determine the order and duration of scenes. The result of this work is transferred to the recording studios, computer graphics and effects.

One of the most interesting and directly computer-related parts of Post-Production is the creation of computer graphics. It is so complex that it is also divided into stages, covering the development of the 3D setting, the animation of all objects and the creation of the 3D environment. The most popular software package for creating three-dimensional scenes in today’s cinema is Autodesk Maya, but Softimage and Cinema 4D are also widely used. From the sketches of the artists to create a full three-dimensional environment and characters, and in order to make the viewer believed in what is happening on the screen, all the details of the scenes must be as plausible. Therefore hundreds of gigabytes of textures are created for the virtual environment, which can be culled from real life or generated from the synthesis of various materials. In addition, artists use shaders to set the light-reflecting properties of the material on which the corresponding textures are superimposed. However, this is not enough, because, for example, pebble stones on the beach immediately give away their flat nature, if you apply dynamic lighting. At the same time, drawing each stone individually is an absolutely impossible task. Therefore, 3D artists create shadow maps for all surfaces. If everything is done correctly, the result is a virtual environment that is virtually indistinguishable from the real thing. However, this kind of realism looks good on static pictures. To make them look more alive and in the movie, you need to animate not only the main characters and the foreground, but also the entire environment. This stage is no less difficult than the previous one, and very often its implementation is entrusted to individual specialized studios.

It should be noted that animation techniques can be very diverse in nature. Animate the grass on the lawn and walking on it is not the same. If the animated man, the experts resorted to motion capture Motion Picture. Quite differently with the animation of the environment, because it is impossible to set your own rule of motion for each blade of grass or leaf. The same applies to the animation of water, fire, smoke, etc. Here come to the aid of resource-intensive calculations. To correctly simulate the mobility of these elements, animators set the dynamics of movement of the environment. For example, setting the parameters of wind and assigning the appropriate properties of the material, grass can be achieved at once an incredibly believable picture of movement on the screen. In order to realistically fit an actively moving character into this environment, the animators have to resort to simulating collisions of objects. Very often these tasks are solved with the help of individual software packages, such as Houdini from Side Effects Software, but sometimes even the many features of existing programs are not enough to create a realistic picture for a particular movie with its fantasy world. In this case, animation studios write their own applications, filters, create new effects and physical properties of the environment. They even resort to the help of scientists. For example, to realistically show the water flowing around the virtual ship, the Russian studio Mainroad Post, which made special effects in the film “Admiral” (2009) had to appeal to the Institute of Oceanology, Israel. In addition, special effects should include not only the drawing and animation of events and surroundings. For example, in today’s cinema, to age the hero is no longer necessary to impose a thick layer of makeup on the actor. And computer programs cope with this.

The post Film Industry: Revolution after Revolution! Across the Screen appeared first on Dream&West.

Modern film industry is increasingly trying to surprise the audience is not only, and sometimes, not so much the script and acting, as the number of special effects per meter of film. And this becomes the primary criterion for creating the next new blockbuster. The more explosions, filming in slow motion, computer graphics – the greater the success of guaranteed motion picture. Of course, the director’s work deserves some attention, but as such, many critics today prefer to talk about the “art of cinema” less and less frequently. This is not a bad thing, but the fact that most viewers go to the theater to see special effects remains a fact.

Movies, where the main roles are given to computer graphics, it is best to watch on the big screen. Hollywood statistics and modern directors say that the audience today demands such spectacles and takes them with great pleasure. Of course, the degree of penetration of computer graphics in cinematography varies, but even in melodramas and youth series some scenes lend themselves to computer processing, and the process of film-making can surprise anyone. And it’s not even about the fact that complex scenery has been almost completely replaced by computer graphics. The work process of filming is no longer focused on camerawork, but on the so-called Post-Production, which includes post-production, editing and voice-over. All of this work is being done by powerful computer systems and special software. Let’s find out what specific functions they perform, but first let’s turn to history.

How did it all begin?

In 1895, Alfred Clark, the director of a black and white silent short film, The Execution of Mary Stewart, decided to film a scene of the beheading of a princess. It turned out this way: after all the actors and the executioner took the necessary poses, he ordered them to freeze and not move. Shooting was paused at this point. Then the actress playing Maria stepped out of the frame and the assistants set up a mannequin in her place, dressed exactly the same way and in the same deathbed position. The camera resumed shooting and the executioner cut off the mannequin’s head. This was the first “special effect”, which opened a new road to the whole cinematography.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the French magician Georges Méliès became interested in cinematography and the possibilities of editing by cutting, combining and hand-coloring frames. He was so fascinated by this that he made over 500 small films that impressed audiences around the world. That’s why he earned the nickname “The Film Magician.” His most famous film is considered “Journey to the Moon” (1902), which is a kind of parody of Jules Verne’s novel “From the Earth to the Moon” and included both live acting and a large amount of animation, combined shooting and editing.

The last century saw many revolutions in filmmaking. Films became color, they appeared the voice, were built hundreds of studios in the U.S., Europe and Asia. Halls of these studios are located on vast areas, equipped with the latest technology and equipment. Companies like Universal Studios, Paramount Pictures and 20th Century Fox have partnered with construction, architecture and other industry professionals to build models and sets of any complexity for new productions.

And today we are witnessing a boom in films with ultra-realistic graphics.

The post Film Industry: Revolution after Revolution! How did it all begin? appeared first on Dream&West.

Fewer people know that cinema began in Europe. For example, one of the most famous events in the world of cinema was the screening of a short film, Arrival of a Train at La Ciotat Station, by the Lumière Brothers from France. By 1910. France was still producing 70 percent of its films. Inventors were trying to come up with devices to help the industry develop, among them Thomas Edison, I.A. Timchenko, and J. Demeny.

But then why is it the American film industry today is the largest and most developed?

If you turn to history, it is clear that this industry has developed quite rapidly, involving an increasing number of interested people who invested money in the new business, creating competition. Focused on the film industry for the mass audience (however, we must not forget about the so-called independent cinema).

Over time, the industry began to grow even faster, the production of films has increased dramatically, actors and directors from other countries began to come to the U.S., there was a wider range of film genres.

Already by the middle of the twentieth century, movies had become one of the most profitable ways to make money. Competition between studios and companies tightened, there was a merger of some of them, small and “weak” were destroyed by competitors. Those who managed to stay in the industry prospered. The number of jobs grew; writers, cameramen, stuntmen, and technicians were hired. Consequently, the specialization of education developed as the need for various film-related professions only increased. Cinemas sprouted up all over the country like mushrooms after the rain. Films began to be put on stream, to become one and the same.

With the advent of sound in movies, a problem arose – so popular throughout the world, American silent movies suddenly began to lose popularity because of the lack of translation. They tried to solve this problem by releasing versions in a foreign language, but the idea did not catch on, and eventually it was necessary to establish a system of translation into other languages anyway.

However, with the advent of the ability to shoot color movies, with the advent of special effects and sets, the U.S. chooses, so to speak, the path of spectacle. The main task now is to surprise the viewer, to make him experience a real shock in the theater. This is how blockbusters come into being. This is perhaps one of the most common definitions of a “typical American film. This spectacularity draws people to cinemas, they want to see things that are not always possible in real life.

Everyone knows that most foreign cinematographers are “inspired” by Hollywood. We can talk about fashion in the film industry, as well as all kinds of compilations and plagiarism.

Being an attractive country for all categories of people, America attracts filmmakers to this day. Undoubtedly, in this country a talented editor/writer/director has much more chances, because the film industry is developed and continues to grow, creating more and more stars, celebrities, masterpieces of cinematography.

I think almost anyone can find something for themselves in American films. The range of subjects, genres, ideas, implementation of these very ideas is so wide and bright, that it is easy to get dizzy from the variety. Of course, connoisseurs and especially subtle natures can argue that the U.S. cinema is too streaming and belongs to the mainstream, but even to such requests America has prepared an answer – independent film. All sorts of trends, the so-called art house, indie, experimental and underground cinema, are as well developed in the U.S. as the production of major Hollywood companies. Isn’t that proof of the multifaceted nature of the U.S. film industry?

People treat America as a collection of many “peoples” in one territory. No wonder, as the history of immigration to the United States tells us. In a relatively short time there has been an incredible diversity of different cultures. If Englishmen, Jews, Germans, and Chinese live in one city alone, what about the nationalities in the whole country? I can only assume that this has been one of the reasons for the popularity of American cinema. All of this mixing of cultures has manifested itself in different areas of life. Including in the film industry. For example, the founders of one of the most famous film companies in the world, Warner Bros. were natives of Poland.

Some people may associate the United States with globalization. Sometimes globalization is equated with Americanization, and this is due to the influence that America began to have on the world in the twentieth century. And, in our case, it is, of course, the influence on cinema.

America sets trends in many areas of modern life, be it science, music or film. The history of the American film industry is rich not only in events and names, but also in turns in the development of artistic thought, and the history of the States itself has allowed the industry to evolve and involve artists from around the world. It’s hard to imagine today’s entertainment scene without American films, and it’s hard to imagine the world cinema without the U.S. film industry.

The post Why has American Cinema Become the Most Popular Film in the World? appeared first on Dream&West.