The invention to which Hollywood owes its existence is the camera

camera

The motion picture camera records still photographs on long strips of celluloid in such rapid succession that, when developed and projected at the proper speed, it appears as if uninterrupted movement has been captured on film. The perceptual principle behind this visual trick is called PERSISTENCE OF VISION.

After the invention of the still camera in the early 19th century, the push to make moving pictures began in earnest. In 1877, Eadweard Muybridge conducted his famous experiment by making rapid, sequential photographs of a race horse at full gallop. This helped to define in photography the interrelationship of time and motion.

A mere 11 years later, in 1888, the first movie camera was built at THOMAS EDISON’s New Jersey laboratory by William Kennedy Laurie Dickson. Edison, however, was not (at first) terribly enthusiastic about the business prospects of the new device, especially given that no dependable source of film had yet been developed for it.

Not until George Eastman invented celluloid film in 1889 did the camera become a viable invention.

After Eastman’s breakthrough, Auguste and Louis Lumière, two French brothers, demonstrated the commercial potential of their own invention, a combination movie camera and projector. The year was 1895, the year in which the movies were born.

From 1895 until the late 1910s, various early movie cameras were beset by mechanical problems. For the most part, they were crudely made wooden boxes that often caused a jarring jerkiness and flickering in the images they recorded. Worse still, these cameras often jammed. By the time of the golden age of the silent cinema (the 1920s), wooden cameras were finally replaced by more carefully crafted metal machines that have remained essentially the same in design to this day.

camera operator

The member of the camera crew who operates the camera during the shoot. This is a job that is often confused with that of the cameraman (also known as the cinematographer or director of photography), who works with the director to light and compose the scenes to be shot. The camera operator (also known as the second cameraman) reports to the cameraman.

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