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Kino mashinasi

How Cinema Technology Changed

1894 → 2020-yillar · 9 stops

Scroll down. Time moves forward.

Film

The earliest film with recorded sound

Dickson Experimental Sound Film · 1894/95

Dickson plays the violin while two men dance — about 17 seconds of film with live-recorded sound.

William Kennedy Laurie Dickson (Edison Manufacturing Co.)1894–1895Public domain · source ↗

Sound is lagging

Did you know?

Picture and sound were only synchronised in 2000, by Walter Murch.

→ Cameras: Kinetoscope: cinema for one, 1894

Film

The first feature with synchronised speech

The Jazz Singer · 1927 · Alan Crosland

The Jazz Singer: the first feature with synchronised songs and speech — though only about two minutes of talking.

Alan Crosland (Warner Bros.)1927Public domain · source ↗

Sound only plays if you tap the button

Did you know?

The whole film has only about two minutes of synchronised talking. The rest is songs and intertitles.

Film

The first full three-strip Technicolor feature

Becky Sharp · 1935 · Rouben Mamoulian

Becky Sharp: the first feature shot entirely in three-strip Technicolor.

Keep scrolling: red, green and blue strips come together

Did you know?

Before it, three-strip Technicolor had only been used in shorts, such as Disney cartoons.

Technology

The first CinemaScope film

The Robe · 1953 · CinemaScope

Fighting television, Hollywood launched CinemaScope. The first film: The Robe.

2.39 : 1

CinemaScope

Did you know?

An anamorphic lens squeezes the image onto film; the projector stretches it back.

Film

The film that made CGI a revolution

Jurassic Park · 1993 · Steven Spielberg

In Jurassic Park, computer-generated dinosaurs shared the screen with full-size animatronics.

1993Jurassic ParkSteven Spielberg

Technology

First major studio film shot fully digitally

Star Wars: Episode II · 2002

Star Wars: Episode II — the first major studio feature shot entirely on digital cameras.

Did you know?

It was shot on Sony HDW-F900 cameras at 24p.

Technology

Frame rates: 16 → 24 → 48

Silent film · sound film · The Hobbit (2012)

Silent film ran at ~16–18 fps (hand-cranked), sound film at 24. The Hobbit came out at 48 fps — and split audiences.

Technology

LED-wall virtual production

StageCraft · The Mandalorian · 2019

The Mandalorian was shot inside walls of LED screens instead of green screen — the background moves with the camera.

Technology

AI: a new tool

Generative video · 2020s

In the 2020s AI began generating images and video. What kind of tool it becomes for cinema is still being debated.

Credits

All archive material on this site is in the public domain. Source and licence for each:

Year
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