Motion Picture News (Oct 1913 - Jan 1914)

THE MOTION PICTURE NEWS -5 MAKING THE MOTION PICTURE SAFER Dussaud's Discovery of a Way to Produce Light without Heat Has Opened Important Science — The Fireproof Film No Longer a Dream of the Future Fields tc I theatres safer. That sources of danger exist under present conditions is certain. In his last annual report the State Fire Marshal of New York said: "It has been estimated that throughout the country there is on an average a daily attendance of 15,000,000 in these places. They are exposed to dangers from fire and the resulting panic, More than $100,000,000 is invested in the business in the Union, and this is divided among 16.000 theatres and many halls, churches and clubs. There should be ordinances governing the storage and handling of Sims, which are generally made of a composition of nitrocellulose and guncotton, one of the most inflammable combinations known." Within the past few weeks officers of the Paris Prefecture of Police have tested picture films made non-inflammable by a new method. So satisfactory were the results that it is now an offense for motion picture shows in Paris to use anything else than these safety films. When it was announced that the Parisian authorities had decided to order the substitution of non-inflammable films Thomas A. Edison was asked if he thought the same course should be followed in this country. Mr. Edison does not agree with the French officials in the matter. He said : "There is no possible material known that takes the place of the present celluloid film. In this country the insurance companies have been so strict that everything pertaining to the film and machine is encased in iron and asbestos, so that the chance of a fire is reduced almost to immunity. Out of 13.000 motion picture theatres we scarcely ever hear of a fire, although the theatres are running almost continuously. The amount of film stored in the fireproof booth at any one time is so small that it is difficult to imagine any danger to the theatre even if the whole amount should burn up. A properly designed machine provides immunity aside from the fireproof booth." C 22 now and then while, and this Such are the the light hereto advocating the another remed] M. Francois Di the glow of hi.! ins: heat is ere Irr. ; and gain is made wnicn promises to revolutionize the motion picture in other ways. This invention is man's most successful effort to simulate the glow of the firefly, which is well-nigh totally lacking in heat. The firefly's light is phosphorescent, and the manner of its making is one of nature's cfle— :;al mysteries. :u: sflerris:: have proved that only 3.5 per cent, of the energy expended is lost in producing heat. No wonder physicists call the firefly's glow ideal for the best man can get to-day out of the efficient mercury vapor lamp is half light and half heat for a given expenditure of electrical energy. A surprising part of M. Dussaud's invention is the fact that he is using electricity and not phosphorescent chemicals, and the substance of his lamp filaments is the same that is to be found in the bulk of the best incandescent bulbs. NOTWITHSTANDING the opinion of so great an authority, the fact remains that a safety film has been produced which has all of the mechanical and optical virtues of ordinary celluloid minus its menace, and the world owes this achievement to the cunning of the German chemists of the famous color works of Friedrich Bayer & Co., of Elberfeld. They first produced a film material from acetylcellulose in aceton, and called it cellit. According to Dr. Carl Duisberg. president of one of the greatest chemical industries in the world, in Germany. " Cellit films in all their properties are equal to the old inflammable ones, yet the proprietors of motion picture theatres have not taken them up because they feared the competition of the schools and the home, where the cellit films would be largely used on account of their non-inflammability.'" The German police or fire authorities have not been slow in recognizing the merits of cellit, and even though the first cost of films made of it is greater than that of celluloid, still the substitution of the safer material has been required. Now the French are not disposed to welcome German ideas, and the fact that the Parisian police have passed a similar ordinance is evidence of the need of this kind of legislation. The French and the Germans have been exacting for a long time regarding other precautions in the way of security against fire in motion picture theatres, and yet they realized that existing precautions were not in themselves enough to guard against the perils of a panic when a film burst into flame. It must not be supposed that actual contact with the projecting light has necessarily been the cause of most of the fires in these theatres. The danger has been of a more insidious nature. ACCORDING to M. Dussaud, his cold light apparatus will produce the equivalent iUumination of the ordinary electric light upon a consumption of current 100 per cent. less. Don't think this means that he gets his glow without cost in current, but he gets it at an expenditure of current which would give too little light to be of any value in the usual ran of electric lamps. The better a conductor of electricity a metal may be the less it will heat when current speeds through it. When the material hampers the electricity in its flow — technically this is called resistance — then heat is created, and if this opposition be sufficient the wire or filament will turn red, then orange, then a light yellow, and at last be nearly white in its incandescence. When it reaches the last stage it is usually pretty close to the melting point, or, if not that, at least it dissipates itself in tiny particles and in time breaks. This, in brief, is the life history of the filaments of most incandescent lamps. This element of resistance incidentally controls the cost of light by reason of the current consumed. The heating up of the delicate wire producing the illumination represents just so much loss, for heat is not lightIn the case of the carbon filament lamp we got 6 per cent, of light with 94 per cent of heat, and the tungsten filament of to-day has reduced this loss and increased the efficiency by quite 50 per cent But even so, there is an enormous waste in the generation of heat. * * * * KEEP this fact about the tungsten filament in mind, because M. Dussaud uses this very metal in his own lamps. Tungsten can stand a higher heat than carbon before reaching