Close Up (Jul-Nov 1927)

Record Details:

Title:
Close Up
Date:
Jul-Nov 1927
Publisher:
[London, etc., Pool]
Volume:
Close up ... devoted to the art of films
Leaf #:
000487
Language:
English
Subjects:
motion pictures, Motion pictures -- Periodicals
Collection:
Switzerland, Early Cinema, and Global Cinema
Format:
Periodicals
Contributor:
Library of Congress, MBRS, Moving Image Section
Sponsor:
Library of Congress, Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division
Coordinator:
Media History Digital Library
Description:
As an active film magazine, CLOSE UP lasted only a short time, from 1927 to 1933. Yet the legacy of this English-language periodical, which was published in Switzerland, continues to matter. Edited by Bryher and her husband Kenneth Macpherson, CLOSE UP became THE magazine for energetic debates about the nature of cinema and manifestos imagining new forms of filmmaking and spectatorship. The magazine published articles by filmmakers, such as Sergei Eisenstein, and female literary modernists, such as H.D. and Gertrude Stein. As film scholar Anne Friedberg explains in the anthology CLOSE-UP, 1927-1933: CINEMA & MODERNISM, 'CLOSE UP became the model for a certain type of writing about film -- writing that was theoretically astute, politically incisive, critical of films that were simply 'entertainment.' For six and a half years, CLOSE UP maintained a forum for a broad variety of ideas about the cinema; it never advocated a single direction of development, but rather posed alternatives to existing modes of production, consumption, and film style.' Like Friedberg's own writing, CLOSE UP continues to be essential reading for anyone interested in the history of film and media theory. -- Eric Hoyt, 2014
Date Added:
August 29, 2022
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CLOSE UP man will not be content much longer with mercury vapour lamps. For one thing they make the actor's hands, unless he uses excessive 'make-up', look like those of a nigger. Another point to remember is that the lights must be switched off and on before a scene so that they burn brightly during the take. When you commence to feel a little confidence in your ability to light a set you may use what are known as 'banks of light'. These are bright groups of lights which operate together. Turn a 'bank' directly on a set, that is only give your set some front lighting (caution : this is exercise number two) which is behind your camera. The set will be flat. It requires side lighting to bring out the dimensions of actors and properties. The Germans are fond of having little front hghting and bringing up the characters in the background. This is remarkabty 'cinematic' if it is not abused. I imagine that an American camera man would have put a semicircle of 'Winnies' round it, I know a British camera man would ! In every studio that I have been in, no matter what the size, I have found that the carpenters have a great love of building the sets dead against the wall so that the cameraman has great difficulty in placing his back lighting. Good photography means good back hghting. Let the beginner secure this first. After that he will find many hints from the set itself as to where his lights should go. Shine a sun through a window, or place a diffused light behind stained glass. Windows generally have no glass but wire netting is put in 45