Close Up (Jul-Dec 1929)

Record Details:

Title:
Close Up
Date:
Jul-Dec 1929
Publisher:
[London, etc., Pool]
Volume:
Close up ... devoted to the art of films
Leaf #:
000465
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:
June 20, 2024
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CLOSE UP There are special microphones for the women. ]Mr. Cameron passes on to the incandescent lights, commenting on the best makes. All that the reader can extract from this admirable analysis makes the book worth its w^eight in fan magazines. The problems that faced the engineers were ignored by the producers; the fact that light reflectors w^ill reflect sound, and the 6-inch piano convex condensing lenses, used in front of the bulbs to eliminate ghosts were not thought of over an afternoon tea. The cameras had to be brought into line without the necessity of scrapping the existing equipment. The steel gears had to be changed for gears of formica. The drumming noises in the magazines were cut out by holes in the metal case which interrupted the sound waves. An endless fabric belt removed the danger of Clicking Rival methods of reproducing and recording sound are sifted : the R.C.A. projector, the Vitaphone, the Movietone, the Cinephone, the Phonofilm, the Simotone, the Bristolphone. Some of this was a little too heavy, and I skipped, yet w^ithout feeling cheated of any of my money. (I borrowed my copy from a kind colleague !) I picked up from the mass of information the surety that the ear needs a lot of discipline to catch up with the eye; and this in spite of the fact that the eye does not detect contrasts under 2 per cent., and the photoelectric cell recognises variations of OT per cent. Therefore, technically, the stock for recording sound has to be free from the blemishes of the stock used for light recording. In telephonic terms everything at a level one TU below' full moderation will be free from distortion, and the peaks will be substantially perfect.'* 327