The photoplay; a psychological study (1916)

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DEPTH AND MOVEMENT The depth effect is so undeniable that some minds are struck by it as the chief power in the impressions from the screen. Vachel Lindsay, the poet, feels the plastic character of the persons in the foreground so fully that he interprets those plays with much indi- vidual action as a kind of sculpture in motion. He says: "The little far off people on the oldfashioned speaking stage do not appeal to the plastic sense in this way. They are by comparison mere bits of pasteboard with sweet voices, while on the other hand the photoplay foreground is full of dumb giants. The bodies of these giants are in high sculp- tural relief." Others have emphasized that this strong feeling of depth touches them most when persons in the foreground stand with a far distant landscape as backgroimd— much more than when they are seen in a room. Psychologically this is not surpris- ing either. If the scene were a real room, every detail in it would appear differently to the two eyes. In the room on the screen both eyes receive the same impression, and the result is that the consciousness of depth is inhibited. But when a far distant land- scape is the only background, the impres- 53