Movie Makers (Jun-Dec 1928)

EDITORIALS SPEAKING for members of ^ the Amateur Cinema League, I offer our hearty congratulations to our member, Russell T. Ervin, Jr. Mr. Ervin, directing "And How" for the Motion Picture Club of the Oranges (New Jersey) , produced a film that won the 35 mm. prize in the first Photoplay amateur film con test. Following the exhibition of this film Mr. Ervin was asked by the Fox Film Corporation to enter that organization. He is now at its western headquarters in Hollywood. The Motion Picture Club of the Oranges may well join us of the Amateur Cinema League in a feeling of profound satisfaction that one of us, working purely as an amateur under amateur inspiration and following amateur ideals, has produced work of such quality as to procure for him an opportunity of importance in the professional industry. Amateur influence on the whole field of the motion picture thus sets up its first milestone. — Roy W. Winton, Managing Director. PROPHETS are generally considered very lucky indeed if events prove them to be correctly foresighted within one or two decades. The Amateur Cinema League and Movie MAKERS can claim a better record than this in the case of color cinematography for amateurs, the most important development in our art since the amateur motion picture maker came into being. Ifl In the first number of MOVIE MAKERS, our president, Hiram Percy Maxim, predicted "colored home movies by radio." That was in December. 1926. Today colored home movies are a commercially developed fact: today television is in existence. The last two words of Mr. Maxim's forecast are still to come. CJ MOVIE MAKERS has continually emphasized the contribution that amateurs would make to cinematography. We can record one of these contributions in concrete form with the appearance of Kodacolor. This process, elsewhere referred to in this number of MOVIE MAKERS would not be the world's possession today if it were not that amateurs exist in sufficient numbers to make the process commercially worthwhile. Because of the present limitations in the size of colored projected movies, the question of duplicates and because of the comparatively narrow margin of camera action in making them, Kodacolor is not, as yet, feasible for professional motion pictures. Without amateurs, this development would have been retarded in its presentation. ^f Thus, by the very fact of his existence in large numbers, the amateur has been responsible for the development of a new kind of color photography in motion pictures. To be sure, this is a passive contribution to the eighth art and the credit should go where it properly belongs, to the Eastman Kodak Company. This marks, though, a specific amateur contribution to motion picture development. It means that industry has found amateur markets a sufficient spur to evoke invention and evolution designed for amateurs alone. CJ Let us lay aside the future of amateur contribution for the moment and consider the future of personal colored cinematography. Kodacolor has made a dream come true. League headquarters have been bombarded during the past two years with queries about color cinematography and when it would appear. It is now here and is a completely practicable reality. It is idle to consider, for one moment, that the present limitations of this pioneer presentation of colored movies will long remain. •I More light will be thrown through the film and larger pictures will be obtained on the screen. Duplicates will, somehow, be possible. This process, now the exclusive possession of one great company in the amateur industry, will be paralleled by other companies and equipment will be generally modified to make color cinematography possible with any taking and projecting apparatus. Once made the possession of amateurs, no invention or process will remain static. <J It is safe to predict that, in another five years, colored personal movies will be available with no greater limitations than those imposed on monochromatic movies today. Not only amateurs, but industry, education, science and general business will make use of colored films. A new field of industrial uses of small projectors can readily be visualized with films in natural colors. Colored micro-cinematography will open new reaches to science. Medical films will be increased in value by the addition of natural color. ^ It is not impossible that the next development of color cinematography for the amateur will be one that will encourage the use of narrow width projectors for small theatres and auditoriums. Color, which is so expensive, at present, for professional producers to use theatrically, may be the basis for thousands of small movie theatres, using narrow width film, and an entirely new trend in professional motion picture presentation may result. •I Unquestionably amateur interest in personal colored cinematography will be very general. Every amateur should see that it is to the interest of his hobby and of the development of motion picture art for him to arrive at a personal evaluation of this step forward in cinematography. It is the first great cinema invention that he shares with nobody at its inception. <J Amateurs should familiarize themselves with colored motion picture making and projecting. They should let the amateur industry know, early, what they like and what they dislike. They should ask for the improvements and developments that they want. Here is something that is their very own From their comments upon it, their experiments with it and their suggestions concerning its betterment and expansion will come the brilliant future for it that Movie Makers confidently expects. <J We extend our thanks and congratulations to George Eastman and his associates, on behalf of the amateurs of the world. We felicitate movie amateurs, everywhere, that they have been responsible for the creation of a new phase of this new art. We call upon amateurs and industry alike to carry forward this contribution to cinematography until it reaches complete flexibility and broad usefulness to the human race. 567