As many of you may already know, Thomas Edison (1847-1931) was a genius of a man who is known as one
of the most creative inventors of all time. Now although he is mainly known for
his experiments and success with electricity, more specifically the commercial light
bulb, he is also one of the forefathers for the creation of the film industry
as we know it today. He was involved with many others who were also instrumental in the development of the movie process, such as Eadward Muybridge, George Eastman, Edwin S. Porter, and the Lumière Brothers.
It was shortly after meeting Muybridge in 1988 that Edison was first inspired to create a motion picture camera after seeing his zoopraxiscope, a device that projected several images in succession to show movement. The invention that he ended up developing for this was the kinetoscope (seen left), a device that contained a kinetograph and allowed people to watch short films by looking through a peephole located at the top.
Although the kinetoscope was popular and profitable for a while, Edison started to get behind when it came to providing films for more than one person at a time. Due to this, his company ended up developing their own Projectoscope (seen right) or Projecting Kinetoscope in 1896, a device that allowed the projection of the short films onto a large screen in darkened rooms, and alas, the movie theater was created.
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One of Edison's earliest short films, the Native American "Buffalo Dance".
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Revised August 20th, 2013 |