Chapter 2 Inventions and Origins 47combined elements of the zoetrope and magic lantern,
viewers were fi rst presented with a continuously moving
row of images and later with a series of quickly passing
shuttered views of single frames. By 1892, Emile Reynaud
had adapted his earlier invention, the praxinoscope, to
create the Th éâtre Optique (pronounced “tay-at-truh
op-teek,” meaning optical theater), a relatively complex
device that projected animated fi lms onto a screen for
audiences.
Although they use a diff erent process from what
we know as fi lms, Reynaud’s moving images were the
fi rst animated motion pictures. But to arrive at the full
development of the cinema as an expressive medium,
we need to examine the last component of its existence:
photography.Printing Light
Photography is a process by which light is captured and
reproduced. Normally, the light passes through a lens into
a camera and falls on a light-sensitive surface. Th is can take
place through chemical, magnetic, or digital interaction
and registration between the light and the surface.
Key practical steps in the development of this medium were taken long ago
by Ibn al-Haytham of Persia, when he fully explained and produced the camera
obscura and pinhole camera in the eleventh century. Some essential elements
of photography are seen in these devices, such as the controlled admittance
of light into a closed area so that an image falls upon a surface for recording.
However, the need to control light and to increase its quality required the useFigure 2-6 Emile Reynaud
projecting an animated
fi lm to an audience using
the Théâtre Optique.Figure 2-7 The pinhole camera, a box that
allows no light other than through a small
hole, making it capable of photography even
without a lens.Copyright 2010 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s).