Industry Notebook #1

Summary
　The article is “OUT OF THE SHADOWS” which comes from “Special Effects: The History and Technique (April 3 2007)”, a book that is wrote by Richard Rickitt, is talking about the movie effects and its history. At first, the author introduces some “toys” that were considered as the ancestors of cinema. He also mentions some persons who invented them and how the toys worked. The principle of those toys is manipulating light and shadows. Second, the author introduces “Persistence of vision”, a principle that makes a rapid sequence of different images appear continuous and is what allow people to enjoy watching film and TV. Finally, the article mentions Eadweard Muybridge(1830-1904), a person who developed a system of individual stills cameras set alongside a track to record the normal movement of men, horses and other animals. His photography was very important for the developing of motion picture devices.

Citations
　Richard Rickitt. Special Effects: The History and Technique. Billboard Books. April 3, 2007. Wikipedia <>

My opinion
　There are lots “toys” about shadows that author mentioned in this article. One is called ombres chinoises(Chinese shadow). It is a Chinese doll play. The stage is a translucent paper screen and there is a lamp project on it in the backside. When the characters that are made by leather are put in back of the screen, the character’s silhouette appeared on it. Moreover, the characters have joints. So you can change their pose by sticks. I’ve played it before. The principle is nothing but light and shadows. Although it is simple and easy to play, I didn’t know it is an ancestor of motion picture, further, I realized that a modern machine usually comes from some old, simple, easy ideals and even comes from a toy in my grandpa’s age. In our opinion, the earlier devices of cinema might like toys, they are simple and crude and even easy to make today, but they play an important role in the cinema history. Therefore, we should play our role well in our life, not for you, but for everyone who concern about you.The “Persistence of vision” has been noted by the ancient Greeks. However, it costs a long time to become a motion picture nowadays. The earlier devices were able to be improved, because of people’s curiosity. Even the ancestors failed again and again during the experiment process; it is still a very important motivation to push the cinema industry moving forward. Yes, a motivation is very important when you are doing something. I love watching 3D animations; I believe it could be a good motivation for my learning English. Ha Ha!