Filmmaking as an artistic medium has always been about foundation . too soon filmmakersrealized that to push the art form forwards , the technology postulate to advance as well . When we think of technology and innovation today , ones and zeroes pop into our top dog . But back in the day , technological advances amount about only because the filmmaker yearn to enjoin a better story .
Smooth tracking shot were practically impossible because of bulkycamerasystems , so crew members switch backgrounds to give the illusion of a moving tv camera . Before audio transcription was possible , euphony and claim cards allowed silent films to present dialogue in a meaningful direction . Once the camera could move around , andsoundwas possible , it opened up a new world of on - location shooting , and motion-picture show would never be the same again .
Here ’s a list of five of the top filmmaking innovations to add up along since Louis Lumiere generate us the first motion picture camera back in 1895 .
5: Steadicam
In 1976 , camera operator innovator Garret Brown had a problem to solve : how to make a hired hand - hold shot look liquid and fluid rather than shaky . Before the Steadicam , the only room to move a photographic camera was either by ride it on a dolly , or by holding it over your shoulder . What Garrett want was a technology that allowed for the suavity of a dolly , with the freedom of the helping hand - book proficiency .
Enter the Steadicam . Through a lot of trial and error , Brown invented a system that used system of weights distribution and a rotating gimbal to smooth out hand - held shots . To manoeuvre a Steadicam , the manipulator fundamentally wears the camera on the front of what looks like a bullet - proof vest . The camera is mount , via the gimbal , onto a flexible " iso - elastic " arm that ’s attached to the undershirt . A system of counterweights parcel out the weight unit of the television camera and allows for – wait for it – a steady slam . In the end , a cameraman was capable to survey Rocky Balboa up the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art and track Jack Nicholson through a snowy tangle in " The Shining . " Thanks to Brown , filmmaking would never be the same .
4: Dolly
Segundo de Chomón probably did n’t realize what a difference of opinion he ’d made when , in 1907 , he invented the camera dolly . In fact , it would be another seven years before the first tracking stroke was used in a democratic movie . Putting thecameraon bicycle seems like a no - brainer now , but for more than a decade in filmmaking ’s early eld the television camera was stuck in one spot . The camera dolly you ’d happen on today ’s movie set is much like the early dollies , heavy and static . But today you ’ll likely retrieve one of two manufacturer ’s names on the side – J.L. Fisher or Chapman / Leonard .
The keystone to making placid shot is the weightiness of the unit and the surface that the dolly rides on . Many quiet , heavy concrete surfaces can be used with the dolly alone , but most of the time a track made from orotund metal tubes , much like a railway track , is necessary to get the smooth trailing crack we ’re all used to . Modern dolly are essentially lowering sleds on four bicycle that can move in any instruction , with a hydraulic lift organization for the camera . The cinematographer depend on on a seat attached to the dolly , and the whole unit is pushed with great truth by a dolly travelling bag . Next clock time you see a movie shot of a couple take the air down the street , just recall of all the metal runway laid on the ground beside them .
3: CGI
Computer generate imagery , orCGI , was not born on a film set , but in research labs at universities , with the finish of making pic from data processor information . In the late 1970s , the early imagination engineering was adopted byspecial effectsteams at moving picture production society , start in earnest what we now recognize as CG effects .
Thesci - fiwestern " Westworld " is credit with being the first pic to make use of 2 - five hundred CGI . Shots from the position of Yul Brenner ’s robotic cowboy were mind muff at the clock time , but see a niggling silly now . That film open up the room access for motion picture like " Tron " in 1982 , the first film to make extensive consumption of CGI . A few old age after " Tron " was made , manager Barry Levinson had his digital squad create the first CGI character in " Young Sherlock Holmes . " From there , innovators like James Cameron , Steven Spielberg and the Pixar studio apartment revolutionize CGI in film like " The Terminator , " " Jurassic Park " and " Toy Story . " Today , you ’d be severely pressed to find a mainstream movie free by a major studio apartment that does n’t have some variety of CG consequence .
2: Digital Technology
Whendigital cameratechnology was first introduce on a belittled scale by Sony in the late 1980s , it ’s dubious anyone had any idea what impact it would make , and how soon it would make it . Only a few age later , in 1995 , the Fox beam web first used a digital camera for a mainstreamtelevisionproduction , a fender for a myopic lived show called " Pasadena . "
Major Hollywood plastic film were a small dull to adopt the emerging applied science , however . Digital tv camera were clearly more effective and easy to use , but until they could produce a product that look as well as explicate film , they would n’t be borrow . Pioneering director George Lucas was the first to shoot a major motility picture with a digital photographic camera – 2002 ’s " Star Wars Episode II : Attack of the Clones . " Since then , cameras have commence smaller and more compact . Today , consumers can shoot HD video on their cell speech sound , bridge player - hold television camera and camcorder .
1: Stereoscopic Imaging (3-D)
Some citizenry consider that the final great filmmaking innovation is the advent of stereoscopic imagination , which you may have intercourse upright as3 - D. Stereoscopy , the allusion of a three - dimensional picture , has been around since 1838 . The first " gilded age " of 3 - D took position between 1950 and 1960 , with movies like Albert Hitchcock ’s " Dial M for Murder . " The engineering and screening proficiency were too limiting at the meter , though , and it would n’t be until the early seventies that 3 - D really took hold .
Cardboard glasses for pic like " Jaws 3 - D " and " Friday the 13th Part 3 " did a comme il faut caper , but 3 - D was still more of a passing novelty than a filmmaking revolution . The mid 1980s commemorate the offset of the unfeigned stereoscopic revolution with the release of " Transitions , " anIMAX3 - 500 film shown at a Canadian technology exhibition in 1986 . Breakthroughs in screening applied science and the television camera used to shoot in 3 - viosterol have spawned a godsend in large - budget stereoscopic films . James Cameron ’s " Avatar " was the first mainstream motion-picture show to clash the universe ’s consciousness by thrusting the audience into a CGI human race .
