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A British Movie Pioneer
William Friese-Greene was a movie pioneer. He saw a slide show in Bath and realised that photographs could be taken that when shown quickly would reproduce movement. His next idea was that sound could also be included so that an audio record of the event could also be made. His third vision in 1898 was colour would add reality to the movies.
These motion picture principles were being advocated by Friese-Greene between 1886 amd 1898. Other movie pioneers were experimenting to record motion in photography.
William Friese - Greene had the whole idea: filming movement, recording sound and using colour from the dawn of movie making. Even if he did nothing else than have this vision then he would be a great figure in the history of Cinema. Alas he, along with others, are the forgotten pioneers.
At last his role is being re-assessed.
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Inspiration Friese-Greene was in Bath when he saw a slide show which gave an illusion of movement. He began experimenting to build movie equipment.
The day of succes for Friese Green was came one Sunday morning in January 1889.He took took his new camera and film to Hyde Park. Near Apsley Gate he placed the camera on a tripod and began filming actuality. He filmed people and the horse drawn traffic.
He then went to his studio and developed the celluloid film. In the early hours of the next morning he watched his movies. He was the first person to watch moving pictures on a screen.
In the 1951 film called 'The Magic Box.' This occurrance is re-created and Friese-Greene is so excited that he rushes outside to find someone to share the experience with. He found a policeman.
The camera became Patent No. 10,131, for a camera with a single lens to record movement was registered on 10th May 1890.
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Friese-Green and Sound Films In the late 19th century devices were invented that could record and playback speech. Edison's phonograph was one such device. Berliner's gramophone could only play records.
William Friese-Greene realised that the phonograph and other recording equipment could be used to make the sound for motion pictures.
The expert in this field was Edison and he says he contacted Edison telling him about his idea and film camera. Edison never replied to him. Edison clains no knowledge about this correspondance.
The strange thing is that around this time Edison's mechanic invented a movie camera and experiments to add sound were carried out by Edison's research developers.
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Colour movie film. William Friese-Greene began experiments in 1889 to make colour movie film. He dyed alternate frames red or green. The system became known as 'Biocolour.'
Friese-Greens colour film still exhists. It can be viewed at the British Film Institute in London.
I recall the colours being very deep but they seemed to have a brownish tint. If this was the quality in the 1890's then the colour films would have been excellent.
His son Claude carried on with the systems development after the death of his father. Claude became an expert in colour motion picture making.
I believe that the 1889 film and other films of Friese-Green are held in a Paris Museum.
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