Comments on: 19th Century Color Motion Picture

By: Lindsey

Lindsey — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 03:50:01 +0000

This may actually be Loie Fuller, not just “in the style of.” According to her wikipedia page, her Serpentine Dance was filmed by the Lumiere brothers around 1896. I was thinking that sure looks like Loie Fuller, although of course it’s impossible to tell. Fascinating! She was an amazing woman.

By: MadMolecule

MadMolecule — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 14:58:06 +0000

@Croccydile: Unfortunately, nobody seems agree what the majority of silent films should be played back at, since there was no hard standard for several decades.

Why not play it back at whatever speed makes it look natural? No one watching it cares about fps; it’s just distracting to have it play back unnaturally fast. Viewers have an intuitive sense of how things “ought” to naturally look, in terms of gravity and momentum and such, and it’s the distortion of that that makes it disconcerting to watch.

I don’t think it would be terribly difficult to get “close enough” to natural speed, at least so it wouldn’t draw attention to itself. But then I’ve never tried, so maybe I’m wrong.

By: Minnesotastan

Minnesotastan — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 22:25:54 +0000

The reason people and vehicles seem to move more quickly in these old films is because that’s actually how things moved at that time. Because of frictional resistance the rotation of the earth is slowing down, and there is even evidence that time itself is slowing down. These old films provide an invaluable resource to show what life and movement was like in olden days…

By: Croccydile

Croccydile — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 21:30:46 +0000

Alot of the old Edison stuff actually shot faster (30+ fps) than what is used to day (24 fps) and alot of silent films were done at 16-18. I remember reading some of the first sound+film experiments that Edison did were actually 50 (!) fps.

Unfortunately, nobody seems agree what the majority of silent films should be played back at, since there was no hard standard for several decades.

By: elizabeth

elizabeth — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 18:56:10 +0000

Just beautiful. MadMolecule, I believe the fast motion comes from them not shooting as many frames per second as they do today, so when it plays on a regular speed projector, it looks sped up. Shouldn’t be difficult to alter that, so yeah, I don’t know why nobody does…. Anybody have an answer to this?

By: Robert

Robert — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 15:46:17 +0000

I saw a copy of the Great Train Robbery that was hand-painted. Didn’t look as well as this video, though.

By: MadMolecule

MadMolecule — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 15:17:13 +0000

This is really cool! I wonder, though: Why does old motion picture footage run so fast? Is it terribly difficult to slow it down to a more natural-looking speed?

By: Alex

Alex — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 06:55:57 +0000

Wow! That’s amazing …

By: Ali S.

Ali S. — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 05:34:40 +0000

I’m absolutely amazed by the seamless colouring!

By: Edward

Edward — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 23:49:06 +0000

Hasn’t the Internet grown into a stunning adolescent? Did its creators imagined that an 1899 movie would be made available for education and entertainment. Thank-you for this.