Edison, Dickson, and the Kinetoscope

Edison, Dickson, and the Kinetoscope

Thomas Edison & Dickson
1) In 1888, Thomas Edison, already the successful inventor of the phonograph and the electric
    light bulb, decided to design machines for making and showing moving photographs.
2)Much of the work was done by his assistant, W. K. L. Dickson.
3)Since Edison’s phonograph worked by recording sound on cylinders,
    the pair tried fruitlessly to make rows of tiny photographs around similar cylinders.
4) In 1889, Edison went to Paris and saw Marey’s camera, which used strips of flexible film.
5)Dickson then obtained some Eastman Kodak film stock and began working on a new type of
    machine.
6) By 1891, the Kinetograph camera and Kinetoscope viewing box were ready to be patented
   and demonstrated.
7) Dickson sliced sheets of Eastman film into strips 1 inch wide (roughly 35 millimeters),
    spliced them end to end, and punched four holes on either side of each frame so that
    toothed gears could pull the film through the camera and Kinetoscope.
8)Dickson’s early decisions influenced the entire history of the cinema;
9)35mm film stock with four perforations per frame remained the norm for over a hundred
   years.
10)(Amazingly, an original Kinetoscope film can be shown on a modern projector.)
11) Initially, however, the film was exposed at about forty-six frames per second—much
       faster than the average speed later adopted for silent filmmaking.

Edison Kinetograph Horizontal Camera Replica

Click Here for clip on how it worked

1)Before Edison and Dickson could exploit their machine commercially,
   they needed films.
2)They built a small studio, called the Black Maria, on the grounds of Edison’s New Jersey
   laboratory and were ready for production by January 1893.
3)The films lasted only twenty seconds or so—the longest run of film that the Kinetoscope
   could hold.
4)Most films featured well-known sports figures, excerpts from noted vaudeville acts, or
    performances by dancers or acrobats.

Edison and Phonograph & Kinetoscope Merchandising
1)Edison had exploited his phonograph by leasing it to special phonograph parlors,
   where the public paid a nickel to hear sound through earphones.
2) (Only in 1895 did phonographs become available for home use.)
3) He did the same with the Kinetoscope.
4) On April 14, 1894, the first Kinetoscope parlor opened in New York.
5) Soon other parlors, both in the United States and abroad, exhibited the machines.
6) For about two years the Kinetoscope was highly profitable,
    but it was eclipsed when other inventors,
7) inspired by Edison’s new device, found ways to project films on a screen.

Kinetoscope from "Edison" American Experience episode (PBS, 2015)
Clip of Edison - Eastman and Dickson work

Notes from film : Marey filmed birds with a gun type of machine. 
You have to have film that stops, get the image stops and does that 20-30 times a second need film strong and sensitive enough to do. Advance the film - stop it.