Two men shake hands for the Kinetograph.Two men shake hands for the Kinetograph.Two men shake hands for the Kinetograph.
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaAn experimental film, never released to the public. Selected frames were published in the journal The Phonogram in 1892.
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Let's Shake on It
While I know pretty much everything about the earliest motion pictures, there's one thing I don't understand: why, when compared to the Kinetoscopic shorts of 1891, Edison's 1892 output was so much worse in quality than previously. Take, for example, the beautifully photographed "Dickson Greeting" and "Men Boxing" of the previous year and compare it to this short: why did the quality drop so low? "A Handshake" is grainy, blurry and poorly lit, (how'd were they even able to identify Dickson and Heise as the two men?) and I have a hard time understanding why this was so. Either time has not been easy on the film, they used a different type of filmstrip which proved unsuccessful, or they altered the camera to improve the visual look even more and actually made it worse. Either way, it's mystifying to see how poor the footage is when viewed now.
I can't blame it all on time, filmstrip or camera, though, as there is yet another possible reason why the end result is so bad. Let's suppose that I was trying to invent the Kinetograph, and I would want a good test subject: would I want to go with a small gesture of little movement or a big gesture with a clear amount of action? Clearly the latter, and I think that's what caused this experiment to end up not as successful: the little gesture within frame doesn't show a obvious movement and thus makes the motion not as clear when seen now. An exaggerated wave or a bow would have provided a much better amount of movement.
But it's good to experiment, and I'm sure the results of this test (for that's all it is, a test) taught Heise and Dickson a very important lesson.
I can't blame it all on time, filmstrip or camera, though, as there is yet another possible reason why the end result is so bad. Let's suppose that I was trying to invent the Kinetograph, and I would want a good test subject: would I want to go with a small gesture of little movement or a big gesture with a clear amount of action? Clearly the latter, and I think that's what caused this experiment to end up not as successful: the little gesture within frame doesn't show a obvious movement and thus makes the motion not as clear when seen now. An exaggerated wave or a bow would have provided a much better amount of movement.
But it's good to experiment, and I'm sure the results of this test (for that's all it is, a test) taught Heise and Dickson a very important lesson.
helpful•00
- Tornado_Sam
- Nov 15, 2017
Details
- Runtime1 minute
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.33 : 1
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