Rough Sea at Dover

Last updated

Rough Sea at Dover
Full film
Directed by Birt Acres
Produced byBirt Acres
Robert W. Paul
CinematographyBirt Acres
Release date
  • 14 January 1896 (1896-01-14)
Running time
39 seconds
Country United Kingdom
Language Silent

Rough Sea at Dover (also known as Gale at Dover and Sea Waves at Dover) is an 1895 British short black-and-white silent film, shot by Birt Acres. [1]

Contents

Acres shot the film in mid-1895, with a camera designed with and built by Robert W. Paul, their original intention being to supply films for viewing in the Edison kinetoscope. Projected, the film premiered on 14 January 1896 when Acres showed it to the Royal Photographic Society in Hanover Street, London, using his "Kinetic Lantern", along with various other films made during the period Acres was working with Paul. [2] Acres had screened some of these films (but not this film) to the Lyonsdown Photographic Society a few days before, on 10 January 1896, just two weeks after the first public screening by the Lumière Brothers in Paris. Following its successful screening in London the film was taken to the United States where it was shown on 23 April 1896 at Koster and Bial's Music Hall in New York City with a series of American movies made by the Edison's company.

Despite its simple nature, Rough Sea at Dover became one of the most popular and widely screened early British films. [3]

Content

The film consists of two distinct shots of different locations which have been edited together. It is not possible to tell with certainty whether these were edited together in the original release version. The first shot is of the rough sea as heavy waves crash against Admiralty Pier in Dover. The second shot is from a different location along a riverbank showing a view of fast-flowing water. It has been speculated that this second half of the footage has been taken from Niagara Falls No. 1: The Upper River Just Above The Falls , a film made by Acres late in 1895.

Current status

Given its age, this short film is available to view or download. It has also featured in a number of film collections, such as Primitives and Pioneers. [4]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Auguste and Louis Lumière</span> French filmmakers and inventors

The Lumière brothers, Auguste Marie Louis Nicolas Lumière and Louis Jean Lumière, were French manufacturers of photography equipment, best known for their Cinématographe motion picture system and the short films they produced between 1895 and 1905, which places them among the earliest filmmakers.

The history of film chronicles the development of a visual art form created using film technologies that began in the late 19th century.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cinematography</span> Art of motion picture photography

Cinematography is the art of motion picture photography.

The following is an overview of the events of 1895 in film, including a list of films released and notable births.

The following is an overview of the events of 1896 in film, including a list of films released and notable births.

The following is an overview of the events of 1897 in film, including a list of films released and notable births.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Kinetoscope</span> Motion picture exhibition device

The Kinetoscope is an early motion picture exhibition device, designed for films to be viewed by one person at a time through a peephole viewer window. The Kinetoscope was not a movie projector, but it introduced the basic approach that would become the standard for all cinematic projection before the advent of video: it created the illusion of movement by conveying a strip of perforated film bearing sequential images over a light source with a high-speed shutter. First described in conceptual terms by U.S. inventor Thomas Edison in 1888, it was largely developed by his employee William Kennedy Laurie Dickson between 1889 and 1892. Dickson and his team at the Edison lab in New Jersey also devised the Kinetograph, an innovative motion picture camera with rapid intermittent, or stop-and-go, film movement, to photograph movies for in-house experiments and, eventually, commercial Kinetoscope presentations.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Birt Acres</span> American and British photographer and film pioneer

Birt Acres was an American and British photographer and film pioneer. Among his contributions to the early film industry are the first working 35 mm camera in Britain (Wales), and Birtac, the first daylight loading home movie camera and projector. He also directed a number of early silent films.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Actuality film</span> Film genre using footage of real events

Actuality film is a non-fiction film genre that uses footage of real events, places, and things, a predecessor to documentary film. Unlike documentaries, actuality films are not structured into a larger narrative or coherent whole. During the era of early cinema, actualities—usually lasting no more than a minute or two and usually assembled together into a program by an exhibitor—were just as popular and prominent as their fictional counterparts. The line between "fact" and "fiction" was not as prominent in early cinema as it would become once documentaries became the predominant non-fiction filmmaking form. Actuality as a film genre is related to still photography.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Robert W. Paul</span> British cinema pioneer

Robert William Paul was an English pioneer of film and scientific instrument maker.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Max Skladanowsky</span> German inventor and early filmmaker

Max Skladanowsky was a German inventor and early filmmaker. Along with his brother Emil, he invented the Bioscop, an early movie projector the Skladanowsky brothers used to display a moving picture show to a paying audience on 1 November 1895, shortly before the public debut of the Lumière Brothers' Cinématographe in Paris on 28 December 1895.

The decade of the 1890s in film involved some significant events.

<i>LArroseur Arrosé</i> 1895 film by Louis Lumière

L'Arroseur Arrosé is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent comedy film directed and produced by Louis Lumière and starring François Clerc and Benoît Duval. It was first screened on June 10, 1895.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Film</span> Visual art consisting of moving images

A film, also known as a movie or motion picture, is a work of visual art that simulates experiences and otherwise communicates ideas, stories, perceptions, emotions, or atmosphere through the use of moving images that are generally accompanied by sound and other sensory stimulations. The word "cinema" is a shortening of the word "cinematography" and is used to refer to either filmmaking, the film industry, the overall art form, or a movie theater.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Georges Méliès</span> French filmmaker and illusionist (1861–1938)

Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès was a French magician, actor, and film director. He led many technical and narrative developments in the early days of cinema, primarily in the fantasy and science fiction genres. Méliès rose to prominence creating "trick films" and became well known for his innovative use of special effects, popularizing such techniques as substitution splices, multiple exposures, time-lapse photography, dissolves, and hand-painted colour. He was also one of the first filmmakers to use storyboards in his work. His most important films include A Trip to the Moon (1902) and The Impossible Voyage (1904).

<i>A Sea Cave Near Lisbon</i> 1896 British film

A Sea Cave Near Lisbon is an 1896 British short silent actuality film, directed by Henry Short, featuring a view looking out to sea through the Boca do Inferno cave near Lisbon, with waves breaking in. The film was popular with audiences and received positive reviews.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of film technology</span> Aspect of motion picture history

The history of film technology traces the development of techniques for the recording, construction and presentation of motion pictures. When the film medium came about in the 19th century, there already was a centuries old tradition of screening moving images through shadow play and the magic lantern that were very popular with audiences in many parts of the world. Especially the magic lantern influenced much of the projection technology, exhibition practices and cultural implementation of film. Between 1825 and 1840, the relevant technologies of stroboscopic animation, photography and stereoscopy were introduced. For much of the rest of the century, many engineers and inventors tried to combine all these new technologies and the much older technique of projection to create a complete illusion or a complete documentation of reality. Colour photography was usually included in these ambitions and the introduction of the phonograph in 1877 seemed to promise the addition of synchronized sound recordings. Between 1887 and 1894, the first successful short cinematographic presentations were established. The biggest popular breakthrough of the technology came in 1895 with the first projected movies that lasted longer than 10 seconds. During the first years after this breakthrough, most motion pictures lasted about 50 seconds, lacked synchronized sound and natural colour, and were mainly exhibited as novelty attractions. In the first decades of the 20th century, movies grew much longer and the medium quickly developed into one of the most important tools of communication and entertainment. The breakthrough of synchronized sound occurred at the end of the 1920s and that of full color motion picture film in the 1930s. By the start of the 21st century, physical film stock was being replaced with digital film technologies at both ends of the production chain by digital image sensors and projectors.

<i>Incident at Clovelly Cottage</i> 1895 film by Birt Acres

Incident at Clovelly Cottage, also known as Incident Outside Clovelly Cottage, Barnet, shot by Birt Acres and produced by Acres and his collaborator Robert W. Paul in March 1895, was the "first successful motion picture film made in Britain".

<i>The Teddy Bears</i> 1907 American film

The 'Teddy' Bears is a 1907 American silent film directed by Edwin S. Porter and Wallace McCutcheon, and produced by the Edison Manufacturing Company starting as the fairy tale Goldilocks and ending as a political satire of United States President Theodore Roosevelt.

References

  1. Rossell, Deac (2 January 2017). "Rough Sea at Dover: a genealogy". Early Popular Visual Culture. 15 (1): 59–82. doi:10.1080/17460654.2016.1263577. ISSN   1746-0654. S2CID   164772763.
  2. Barnes, John (1996–1998). The beginnings of the cinema in England 1894-1901. Maltby, Richard, 1952-. Exeter [England]: University of Exeter Press. pp. 65–67. ISBN   0859895645. OCLC   36996858.
  3. "Rough Sea at Dover". Screenonline. Retrieved 9 April 2007.
  4. "Buy Early Cinema: Primitives and Pioneers (2-DVD set) - Early Cinema: Primitives and Pioneers". shop.bfi.org.uk. Archived from the original on 9 January 2015. Retrieved 19 March 2019.