Wolf’s Advent Calendar 2018

By
EARL THEISEN
Honorary Curator
Motion Pictures
Los Angeles Museum

The International Photographer April 1934 p.10

THE most important of the dramatic devices of the motion picture is light. Light and shade are the most vital of the cinematic tools.

Emotions are literally painted with light. George Raft, for example, is depicted in love by a special soft lighting in one scene and in the next, through the use of a harsh light, he is a menace. Pastoral and spring-like effects are the result of soft, shimmery “catch light” and after changing the lights on the same set, it becomes a suitable setting for any villainy.

The flashing and uncertain lighting of the mystery picture gives rise to fear. Menace is portrayed by “hard” lighting” the features. Any desired reaction can be gained by the light artist. [Read more…] about CINEWOLF X-MAS-SURPRISE 12: PART of the STORY of LIGHTING

Your Hit Parade is an American radio and television music program that was broadcast from 1935 to 1955 on radio, and seen from 1950 to 1959 on television. It was sponsored by American Tobacco’s Lucky Strike cigarettes. During this 24-year run, the show had 19 orchestra leaders and 52 singers or groups. 

By Paul R. Harmer

from The International Photographer April 1934 pg.8

NATURAL publicity such as an earthquake is quickly taken advantage of by showmen and we have the best in the business here in Hollywood, but making a natural cataclysm perform on
schedule, so the world may see for itself just how a major earthquake looks in action, is a problem attempted only by the world’s greatest optimists. They do it and it is genuine, except that the casualties get well immediately, when the directors shouts “cut.”

It is true that some companies have taken advantage of the wreckage caused by erathquakes, but in this article we are concerned only with the ones where moving picture stars and actors are woven into a series of incidents and adventures, during the filming of a major motion picture production.

The fact that THE INTERNATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHER is a professional and technical magazine and its circulation is almost entirely confined to the workers in the motion picture industry is the only reason such an article as this can be attempted. [Read more…] about CINEWOLF X-MAS-SURPRISE 09: SYNTHETIC EARTHQUAKES MADE TO ORDER IN THE MOTION PICTURE STUDIOS

from MOTION PICTURE REVIEWS
THE WOMEN S UNIVERSITY CLUB
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA
FEBRUARY 1936 pg.3

NOTE
With the permission of the Public Schools of Denver, Colorado, we are reprinting a portion of a pamphlet by Katherine Anne Ommaney, instructor of dramatics at North High School. It seems that it provides a most valuable set of standards by which to measure one’s critical faculty and consequently one’s ability to appreciate pictures.
—
The Editors.

HOW TO ENJOY MOTION PICTURES

The Relation of the Motion Picture to Youth and the School

Schools which conscientiously seek to provide for young people a curriculum related to real life situations and needs cannot avoid giving consideration to current motion pictures. The material which follows is intended to assist teachers in giving instruction relative to motion pictures.
[Read more…] about CINEWOLF X-MAS-SURPRISE 08: HOW TO ENJOY MOTION PICTURES

“Trick” Photography Methods
Summarized
(Continued from Page 9)
(unfortunately there is no source of page nine until now please inform ME of any findings)

[…] spot light photographed through a copper wire screen to give the shimmering rays which are shown in the conventional paintings representing this sacred history. The massive walls of Fort Schuyler furnished the walls of the City of Jerusalem and the Wise Men followed the Star on the backs of camels in the Bronx Zoo. Photographs of the pyramids were double exposed above a location on a sandy beach for the sojourn in Egypt and the pillared portico of a rich patent medicine manufacturers’ home, served as the architecture of the Roman Court.

Great Demand

Nearly seven hundred prints from the original and two dupe negatives which had to be made to supply the demand were sold and some of the prints are still listed by educational exchanges. Orders were still coming in when the negatives were destroyed in a disastrous studio
fire. [Read more…] about CINEWOLF X-MAS-SURPRISE 07: “Trick” Photography Methods Summarized

By W. Wallace Clendenin
(Pinch Hitting This Month for Earl Theisen)

from The International Photographer February 1934 p.12

BIOGRAPH produced pictures in Los Angeles in 1906, it being the first company to do so, but it did not at that time build a studio. This honor goes to William N. Selig, who, in 1909, built the first moving picture studio on the Pacific coast. This was at the northeast corner of Clifford and Allesandro streets (this portion of Allesandro has since become a part of Glendale boulevard) in Edendale. Selig had faith in the future of the film industry and proved it by building a complete studio from the ground up—stucco buildings, a stucco wall around the property and most remarkable of all, a glass enclosed stage.

Closely following Selig came the Bison Company.
[Read more…] about CINEWOLF X-MAS-SURPRISE 06: Hollywood Studios of the Early Days