Auguste and Louis Lumière
Encyclopedia
| The Lumière Brothers Les frères Lumière |
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| Place of birth | Besançon Besançon Besançon , is the capital and principal city of the Franche-Comté region in eastern France. It had a population of about 237,000 inhabitants in the metropolitan area in 2008... , France France The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France... |
| Auguste | Auguste Marie Louis Nicolas Lumière October 19, 1862 (Lyon Lyon Lyon , is a city in east-central France in the Rhône-Alpes region, situated between Paris and Marseille. Lyon is located at from Paris, from Marseille, from Geneva, from Turin, and from Barcelona. The residents of the city are called Lyonnais.... , France) |
| Louis | Louis Jean Lumière October 05, 1864 (Bandol Bandol Bandol is a commune in the Var department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in southeastern France.-References:*... , French Riviera) |
| Occupation | Filmmakers Film director A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:... |
| Education | La Martiniere Lyon La Martiniere Lyon La Martiniere Lyon is the La Martiniere College branch in Lyon, France.Lyon hosts three La Martiniere colleges, which were all created by Claude Martin: La Martinière Monplaisir, La Martinière Duchère, and La Martinière Terreaux.... |
| Parents | Claude-Antoine Lumière (1840–1895) |
| Awards | Elliott Cresson Medal Elliott Cresson Medal The Elliott Cresson Medal, also known as the Elliott Cresson Gold Medal, was the highest award given by the Franklin Institute. The award was established by Elliott Cresson, life member of the Franklin Institute, with $1,000 granted in 1848... (1909) |
The Lumière (lymjɛːʁ) brothers, Auguste Marie Louis Nicolas (ogyst maʁi lwi nikɔla) (19 October 1862, Besançon
Besançon
Besançon , is the capital and principal city of the Franche-Comté region in eastern France. It had a population of about 237,000 inhabitants in the metropolitan area in 2008...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
– 10 April 1954, Lyon
Lyon
Lyon , is a city in east-central France in the Rhône-Alpes region, situated between Paris and Marseille. Lyon is located at from Paris, from Marseille, from Geneva, from Turin, and from Barcelona. The residents of the city are called Lyonnais....
) and Louis Jean (lwi ʒɑ̃) (5 October 1864, Besançon
Besançon
Besançon , is the capital and principal city of the Franche-Comté region in eastern France. It had a population of about 237,000 inhabitants in the metropolitan area in 2008...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
– 6 June 1948, Bandol
Bandol
Bandol is a commune in the Var department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region in southeastern France.-References:*...
), were among the earliest filmmakers
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...
in history. (Appropriately, "lumière" translates as "light" in English.)
Asteroid
Asteroid
Asteroids are a class of small Solar System bodies in orbit around the Sun. They have also been called planetoids, especially the larger ones...
775 Lumière
775 Lumière
-External links:*...
is named in their honour.
History
The Lumière brothers were born in BesançonBesançon
Besançon , is the capital and principal city of the Franche-Comté region in eastern France. It had a population of about 237,000 inhabitants in the metropolitan area in 2008...
, France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
, in 1862 and 1864, and moved to Lyon
Lyon
Lyon , is a city in east-central France in the Rhône-Alpes region, situated between Paris and Marseille. Lyon is located at from Paris, from Marseille, from Geneva, from Turin, and from Barcelona. The residents of the city are called Lyonnais....
in 1870, where both attended La Martiniere
La Martiniere Lyon
La Martiniere Lyon is the La Martiniere College branch in Lyon, France.Lyon hosts three La Martiniere colleges, which were all created by Claude Martin: La Martinière Monplaisir, La Martinière Duchère, and La Martinière Terreaux....
, the largest technical school in Lyon. Their father, Claude-Antoine Lumière (1840–1911), ran a photographic
History of the camera
The history of the camera can be traced back much further than the introduction of photography. Photographic cameras evolved from the camera obscura, and continued to change through many generations of photographic technology, including Daguerreotypes, calotypes, dry plates, film, and digital...
firm and both brothers worked for him: Louis as a physicist and Auguste as a manager. Louis had made some improvements to the still-photograph process, the most notable being the dry-plate process, which was a major step towards moving images.
It was not until their father retired in 1892 that the brothers began to create moving pictures. They patented a number of significant processes leading up to their film camera, most notably film perforations
Film perforations
Film perforations, also known as perfs, are the holes placed in the film stock during manufacturing and used for transporting and steadying the film. Films may have different types of perforations depending on film gauge, film format, and the intended usage...
(originally implemented by Emile Reynaud) as a means of advancing the film through the camera and projector. The cinématographe
Cinematographe
A cinematograph is a film camera, which also serves as a film projector and developer. It was invented in the 1890s.Note that this was not the first 'moving picture' device. Louis Le Prince had built early devices in 1886. His 1888 film Roundhay Garden Scene still survives.There is much dispute as...
itself was patented on 13 February 1895 and the first footage ever to be recorded using it was recorded on March 19, 1895. This first film shows workers leaving the Lumière factory.
First film screenings
The Lumières held their first private screening of projected motion pictures in 1895. Their first public screening of films at which admission was charged was held on December 28, 1895, at Salon Indien du Grand CaféSalon Indien du Grand Café
Le Salon Indien du Grand Café was a café in Paris at the Place de l'Opéra where on December 28, 1895, the Lumière brothers hosted the very first public moviescreening. Among the ten short clips presented by the French innovators were La Sortie des usines Lumière and l'Arroseur Arrosé.Currently, the...
in Paris. This history-making presentation featured ten short films, including their first film, Sortie des Usines Lumière à Lyon
Workers Leaving the Lumiere Factory
Workers Leaving The Lumière Factory in Lyon Workers Leaving The Lumière Factory in Lyon Workers Leaving The Lumière Factory in Lyon (also known as La Sortie des usines Lumière à Lyon (original title), Employees Leaving the Lumière Factory and Exiting the Factory (US titles) is an 1895 French short...
(Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory). Each film is 17 meters long, which, when hand cranked through a projector, runs approximately 50 seconds.
Léon Bouly
Léon Guillaume Bouly was a French inventor who created the word cinematograph.-Cinematograph:After devising chronophotography devices, Bouly applied a patent on a reversible device of photography and optics for the analysis and synthesis of motions, calling it the Cynématographe Léon Bouly on...
's cinématographe
Cinematographe
A cinematograph is a film camera, which also serves as a film projector and developer. It was invented in the 1890s.Note that this was not the first 'moving picture' device. Louis Le Prince had built early devices in 1886. His 1888 film Roundhay Garden Scene still survives.There is much dispute as...
device, which was patented the previous year. The cinématographe — a three-in-one device that could record, develop, and project motion picture
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
s — was further developed by the Lumières.
The public debut at the Grand Café came a few months later and consisted of the following ten short films (in order of presentation):http://www.institut-lumiere.org/francais/films/1seance/accueil.html
- La Sortie de l'Usine Lumière à LyonWorkers Leaving the Lumiere FactoryWorkers Leaving The Lumière Factory in Lyon Workers Leaving The Lumière Factory in Lyon Workers Leaving The Lumière Factory in Lyon (also known as La Sortie des usines Lumière à Lyon (original title), Employees Leaving the Lumière Factory and Exiting the Factory (US titles) is an 1895 French short...
(literally, "the exit from the Lumière factory in Lyon", or, under its more common English title, Workers Leaving the Lumiere Factory), 46 seconds - La VoltigeLa VoltigeLa Voltige is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent documentary film directed and produced by Louis Lumière. It was filmed in Lyon, Rhône, Rhône-Alpes, France...
("Horse Trick Riders"), 46 seconds - La Pêche aux poissons rougesLa Pêche aux poissons rougesPêche aux poissons rouges is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent documentary film directed and produced by Louis Lumière. It was filmed in Lyon, Rhône, Rhône-Alpes, France...
("fishing for goldfish"), 42 seconds - Le Débarquement du Congrès de Photographie à LyonThe Photographical Congress Arrives in LyonThe Photographical Congress Arrives in Lyon is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent documentary film directed and produced by Louis Lumière and starring P.J.C. Janssen as himself...
("the disembarkment of the Congress of Photographers in Lyon"), 48 seconds - Les ForgeronsLes ForgeronsLes Forgerons is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent documentary film directed and produced by Louis Lumière...
("Blacksmiths"), 49 seconds - Le Jardinier (l'Arroseur ArroséL'Arroseur ArroséL'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...
) ("The Gardener," or "The Sprinkler Sprinkled"), 49 seconds - Repas de bébéRepas de bébéRepas de bébé is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent documentary film directed and produced by Louis Lumière and starring Andrée Lumière....
("Baby's Breakfast" (lit. "baby's meal")), 41 seconds - Le Saut à la couvertureLe Saut à la couvertureLe Saut à la couverture is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent documentary film directed and produced by Louis Lumière....
("Jumping Onto the Blanket"), 41 seconds - La Place des Cordeliers à LyonPlace des Cordeliers à LyonPlace des Cordeliers à Lyon is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent documentary film directed and produced by Louis Lumière....
("Cordeliers Square in Lyon"--a street scene), 44 seconds - La Mer (Baignade en mer)La Mer (film)La Mer is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent documentary film directed and produced by Louis Lumière...
("the sea [bathing in the sea]"), 38 seconds
The Lumières went on tour with the cinématographe in 1896, visiting Bombay, London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
, Montreal
Montreal
Montreal is a city in Canada. It is the largest city in the province of Quebec, the second-largest city in Canada and the seventh largest in North America...
, New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
and Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires is the capital and largest city of Argentina, and the second-largest metropolitan area in South America, after São Paulo. It is located on the western shore of the estuary of the Río de la Plata, on the southeastern coast of the South American continent...
.
The moving images had an immediate and significant influence on popular culture with L'Arrivée d'un Train en Gare de la Ciotat
L'Arrivée d'un train en gare de la Ciotat
L'arrivée d'un train en gare de La Ciotat is an 1895 French short black-and-white silent documentary film directed...
(literally, "the arrival of a train at La Ciotat", but more commonly known as Arrival of a Train at a Station) and Carmaux, défournage du coke
Carmaux, défournage du coke
Carmaux, défournage du coke is a film made in 1896 by Lumière. The location was Carmaux, France near the Tarn River in southern France. It is a one minute sequence of men lifting a large coal block out of a smelter. One man is spraying water to cool the block while others use rakes to spread it out...
(Drawing out the coke). Their actuality film
Actuality film
The actuality film is a non-fiction film genre that like the documentary film uses footage of real events, places, and things, yet unlike the documentary is not structured into a larger argument, picture of the phenomenon or coherent whole. In practice, actuality films preceded the emergence of the...
s, or actualités, are often cited as the first, primitive documentaries. They also made the first steps towards comedy film with the slapstick of L'Arroseur Arrosé
L'Arroseur Arrosé
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...
.
Early colour photography
The brothers stated that "the cinema
Film
A film, also called a movie or motion picture, is a series of still or moving images. It is produced by recording photographic images with cameras, or by creating images using animation techniques or visual effects...
is an invention
Invention
An invention is a novel composition, device, or process. An invention may be derived from a pre-existing model or idea, or it could be independently conceived, in which case it may be a radical breakthrough. In addition, there is cultural invention, which is an innovative set of useful social...
without any future" and declined to sell their camera to other filmmakers such as Georges Méliès
Georges Méliès
Georges Méliès , full name Marie-Georges-Jean Méliès, was a French filmmaker famous for leading many technical and narrative developments in the earliest cinema. He was very innovative in the use of special effects...
. This made many film makers upset. Consequently, their role in the history of film was exceedingly brief. They turned their attentions to colour photography and in 1903 they patented a colour photography process, the "Autochrome Lumière
Autochrome Lumière
The Autochrome Lumière is an early color photography process. Patented in 1903 by the Lumière brothers in France and first marketed in 1907, it was the principal color photography process in use before the advent of subtractive color film in the mid-1930s....
", launched on the market in 1907. Throughout much of the 20th century, the Lumière company was a major producer of photographic products in Europe, but the brand name, Lumière, disappeared from the marketplace following its merger with Ilford
Ilford Photo
Ilford Photo is a manufacturer of photographic materials known worldwide for its black-and-white film and papers and chemicals, as well as its range of Ilfochrome and Ilfocolor colour printing materials. Ilfochrome was formerly called Cibachrome, developed in partnership with the Swiss company...
.
The Lumières also developed other products such as a loudspeaker, "Lumière tulle gras" (a dressing to heal burns) and the homonoid forceps
Forceps
Forceps or forcipes are a handheld, hinged instrument used for grasping and holding objects. Forceps are used when fingers are too large to grasp small objects or when many objects need to be held at one time while the hands are used to perform a task. The term 'forceps' is used almost exclusively...
(a medical tool).
Other early cinematographers
The Lumière Brothers were not the only ones to claim the title of the first cinematographers. The scientific chronophotographyChronophotography
Chronophotography is an antique photographic technique from the Victorian era , which captures movement in several frames of print. These prints can be subsequently arranged either like animation cels or layered in a single frame...
devices developed by Eadweard Muybridge
Eadweard Muybridge
Eadweard J. Muybridge was an English photographer who spent much of his life in the United States. He is known for his pioneering work on animal locomotion which used multiple cameras to capture motion, and his zoopraxiscope, a device for projecting motion pictures that pre-dated the flexible...
, Étienne-Jules Marey
Étienne-Jules Marey
Étienne-Jules Marey was a French scientist and chronophotographer.His work was significant in the development of cardiology, physical instrumentation, aviation, cinematography and the science of labor photography...
and Ottomar Anschütz
Ottomar Anschütz
Ottomar Anschütz was an inventor, photographer, and chronophotographer.-Biography:He invented 1/1000 of a second shutter, and the "electrotachyscope" in 1887...
in the 1880s were able to produce moving photographs, as was Thomas Edison
Thomas Edison
Thomas Alva Edison was an American inventor and businessman. He developed many devices that greatly influenced life around the world, including the phonograph, the motion picture camera, and a long-lasting, practical electric light bulb. In addition, he created the world’s first industrial...
's Kinetoscope
Kinetoscope
The Kinetoscope is an early motion picture exhibition device. Though not a movie projector—it was designed for films to be viewed individually through the window of a cabinet housing its components—the Kinetoscope introduced the basic approach that would become the standard for all cinematic...
, premiered in 1891. Since 1892, the projected drawings of Émile Reynaud's Théâtre Optique
Théâtre Optique
The Théâtre Optique was a moving picture show presented by Charles-Émile Reynaud in 1892. It was the first presentation of projected moving images to an audience, predating Auguste and Louis Lumière's first public performance by three years.- History :...
were attracting Paris crowds to the Museé Grevin. Louis Le Prince
Louis Le Prince
Louis Aimé Augustin Le Prince was an inventor who is considered by many film historians as the true father of motion pictures, who shot the first moving pictures on paper film using a single lens camera....
had been shooting moving picture sequences on paper film as soon as 1888, but had never performed a public demonstration. Polish inventor, Kazimierz Prószyński
Kazimierz Prószynski
Kazimierz Prószyński was a Polish inventor active in the field of cinema. He patented his first film camera, called Pleograph , before the Lumière brothers, and later went on to improve the cinema projector for the Gaumont company, as well as invent the widely used hand-held Aeroscope...
had built his camera and projecting device, called Pleograph
Pleograph
Pleograph was an early type of movie camera constructed in 1894, before those made by the Lumière brothers, by Polish inventor Kazimierz Prószyński. Prószyński later constructed the first hand held camera called an Aeroscope....
, in 1894. Max and Emil Skladanowsky
Max Skladanowsky
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 the first moving picture show to a paying audience on November 1, 1895, some two months before the public debut of...
, inventors of the Bioskope, had offered projected moving images to a paying public one month earlier (November 1, 1895, in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
). Nevertheless, film historians consider the Grand Café screening to be the true birth of the cinema as a commercial medium, because the Skladanowsky brothers' screening used an extremely impractical dual system motion picture projector that was immediately supplanted by the Lumiere cinematographe.
Although the Lumière brothers were not the first inventors to develop techniques to create motion pictures, they are often credited as one of the first inventors of Cinema as a mass medium, and are among the first who understood how to use it. By comparison, it is argued that Thomas Edison may have meant his invention as entertainment for rich people, not as a movie to be seen in public.
See also
- 1895 in film1895 in film-Events:* February–March - Robert W. Paul and Birt Acres build and run the first working 35 mm movie camera in Britain, the Kineopticon. Their first films include Incident at Clovelly Cottage, The Oxford and Cambridge University Boat Race and Rough Sea at Dover.* In France, the brothers...
- 1896 in film1896 in film-Events:* January - In the United States, the Vitascope film projector is designed by Charles Francis Jenkins and Thomas Armat. Armat begins working with Thomas Edison to manufacture it....
- 19th century in film19th century in film-Events:*1826 - Nicephore Niepce takes the first photograph in history. *1832 - Joseph Plateau and Simon von Stampfer introduced simultaneously a scientific demonstration device that creates an optical illusion of movement by mounting drawings on the face of a slotted, spinning disk...
- History of filmHistory of filmThe history of film is the historical development of the medium known variously as cinema, motion pictures, film, or the movies.The history of film spans over 100 years, from the latter part of the 19th century to the present day...
Further reading
- Chardère, B.; Borgé, G. and M. (1985). Les Lumière, Paris: Bibliothèque des Arts. ISBN 2-85047-068-6 (Language: French)
- Chardère, B. (1995). Les images des Lumière, Paris: Gallimard. ISBN 2-07-011462-7 (Language: French)
- Rittaud-Hutinet, Jacques. (1985). Le cinéma des origines, Seyssel: Champ Vallon. ISBN 2-903528-43-8 (Language: French)
External links
- Société d'encouragement pour l'industrie nationale
- The films shown at the first public screening (Quicktime format) — December 28, 1895. Also includes a program for the event.
- Le musée Lumière — Lumière Museum
- autochrome color still of the Lumiere Brothers , 1907