Cinema's Conversion to Sound

Cinema's Conversion to Sound

Author: Charles O’Brien

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2005-01-18

Total Pages: 222

ISBN-13: 9780253217202

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A groundbreaking look at the transition to sound in the French Cinema.


The Talkies

The Talkies

Author: Donald Crafton

Publisher: Univ of California Press

Published: 1999-11-22

Total Pages: 656

ISBN-13: 9780520221284

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This text offers readers a look at the time when sound was a vexing challenge for filmmakers and the source of contentious debate for audiences and critics. The author presents a view of the talkies' reception, amongst other issues.


Wonderstruck

Wonderstruck

Author: Brian Selznick

Publisher: Scholastic

Published: 2015-09-03

Total Pages: 325

ISBN-13: 1407166557

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Ben's story takes place in 1977 and is told in words. Rose's story in 1927 is told entirely in pictures. Ever since his mother died, Ben feels lost. At home with her father, Rose feels alone. When Ben finds a mysterious clue hidden in his mother's room, both children risk everything to find what's missing.


The Cambridge Companion to Film Music

The Cambridge Companion to Film Music

Author: Mervyn Cooke

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2016-12-08

Total Pages: 439

ISBN-13: 1107094518

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A stimulating and unusually wide-ranging collection of essays overviewing ways in which music functions in film soundtracks.


Sound or silence, loss or gain?

Sound or silence, loss or gain?

Author: Sabine Buchholz

Publisher: GRIN Verlag

Published: 2008-01-30

Total Pages: 13

ISBN-13: 3638906183

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Essay from the year 2005 in the subject Communications - Media History, grade: 1,3, University of Southampton (University of Southampton - School of Humanities: Film Studies), course: Image, Sound and Narrative in Late Weimar Cinem, language: English, abstract: “Put speech into films, and you will get speech plus film but you will not get a film.” Although, initially, sound films were considered to be only a temporary phenomenon that would never replace the silent picture, the transition to talkies proceeded more and more in Weimar cinema of the late 20’s, and, in 1931/32, the sound film completely replaced its predecessor, which had gone out of fashion finally. Yet, the new invention unmistakably evoked numerous debates about whether the addition of sound to cinema pictures rather should be seen as a pro- or regress within the evolution of film art. In view of that, this essay discusses the advantages and drawbacks of silent as well as of sound films. [...]


Movies, Songs, and Electric Sound

Movies, Songs, and Electric Sound

Author: Charles O'Brien

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2019-02-08

Total Pages: 228

ISBN-13: 0253040426

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How did the introduction of recorded music affect the production, viewing experience, and global export of movies? In Movies, Songs, and Electric Sound, Charles O’Brien examines American and European musical films created circa 1930, when the world’s sound-equipped theaters screened movies featuring recorded songs and filmmakers in the United States and Europe struggled to meet the artistic and technical challenges of sound production and distribution. The presence of singers in films exerted special pressures on film technique, lending a distinct look and sound to the films’ musical sequences. Rather than advancing a film’s plot, songs in these films were staged, filmed, and cut to facilitate the singer’s engagement with her or his public. Through an examination of the export market for sound films in the early 1930s, when German and American companies used musical films as a vehicle for competing to control the world film trade, this book delineates a new transnational context for understanding the Hollywood musical. Combining archival research with the cinemetric analysis of hundreds of American, German, French, and British films made between 1927 and 1934, O’Brien provides the historical context necessary for making sense of the aesthetic impact of changes in film technology from the past to the present.


Sound

Sound

Author: Kathryn Kalinak

Publisher: Rutgers University Press

Published: 2015-05

Total Pages: 234

ISBN-13: 081356428X

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Sound has always been an integral component of the moviegoing experience. Even during the so-called “silent era,” motion pictures were regularly accompanied by live music, lectures, and sound effects. Today, whether we listen to movies in booming Dolby theaters or on tiny laptop speakers, sonic elements hold our attention and guide our emotional responses. Yet few of us are fully aware of the tremendous collaborative work, involving both artistry and technical wizardry, required to create that cinematic soundscape. Sound, the latest book in the Behind the Silver Screen series, introduces key concepts, seminal moments, and pivotal figures in the development of cinematic sound. Each of the book’s six chapters cover a different era in the history of Hollywood, from silent films to the digital age, and each is written by an expert in that period. Together, the book’s contributors are able to explore a remarkable range of past and present film industry practices, from the hiring of elocution coaches to the marketing of soundtrack records. Not only does the collection highlight the achievements of renowned sound designers and film composers like Ben Burtt and John Williams, it also honors the unsung workers whose inventions, artistry, and performances have shaped the soundscapes of many notable movies. After you read Sound, you’ll never see—or hear—movies in quite the same way. Sound is a volume in the Behind the Silver Screen series—other titles in the series include Acting; Animation; Art Direction and Production Design; Cinematography; Costume, Makeup, and Hair; Directing; Editing and Special Visual Effects; Producing; and Screenwriting.


Film, a Sound Art

Film, a Sound Art

Author: Michel Chion

Publisher: Film and Culture Series

Published: 2009

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780231137775

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The author argues that watching movies is more than just a visual exercise--it enacts a process of audio-viewing. The audiovisual makes use of tropes, devices, techniques, and effects that convert multiple sensations into image and sound, therefore rendering, instead of reproducing, the world through cinema. This book considers developments in technology, aesthetic trends, and individual artistic style that recast the history of film as the evolution of a truly audiovisual language. It also explores the intersection of auditory and visual realms. The author describes the effects of audio-visual combinations claiming, for example, that the silent era (which he terms "deaf cinema") did not end with the advent of sound technology but continues to function underneath and within later films. He also discusses cinematic experiences ranging from Dolby multitrack in action films and the eerie tricycle of Stanley Kubrick's The Shining to the way actors from different nations use their voices and words.


Electric Sounds

Electric Sounds

Author: Steve J. Wurtzler

Publisher: Columbia University Press

Published: 2007

Total Pages: 424

ISBN-13: 9780231136778

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The 1920s and 1930s marked some of the most important developments in the history of the American mass media: the film industry's conversion to synchronous sound, the rise of radio networks and advertising-supported broadcasting, the establishment of a federal regulatory framework, and the birth of a new acoustic commodity in which consumers accessed stories, songs, and other products through multiple media formats. The innovations of this period not only restructured and consolidated corporate mass media interests while shifting the conventions of media consumption. They renegotiated the social functions assigned to mass media forms. In this impeccably researched history, Steve J. Wurtzler grasps the full story of sounds media, proving that the ultimate form technology takes is never predetermined but shaped by conflicting visions of technological possibility in economic, cultural, and political realms.