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Zoetrope: created in the 1860's by several inventors and was very similar to the Phenakistoscope. It was a bowl like device with a strip of drawings around the interior circumference. When the bowl was spun, the viewer looked through slots where you could see a moving image.
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Thaumatrope: created by John Ayrton in Paris in 1862. This was a round card attached to a string, while one side was a a picture of a horse and the other a picture of a man in a riding position. When the card was spun, it seem as if the man was riding the horse.
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Eadweard muybridge makes a bet in the process creating the first optical illusion
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In 1885, two men named George Eastman and William H. Walker developed the very first reel of film.
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The Great Train Robbery was directed by Edwin S. Porter who was a former camera man for Thomas Edison.
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In 1905 an inexpensive way to view movies was created - the 5 cent movie theatre! The period of time in which these theatres were built was called the Nickelodeon era.
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Directors were receiving more and more recognition during the 1920's because they were using their own personal stylistic signatures on their products.
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The 1930's were a revival of documentaries and other non fiction films.
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Following the end of the war, the film industry raked in it's highest profits in the year 1946.
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Rock Around the Clock This film made in 1956 was the first movie ever to be entirely dedicated to rock n' roll.
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1963 was the worst year in film production.Most of the early film directors were either dead or retired. Some studios were still desperately hanging on and made money by offering studio tours, selling movie artifacts, or creating theme parks such as Disney World in Orlando, Florida.
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The 1970's started with a feeling of disillusionment due to the Viet Nam War. Movies seemed to portray this in their often violent military themes. Although the 60's ended with the downfall of Hollywood, the 70's was a decade of a creative high point in the U.S. film industry.