Introduction: Historical Perspective

The world that we live in has become heavily reliant on video recording technology. In one sense, we rely on videos as consumers. We Facebook, Youtube, watch 3-D movies at the theatres and tune in to TV programmes made all over the world. We are entertained and make sense of the world in so many ways through different types of video. But in another sense, we also rely on videos as producers. Some capture our happiest moments on our phones to share them with others, or simply for keepsake, while others capture the darkest moments of humanity to evoke moral outrage, or simply to tell a story.

Wide diversity of film genres

As consumers and producers, people have both shaped and been shaped by videos, in highly interactive ways. Consumers interpret and attempt to make sense of what they see, while producers create and attempt to make something meaningful. In this interactive process, both are influenced and influence changes in the technology underlying video: its recording and editing. Video recording and editing technology in its current form today, was therefore not the inevitable outcome of a march towards more and more advanced computers; people might have been perfectly happy with still images, or just plain text. Neither was it result of the sheer will and desire of a mankind that simply had to have their 1080p HD cat videos; people might have sought out some other form of entertainment if the technology had not made video so appealing. Instead, the history of video recording technology should be understood as a non-linear movement towards different forms, differentiated not solely by their scientific or ontological properties, but also by the different ways in which they are used by producers and consumers to create and interpret meaning.

This report considers these issues as it examines the technology behind videos--which more broadly speaking, includes all kinds of motion pictures and films--as it makes major shifts from the early forms of moving images, to film, to the magnetic tape, and finally to the digital medium. This report also looks at two recurring themes throughout this history: the popularization and miniaturization of recording tools and attempts to create impressive spectacles through stereoscopy, or 3-D.

Next: Precursors of Motion Pictures