A film, also called a movie, motion picture, moving
picture, or photoplay, is a series of still images that, when shown on a
screen, create the illusion of moving images. This optical illusion
causes the audience to perceive continuous motion between separate
objects viewed in rapid succession. The process of filmmaking is both an
art and an industry. A film is created by photographing actual scenes
with a motion-picture camera, by photographing drawings or miniature
models using traditional animation techniques, by means of CGI and
computer animation, or by a combination of some or all of these
techniques, and other visual effects.
The word "cinema", short for cinematography, is often used to refer to
filmmaking and the film industry, and to the art of filmmaking itself.
The contemporary definition of cinema is the art of simulating
experiences to communicate ideas, stories, perceptions, feelings, beauty
or atmosphere by the means of recorded or programmed moving images along
with other sensory stimulations.
Films were originally recorded onto plastic film through a photochemical
process and then shown through a movie projector onto a large screen.
Contemporary films are now often fully digital through the entire
process of production, distribution, and exhibition, while films
recorded in a photochemical form traditionally included an analogous
optical soundtrack (a graphic recording of the spoken words, music and
other sounds that accompany the images which runs along a portion of the
film exclusively reserved for it, and is not projected).
The individual images that make up a film are called frames. In the
projection of traditional celluloid films, a rotating shutter causes
intervals of darkness as each frame, in turn, is moved into position to
be projected, but the viewer does not notice the interruptions because
of an effect known as persistence of vision, whereby the eye retains a
visual image for a fraction of a second after its source disappears. The
perception of motion is due to a psychological effect called the phi
phenomenon.
The name "film" originates from the fact that photographic film (also
called film stock) has historically been the medium for recording and
displaying motion pictures. Many other terms exist for an individual
motion-picture, including picture, picture show, moving picture,
photoplay, and flick. The most common term in the United States is
movie, while in Europe film is preferred. Common terms for the field in
general include the big screen, the silver screen, the movies, and
cinema; the last of these is commonly used, as an overarching term, in
scholarly texts and critical essays. In early years, the word sheet was
sometimes used instead of screen. |
