visual art form film technologies 19th century film Lumière brothers cinematographic Skladanowsky brothers Bioscop film production companies
The history of film chronicles the development of a visual art form created using film technologies that began in the late 19th century. The advent of film as an artistic medium is not clearly defined. However, the commercial, public screening of ten of the Lumière brothers' short films in Paris on 28 December 1895, can be regarded as the breakthrough of projected cinematographic motion pictures. There had been earlier cinematographic results and screenings by others, like the Skladanowsky brothers, who used their self-made Bioscop to display the first moving picture show to a paying audience on 1 November 1895, in Berlin, but they had neither the quality, financial backing, stamina, or luck to find the momentum that propelled the cinématographe Lumière into worldwide success. Those earliest films were in black and white, under a minute long, without recorded sound, and consisted of a single shot from a steady camera. The first decade of motion pictures saw film move from a novelty to an established mass entertainment industry, with film production companies and studios established all over the world.
