You know you are getting old when:

[ChiTownScion]

LizzieMaine wrote: "Basic facts are one thing. It's how the facts are interpreted where propaganda comes into play, and there's no author of whatever point of view who doesn't indulge in it. A history book without propaganda is an almanac."

Absolutely! Being a historian by training, the basic rule is to answer the questions of who?, what?, when?, where?, why?, how?, and so what? The most important of these is So What?. That is where you earn your bread and butter. Its the author's analysis of factual data and their interpretation of Why Is This Important that makes a history interesting and useful. Just because the author has a known bias doesn't mean that what they wrote is useless. Just look at Procopius and his Secret History...

And this is why the American Civil War is the most popular topic in the Library of Congress. The Whys, Hows, and So Whats were debated before the first shot was fired on Fort Sumter, and they are debated to this day. The analyses run from the sublime to the ridiculous, but, so be it. Two individuals can read exactly the same books, articles, diaries, and letters, and draw opposite conclusions. And that's why it's such a rich field.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Indeed so. And the public image of Reconstruction that prevailed for the better part of the twentieth century was *entirely* a creation of propaganda, not "unbiased historical fact." The "Dunning School" was the most pervasive propaganda factory ever to pervade academia -- well, perhaps other than the CIA -- and it still has an influence today among people who were taught its beliefs growing up and thus assume that those beliefs have to be correct because otherwise why would they have been taught them in school? And that's how "history" is made.

 

[GHT]

Before I argued that faith schools must be high on the list of pervasive propaganda factories, i thought it best to read up on The Dunning School. Good grief, I'm shocked, seriously.

 

[vitanola]

Indeed so. And the public image of Reconstruction that prevailed for the better part of the twentieth century was *entirely* a creation of propaganda, not "unbiased historical fact." The "Dunning School" was the most pervasive propaganda factory ever to pervade academia -- well, perhaps other than the CIA -- and it still has an influence today among people who were taught its beliefs growing up and thus assume that those beliefs have to be correct because otherwise why would they have been taught them in school? And that's how "history" is made.

The wide acceptance of the "Dunning School" version of Reconstruction is, I think, a perfect demonstration of the Dunning-kruger effect in action.

 

[Trenchfriend]

When you finally like good handcream and you enjoy everytime, it's moisturizing your winterfingers so well.

 

[LizzieMaine]

The wide acceptance of the "Dunning School" version of Reconstruction is, I think, a perfect demonstration of the Dunning-kruger effect in action.

Dunning-Kruger pretty much explains the entire history of the world over the last seventy-five years.

 

[2jakes]

When you finally like good handcream and you enjoy everytime, it's moisturizing your winterfingers so well.

The realization that as you get older, your skin not only gets drier but more sensitive to
cuts and bleeding.

 

[PeterGunnLives]

I think part of the problem is that there is a rather sizable segment of society that refuses to watch any movie (or television show, for that matter) that was filmed in black and white. I've even spoken to people who were approximately my age (the tail end of the Baby Boomer generation) who felt the same way. Regardless of age, whenever I've asked why the response was almost always the same: "Because color is so much better!"

I think they are limiting themselves. Black and white photography and cinematography can be quite artistic and evocative. It has even been used to such effect within the last couple decades in period films like "The Artist" and "Good Night, and Good Luck."

In fact, some of the more artistically inclined filmmakers will tell you that color gives too much unnecessary visual information!

 

[2jakes]

I think they are limiting themselves. Black and white photography and cinematography can be quite artistic and evocative. It has even been used to such effect within the last couple decades in period films like "The Artist" and "Good Night, and Good Luck."

In fact, some of the more artistically inclined filmmakers will tell you that color gives too much unnecessary visual information!

I enjoy my favorite movies as they were originally produced.
The majority being film-noir black & white.
But I also enjoy early original color films as well.
Not to be confused with “colorized” versions of original B & W films.
Although I do enjoy them as a novelty, I prefer the originals whether
in color or otherwise.

 

[scottyrocks]

One not recent but not GE film that demands the B&W it was shot in is Eraserhead (1977). The overall mood of the film (psychotically depressing) could never have been carried off in color.

 

[Fading Fast]

One not recent but not GE film that demands the B&W it was shot in is Eraserhead (1977). The overall mood of the film (psychotically depressing) could never have been carried off in color.

I'm not familiar with that one, but for my money, the TV series "Babylon Berlin" which is shot in a beautifully muted color would lose nothing and possibly even gain atmosphere if shot in B&W.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Colorization 1909 style:

This film was shot in conventional black and white, and then hand-colored using the Pathecolor process. Developed by the Pathe company in France the process used a pantograph to trace enlarged images of each frame of the film, cutting a stencil of each section traced in a blank piece of film. This stencil was then used to apply colored dye to a black and white print, with multiple stencils used for different colors and sections of the frame. Every release print had to be dyed individually, so Pathecolor was usually used only for shorts, or for specific sections of features -- although occasionally an entire feature would get the treatment. The process remained in limited use into the early 1930s, although by the twenties it was already supplanted, for the most part, by more sophisticated color systems.

 

[Fading Fast]

Colorization 1909 style:

This film was shot in conventional black and white, and then hand-colored using the Pathecolor process. Developed by the Pathe company in France the process used a pantograph to trace enlarged images of each frame of the film, cutting a stencil of each section traced in a blank piece of film. This stencil was then used to apply colored dye to a black and white print, with multiple stencils used for different colors and sections of the frame. Every release print had to be dyed individually, so Pathecolor was usually used only for shorts, or for specific sections of features -- although occasionally an entire feature would get the treatment. The process remained in limited use into the early 1930s, although by the twenties it was already supplanted, for the most part, by more sophisticated color systems.

While impressive technology for the time, it also supports the view that colorization has always sucked.

 

[LizzieMaine]

When you see it on the big screen it's even more unsettling. The uneven application of the dye from frame to frame gives everything a "boiling" effect that's both distracting and unpleasant.

A lot of religious films of the 1900s and 1910s had Pathecolor versions, and are decidedly uninspiring. It was very popuiar to give Jesus, the Apostles, and other such figures "halos" around their heads, which came across more as undulating yellow amoebas.

 

[scottyrocks]

I'm not familiar with that one,

Well see it, then, but don't blame me if you are emotionally scarred for life.

 

[Zombie_61]

One not recent but not GE film that demands the B&W it was shot in is Eraserhead (1977). The overall mood of the film (psychotically depressing) could never have been carried off in color.

I saw Eraserhead once at the urging of one of my brothers-in-law, and that single viewing was more than enough for me. In terms of entertainment value, I consider it one of the worst movies I've ever seen. But in terms of cinematography, editing, and capturing an atmosphere that is both beautiful and unsettling, all of which combine to tell one of the strangest stories ever committed to film, it's one of the best.

 

[tonyb]

I never knew what a masochistic time at the movies was until I saw "Nekromantic."

Yes, I sat through the entire showing, in a tiny, almost hidden art house. I recall one reviewer saying something to the effect of it being the cinematic equivalent of hitting oneself over the head with hammer for 93 minutes.

 

[HanauMan]

I first saw the movie Eraserhead in 1980 and it really spoke of my teenage angst at the time. A disturbing film.

 

[LizzieMaine]

Two-color Technicolor at the zenith of its development in "The King Of Jazz" (1930)

Like the later three-strip Technicolor process, two-color was photographed on black and white film in a special camera fitted with a beam-splitter prism that directed light thru color filters -- one red/orange and the other blue/green. Two exposures were made for each frame, paired one upright/one upside-down on a single strip of film. This negative was used to prepare gelatin printing matrices, which generated the finished print using special dyes. Certain colors could not be recorded with this system -- no pure yellows, no pure blues -- but with careful set design and lighting reasonable approximations could be made. Two-color Technicolor was hugely popular in the early-talkie era, and was used in dozens of films released in 1929-30. It continued in use for cartoons and shorts thru 1935.

 

[EstherWeis]

I can't count how many tines that has happened. Way too many.

Why does it have to be so darn dark in restaurants?!?!

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You do like borrowing my eyes for that very issue