April 9, 2008

Putting Color Into the Movies (Jun, 1930)

Filed under: Movies, Origins — @ 11:08 pm
Source: Modern Mechanix ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Jun, 1930

Putting Color Into the Movies

Everyone has seen the new color-talkies on the screen, but few people know how the startlingly life-like color effects are produced. This article gives the story of how technicolor films are made.

by RAY FRASER

BACK in 1915, Herbert T. Kalmus, a struggling chemistry instructor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, invented a camera which took two pictures at the same click.

He had hopes that it would prove helpful to the country constable in trapping the speeding motorist. The picture thus obtained would prove scientifically the speed at which the automobile was traveling and also register the number of the vehicle.

When he tried to find his way to a practical application, he found that one camera of this type would cost more than the sum total of taxes collected by most townships for a single year. But he felt he had an idea and clung to it tenaciously.

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April 2, 2008

Builds Turret-Type Midget Racing Car (Sep, 1938)

Builds Turret-Type Midget Racing Car
BELIEVED to be the smallest electric-powered type in the world, a streamlined midget racing auto built by William Dube, of Worcester, Mass., is 31 inches high, 36 inches wide and six feet long. The novel car features a turret compartment for the driver and is said to be capable of a speed of 55 m.p.h. Four springs on each wheel provide knee-action riding.

Odd Machines Put Fun in Movies (Mar, 1935)

Filed under: Movies — @ 10:41 pm
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Mar, 1935

Odd Machines Put Fun in Movies

By John E. Lodge

MOVIE studio men were stumped when a comedy script called for an oyster that would open its shell and wink one eye. But a New York maker of comedy props welcomed the job. A few days later, he appeared at the studio carrying an ingenious shell made of papier-mache. The two halves opened and closed on a spring hinge and an eye within winked when a studio man pulled a hidden string.

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March 31, 2008

ANTIQUE JUKE BOXES (Mar, 1956)

Filed under: Music — @ 10:15 pm
Source: Mechanix Illustrated ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Mar, 1956

ANTIQUE JUKE BOXES

A rare find in a dusty attic led to Louis Kernstein’s role as an expert on old music machines.

TWENTY-FIVE years ago, Louis Kernstein found an old, dusty victrola in the attic of his family home in Freehold, N. J. The machine was in sad need of repair and Louis scoured his neighborhood for parts. He didn’t find the parts but he did discover all kinds of music boxes and machines which formed the basis of his present remarkable collection.

March 27, 2008

Beam of Light Carries Music (Apr, 1933)

Filed under: Music — @ 9:57 pm
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Apr, 1933

Beam of Light Carries Music

Powerful Ray Speeds Radio Program Across Half-Mile of City Buildings RADIO fans witnessed a twentieth-century marvel, the other night, when they listened to a radio program transmitted over a ray of light.

High in the tower of the Chrysler Building, in New York City, an orchestra played before a microphone. No land wire linked it to the broadcasting studio half a mile away. Instead, the blue beam of a 50.000-candlepower searchlight sped the music across intervening rooftops.

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Television Turret Camera Sends Movies of Olympics (Nov, 1936)

Filed under: Television — @ 9:56 pm
Source: Popular Mechanics ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Nov, 1936

That’s an amazingly modern looking camera for 1936.

Television Turret Camera Sends Movies of Olympics

Bleacherites ten miles away from the Olympic stadium saw the sports events by television. Mounted on a movable pedestal like a turret gun, a television movie camera trained its giant eye on the international games and transmitted the action pictures to distant bleachers and to a projection room in the German post-office headquarters. Done experimentally, the reception was not always clearly defined.

TESTS NOW SHOW IF CHILD IS TONE DEAF OR MUSICAL (Aug, 1931)

Filed under: Just Weird, Music — @ 9:56 pm
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Aug, 1931

TESTS NOW SHOW IF CHILD IS TONE DEAF OR MUSICAL

Has Junior a natural ear for music? Or are his piano lessons wasted effort? It’s easy to find out at once, according to Prof. Harold M. Williams, of the University of Iowa Child Welfare Research Station. Tests he has devised show whether a child has a real sense of rhythm and whether he can keep a tune in singing.

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New 1978 Electronic Games (Jan, 1978)

New 1978 Electronic Games

A host of video and nonvideo electronic games, many using microprocessors, promises the public more stimulating fun for leisure time.

BY KRIS JENSEN

A COUPLE of years ago, an electronic video game consisted of a simple “black box” that, when connected to a TV receiver, produced little more than some version of video table tennis. In some cases today, that black box is virtually a personal computer. Now there are games whose color images try your gambling instincts at blackjack, your “destroy” capability against an enemy tank, your patience and fortitude through a maze while a “cat” attempts to devour you, your artistic talent with computer-drawn pictures, or your knowledge of math and history. And that is just the beginning in video games!

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March 25, 2008

There’s Music in Everything (Jun, 1936)

Filed under: Music — @ 9:51 pm
Source: Popular Mechanics ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Jun, 1936

There’s Music in Everything

HAVE you ever been lulled to sleep by the musical click of the wheels as your train sped over steel rails? Have your fighting instincts been aroused by staccato drum beats or have you listened to tunes played on such improvised instruments as a musical saw, a length of pipe with a funnel in one end, a comb and piece of tissue paper, or a deflating automobile tube whose valve was fingered by the performer?

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March 23, 2008

TV’s Tiniest Actress (Sep, 1955)

Filed under: Television — @ 1:05 am
Source: Mechanix Illustrated ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Sep, 1955

TV’s Tiniest Actress

Barbra Loden cavorts in miniature on the Ernie Kovacs’ show, astounding and amusing audiences with her feats.

BARBRA Loden is TV’s tiniest performer by virtue of electronic wizardry. In reality she’s a shapely 5 ft., 5 in., 112-pound gal with a mighty fine specification sheet reading 36-23-34. She performs on Ernie Kovacs’ show twice a week, cavorting through a series of weird Lilliputian escapades dreamed up by Kovacs and director Barry Shear.

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March 18, 2008

NEW DOUBLE FEATURE - FISH AND FILMS! (Oct, 1955)

Filed under: Movies — @ 2:04 am
Source: Mechanix Illustrated ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Oct, 1955

NEW DOUBLE FEATURE - FISH AND FILMS!
James Beach never dreamed his customers would take home fish caught while watching his drive-in movie.

WHEN James Beach built his drive-in theatre on a lakeside at Winter Haven, Fla., he never thought that fish might be lurking in the waters offshore. But customers began lugging their fishing gear when they came to the movie and Beach soon noticed they were having good luck hauling in speckled perch and black bass. Enterprising Beach now provides fishing poles for patrons who park their autos around the rim of the 420-car lot. The one problem Beach hasn’t solved: free-loaders who pull up in boats.

March 15, 2008

Inventing Puzzles is Hobby of Professor (Jul, 1934)

Filed under: Toys and Games — @ 2:28 am
Source: Popular Science ( More articles from this issue )
Issue: Jul, 1934

Inventing Puzzles is Hobby of Professor

WHEN C. A. Jacobson, professor of chemistry at West Virginia University and the inventor of numerous pieces of laboratory equipment and a calculating machine, needs diversion, he turns to constructing puzzles. His interest in puzzles dates back forty years and he has been inventing them for more than twenty-five. His latest is a complicated block puzzle of unusual construction. One form of this puzzle is intended for use as a base for an inkwell. Professor Jacobson is shown here with a few puzzles from the huge collection he has acquired. One of Jacobson’s earliest puzzles was purchased by the famous Jack London.

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