Modem Wizards of the Screen

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 98, 16 July 1927, Page 23

Modem Wizards of the Screen

Furnishing the Illusions

HOW THE FAN IS DECEIVED Meet Mr. Fred Waller, th® wizard of the screen Nothing is impossible to this modern magician of filmdom. He can make Cinderella’s coach disappear with even greater rapidity than did her Faery Godmother!

Opposite the Paramount studio in Astoria is a three-storey building where a dozen men are engaged in making miniature cities, models of yachts, buildings and bridges. Their wizardry is not confined to the mere fashioning of these rep’icas, for the chief feature of their iuties is in furnishing illusions that look real on the screen, such as Cinderella driving up in a jewelled coach to a citadel in the clouds or having tiny figures come to life front a magazine. Here is found the last word in this imaginative work, and Fred Waller, the guiding spirit of the department.

which is seldom open to visitors, takes a great pride in fathoming ways for presenting curious and fascinating effects.

This interesting workshop at first reminds one of a toymaker’s den, with its cast-off boats, bridges, Zeppelins, airplanes and tiny towns. One day a man was arranging a replica of Moscow which was about two feet square; another assistant appeared to be studying Euclid and mathematics; a carpenter was carving figures, and in a dark room a photographer was developing a special stretch of film with some peculiar combination of double printing. MINIATURE YACHT

In the first place it should be stated that although miniatures are made to look liko real objects through the de-

gree of the propinquity of the camera to them when they are pictured, they are none the less impressive. There was one yacht, for instance, which i*> by no means so small as one would think it might he It is eight feet lot and through a

motor it goes along under its own power. When it was depicted on the screen in a Gloria Swanson production, it was lighted inside. THE “BRIDGE BUILDERS” Mr. Waller’s work has many ramifications. He may be asked to obtain a revolving “shot” of Broadway at night. For this he has a camera affixed to a flexible shaft. The emulsion on the film is of an extreme degree of sensitiveness, and it cannot be kept for more than 24 hours without fogging. In the case of a bridge, which looked a tremendous undertaking in “Tin Gods,” the structure was about 22 feet long when completed. It had to be shown first when the bridge was started, then when the work had progressed and finally when the span was finished.

This model was manufactured of airplane spruce, and in making the miniature scenes Mr. Waller studied where the action o‘f the players was to be on the full scale, and then he worked out in the model or miniature “shots” everything in proportion. When the camera was turned on the model bridge the articulated figures had to be in positions to correspond to the full scale scenes.

Not a few persons have marvelled at the sequence in the pictorial translation of Sir James Barrie’s “A Kiss for Cinderella,” where the coach attached to four white horses appears to glide off into the clouds and pass through the gates of a city in the heavens. DEW AND MOTHS It was decided to have an inclne on a vacant lot and to obtain the nebulous effect through a scrim on which clouds were painted. Mr. Waller th zn discovered that the incline necessary would have to be much too steep for the horses to pull up the coach. He then suggested that a downwardinclined platform would give the horses a start to go up the steep incline. In a measure this was Jone, but the camera entered into the solution of the difficulty, for the apparatus was turned so that the downward incline looked to be on a level, and, therefore, the upward platform appeared much steeper than it was in reality. These scenes were taken at night time, and nine distinct photographe planes entered into the work. Six of these planes were mobile. In picturing these scenes one of the incidents that had not been calculated upon was the collecting of moisture or dew on the glass shields in front of the camera (part of this glass is painted

I for scenic effects). Through the aid I of nitrogen lamps this dew was mad* to disappear, but another difficulty I arose: moths were attracted by the j nitrogen lamps, and although one I would not think that a moth could cause much difficulty. nevertheless, when one of these pests fiies near a camera lens it comes out in the picture about as large as an eagle, j Mr. Waller eventually discovered a means to chase the moths away, ami he then went on with the shipping of th® jewelled coach to the skies, work [ on which was finished about 3 o'clock lin the morning. And next day it was ; with great gratification that Mr. Waller ; and others decided that the effect was perfect. TINY LIVING FIGURES ! In a picture entitled “The Americas Venus,” human figures walk out cf a magazine. To obtain this illusion a huge book was constructed with & desk in proportion to its size. The «xx»k I was large enough for girls to walk in and out of. To Mr. Waller this wuß purely elementaryThe difficulty was to have Ford Sterling turning the pages of a magazine and then to have the actresses appear suddenly to come to life and step out of the volume. This wan eventu;dlv effected by having the scale between the size of the actual magazine and the enormous one so accurately gauged before the camera tn , the small but living figures seemed to step from the magazine right under Mr. Sterling’s eyes. At present it is the keen desire oJ miniature scene-makers to have a. train collision look like a real one. Hitherto when the crash came the coaches bounced off the tracks. As a partial aid in this effect. Mr. Waller has some Balboa wood which splinters easily. Incidentally this tropical pith or Balboa wood weighs about half a« much as cork. Mr. Waller was a photographer before he entered the motion-picture game. He is the most satisfied person in the studio when he has conceived some new way of giving a satisfactory illusion on the screen.