The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1920-07-16

VI Att4o 6kSfdt0E6 UNDERNEATH Ju6 SET
operated by large corps of men under
Mr.. Halls direction.
One of these miniature mechanical
marvels cost twenty-four thousand dol
lars to build. There was no fake about
that! "Mr. Griffith almost laughed
himself sick when he saw the thing
operated" says Hall. But SO amazing
ly perfect was the complicated device
that these manikins were shown spear
ing each other, battling furiously VITA
swords, falling in combat, and even
hurting balls of fire from the parapets
so realistically that no eye has ever
been skilled enough to get a suspicion
of fake No wonder Griffith laughed
The illusion was perfect by host
of real, moving humans in the scenes
and this was another achievement of
Hall plus Griffith-to make the false
dovetail. so perfectly with the real
that an expert camera man could not
tell one from t'other.
Revealing this does not detract from
Grifith's wonderful work in 'Intol-
erence." In most of the big scenes he
marshaled and directed vast numbers
of people-so many that the salary list
of Intolerance" has never been even
approached by any other picture.
An amusing piece Of taking was
done under Halls master-hand in a
fairy play. They asked him to corr
ceive some way in which a dragon
could be shown pursuing children.
Hall got young denizen of one of the
Southern California alligator farms and
"dolled it up" with horns, claws, and
other accouterments of a husky dra-
gon. Then he had the children photo
graphed running up steps to refuge
in an enchanted tower.
Running the film back, he made a
second exposure showing the dragon
crossing the foreground in all his hor-
rife design crawling up the steps and
finding himself baffled by the enchant-
ed door-sill. Maybe we didn't have I.
time making that dragon act his role"
said Hall. The skill of the thing con.
sisted in the mathematical accuracy
with which the double exposure had
to be done. The illusion was perfect.
Another wizard of the camera-mas-
ter of them all, in fact, in the making
of fake thrill stuff as it is known in
the argot of the studios Fred Jack
man head of the Photographic staff for
Sennett. 1t is generally Sennett who
conceives the situations; it is Jackman
who puts them into execution. Says
the writer:
the top of the Washington Monument,
landing on his feet, and walking away
with an unruffled cigar in his mouth.
He's nice about refusing to give away
the tricks of his trade, explaining that
in his particular line it's especially de-
sirable to keep the people guessing
which is real and which is fake.
make no mistake about this" he
said; "most of the thrill stuff you see
nowadays in our films is genuine.
Audiences have grown wise and de-
mand the real thing. Too many of
them know when you are resorting to
tricks to try to pull the old simple stuff
on them. What we do now is the
rarity, and it's got to be so good that
they can't detect it."
But Jackman admits that he does
put it over them now and then. He's
so expert, in fact, that often other
producers borrow him from Sonnet for
particularly difficult trick photography.
He told how he made a bony horse
eat bag of oats and grow fat before
your eyes. He photographed cad
averous old Dobbin eating the feed
Then he faded the scene out with six
turns of the crank. Then he substi-
tuted a horse swollen up with wind
collie.
Next he turned the film back six
turns and faded in. The optical eff
feet is an animal gaining hundred
weight in few seconds. In the same
way he made frightened darby turn
snow-white. But it's not so simple as
it sounds. The dareky had to retire
to put on a white makeup, but before
doing so another camera was trained
on him and his exact location was
sketched on the glass plate.
If, in retaking the scene, the darby
had been a small part of an inch out
of the position he left, the figure would
appear to jump on the screen and the
trick would be spotted. When the
darby came back he was located in