Question re 1940 Toho Musical Film Extravaganza Etc.

[Aaron Gerow]

Just a note on color:

First, as with many cinemas around the world, tinting and toning and  
hand coloring was evident from the early years of Japanese cinema.

Also, Japan made color films as early as the 1910s when Tenkatsu-- 
who's name comes from Tennenshoku Katsudo Shashin Kaisha--made a  
number of shorts using Charles Urban's Kinemacolor process.

One sees color films appearing every once in a while after that, even  
among amateur filmmakers. Nakai Masakazu and his group made one in  
the 1930s. Those who went to the NFC screening for Alt-SCMS got to  
see a abstract experimental color film by Ogino Shigeji entitled An  
Expression from 1935. It uses the same kind of process as  
Kinemacolor, which creates color through an additive process where  
alternating frames have different primary colors.


Aaron Gerow
KineJapan owner

Assistant Professor
Film Studies Program/East Asian Languages and Literatures
Yale University

For list commands, send "information kinejapan" to
listserver at lists.acs.ohio-state.edu
Kinema Club: http://pears.lib.ohio-state.edu/Markus/Welcome.html