This is the second edition of my work which continues to be an ongoing project, as I am still learning of pre cinema pioneers I had not known of when I started in 1990. At that time, I was doing so on hard copy and was negotiating with Indiana University Press.
At that time e-books did not exist and there were no gif’s, mp4’s or videos in books. How better to illustrate than through motion. The web was the perfect forum.
I abandoned my negotiation with my editor, taking advantage of the new medium. It was just as well seeing that she had run off with a lot of manuscripts, including mine.
More on me in ABOUT, but for the moment, I am an amateur historian, studying the history of how the movies came to be and as of 2025, I am in my 35th year of research.
DYK that the word cinema is derived from the Greek word kinema-matos meaning the science of pure motion?
I cover the entire period of pre cinema. Simply put, pre cinema began when God said
“let there be light”
This is because without light going through the pinhole, we wouldn’t have any movies. We would only have hand-drawn animation. Photography is required for motion pictures and of course photography comes to us by way of the pinhole which enters the camera and is captured.
I therefore begin the study of pre cinema at the beginning of time.
My purpose here is not to induce controversy around the parentage of commercial cinema, or the year it finally came of age. Nor do I want to argue about the difference between projected, painted disks vs. disks with photographs, or celluloid versus sensitized paper strips, or whether a nickle was paid to get in. My work is only to provide factual data on the grounds of well documented material from scholars around the world, as it says in the left margin, who have already completed the original research.
However, from time to time I do stumble upon names and devices that no one else seems to know about. I include those revelations in their appropriate chapter seeing that this is a ‘chronology.’ Therefore please check back frequently for new additions.
Illustration called Chambre Noire by Alphonse De Neuville in 1867, is taken from a 19th century book by Fulgence Marion entitled The Wonders of Optics published in 1869. Animated and colourised.
A key focus of this study will be the pinhole image and it’s effect through the Camera Obscura. However, it will not end there as there are so many elements, people, contraptions, devices, apparatuses and topics involved, suffice to say they cannot all be listed here.
Come and be surprised at where, when and how the movies first began. You can also visit me daily at X https://x.com/RealPreCinema. I post non-chronological entries every day from this 2nd edition.
Follow @RealPreCinema and be amazed.
Feel free to email me at hotdoc@precinemahistory.com I would love to correspond.
You are now invited, to view the chronology of events leading from the pinhole image which was seen by the first humans at the beginning of time, to the silver screen of 1900.
This, is the genesis of the cinema.
– Paul Burns
| Welcome | About | Introduction | Chapter One beginning of time – 999 AD |
| Chapter Two 1000 AD – 1399 | Chapter Three 1400 – 1599 | Chapter Four 1600 – 1649 | Chapter Five 1650 – 1699 |
| Chapter Six 1700 – 1749 | Chapter Seven 1750 – 1799 | Chapter Eight 1800 – 1819 | Chapter Nine 1820 – 1829 |
| Chapter Ten 1830 – 1839 | Chapter Eleven 1840 – 1849 | Chapter Twelve 1850 – 1859 | Chapter Thirteen 1860 – 1869 |
| Chapter Fourteen 1870 – 1879 | Chapter Fifteen 1880 – 1884 | Chapter Sixteen 1885 – 1889 | Chapter Seventeen 1890 – 1894 |
| Chapter Eighteen 1895 – 1896 | Chapter Nineteen 1897 – 1899 | Chapter Twenty 1900 + post cinema | Chapter Twenty-One Addendum 1911+ |
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