- Guido Seeber
Guido Seeber (
June 22 1879 inChemnitz –July 2 1940 inBerlin ) was a Germancinematographer and pioneer of early cinema.Seeber's father, Clemens, was a
photographer and therefore Seeber had experience with photography from an early age. In the summer of 1896, he saw the first films of theLumière Brothers and became fascinated by this new technology. He bought a film camera and devoted himself to the development ofcinematography and ofsound films .In 1908 he became technical manager of the film company "Deutsche Bioscop" [imdb company|0064793|Deutsche Bioscop GmbH (de)] and in 1909 directed his first film. His pioneering work as a cinematographer from this time on laid the foundations which other cameramen of German
silent film such asKarl Freund ,Fritz Arno Wagner andCarl Hoffman were able to build.In addition to his technical talents with the camera (he developed several
special effects techniques), his use of perspective and skillful contrasts between light and dark are noteworthy. His main collaborators were the directorsUrban Gad ,Lupu Pick ,Georg Wilhelm Pabst undPaul Wegener and among his most important accomplishments are the shots of the Doppelgänger in Wegener's "Der Student von Prag (The Student of Prague)" of 1913 and the moving camera shots in the films of Lupu Pick, particularly "Sylvester" (1923), which can be seen as anticipating the so-called "unchained camera" ofFriedrich Wilhelm Murnau 's "The Last Laugh " (1924).Seeber continued to work into the sound era, but his work from this period is less significant. He had suffered a
stroke in 1932 and after this he largely retired from active camera operation. However, he continued to be involved in the film industry, taking over the management ofUFA 'sanimation department in 1935 and publishing several books for amateur filmmakers.References
* Herbst, Helmut. "Drei Bildbeschreibungen und eine Liste. Der Filmpionier Guido Seeber." pp. 15-41 in C. Müller und H. Segeberg (ed.) "Die Modellierung des Kinofilms." Munich, 1998.
* Stiftung Deutsche Kinemathek (publ.) "Das wandernde Bild. Der Filmpionier Guido Seeber." Berlin, 1979.
*Castan, Joachim. "Max Skladanowsky oder der Beginn einer deutschen Filmgeschichte.", Stuttgart, 1995. ISBN 3-9803451-3-0. Highly interesting the relationship between Skladanowsky and Seeber.External links
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