How Movies Are Made (Filmmaking)

Have you ever sat in a dark room, watched a giant screen light up, and felt like you were flying to a new galaxy or swimming deep under the sea. That’s me. I’m the magic that makes pictures move and stories come alive. I can make you giggle with a silly cartoon character, hold your breath during a thrilling chase, or feel a happy tear when friends say goodbye. I’m not a wizard’s spell, but a special kind of trick I play with your eyes and your heart. I take thousands of still pictures and flash them by so fast that your brain sees them as one moving story. So, what am I. I am Filmmaking, and I love telling stories.

A long, long time ago, people wished they could make their drawings and photographs move. In the 1800s, they created fun toys like the Zoetrope that spun pictures to create a flicker of motion. Then, in 1878, a photographer named Eadweard Muybridge took many pictures of a horse running. He wanted to see if all four of its hooves ever left the ground at the same time. His pictures proved they did. This gave two brothers in France, Louis and Auguste Lumière, a brilliant idea. They invented a special machine called the Cinématographe that could both record and show moving pictures. On December 28th, 1895, they showed their very first movies to a crowd in Paris. People gasped when they saw a train on the screen that looked like it was coming right at them. For a while, I was quiet—actors told stories with just their faces and bodies. But in 1927, I learned to talk in a movie called The Jazz Singer. Then, in 1939, I burst into brilliant color with films like The Wizard of Oz, painting whole new worlds for everyone to see.

Today, I'm bigger and more creative than ever. With the help of computers, I can build entire worlds from imagination. The first movie made completely by computers was Toy Story in 1995, and it showed that stories could look real even if they were made of pixels. But I’m not just one person’s idea. I am a team. I am the writer who dreams up the adventure, the director who guides the actors, the camera operator who captures the action, and the editor who pieces it all together like a puzzle. I am sound, music, and color all working together. I help people from all over the world share what it’s like to be them. I show us that even though we might live far apart, we all feel joy, sadness, and excitement. I am a way to share dreams with the world, and maybe one day, you’ll use me to tell your very own story.