Editing William Friese-Greene

{{Short description|British photographer and inventor (1855–1921)}}
{{Use British English|date=February 2012}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2020}}
{{Infobox person
|name = William Friese-Greene
|birth_name = William Edward Green
|birth_date = {{birth date|df=yes|1855|09|7}}
|birth_place = [[Bristol]], England
|death_date = {{Death date and age|df=yes|1921|05|5|1855|09|7}}
|death_place = [[London]], England
|resting_place = [[Highgate Cemetery]]
|resting_place_coordinates = 
|nationality = British
|image = Williamfriesegreen.jpg
|caption = Friese-Greene c. 1890
|other_names = 
|known_for = [[Motion pictures]] • [[printing]] • [[photography]]
|education = 
|employer = 
|occupation = [[Inventor]] • [[photographer]]
|title = 
|networth = 
|height = 
|term = 
|predecessor = 
|successor = 
|party = 
|boards = 
|spouse = Victoria Mariana Helena Friese<br>(m. 1874-1895, her death)<br>Edith Jane Harrison<br>(m. 1897-1921; his death)
|children = 7, including [[Claude Friese-Greene|Claude]]
|relatives = [[Tim Friese-Greene]] (great-grandson)
|signature = 
|website = 
|footnotes = 
}}
'''William Friese-Greene''' (born '''William Edward Green''', 7 September 1855 – 5 May 1921) was a prolific English [[inventor]] and professional [[photographer]]. He was known as a pioneer in the field of [[motion pictures]], having devised a series of [[cameras]] between 1888–1891 and shot moving pictures with them in [[London]]. He went on to [[patent]] an early two-colour filming process in 1905. Wealth came with inventions in [[printing]], including [[phototypesetting]] and a method of printing without ink, and from a chain of photographic [[studios]]. However, Friese-Greene spent all his money on inventing, went [[bankrupt]] three times, was [[jailed]] once, and died in [[poverty]].

==Early life==
William Edward Green was born on 7 September 1855, in [[Bristol]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.screenonline.org.uk/people/id/508948/ |title=Friese-Greene, William (1855–1921) Biography |website=BFI Screenonline |language=en |access-date=2017-10-31}}</ref> He studied at the [[Queen Elizabeth's Hospital]] school.<ref name=":0"/> In 1871, he was apprenticed to the Bristol photographer Marcus Guttenberg,<ref name="natmedia">{{Cite web |url=http://www.cartedevisite.co.uk/photographers-category/biographies/g-to-l/marcus-guttenberg/ |title=Marcus Guttenberg 1828 – 1891 |last=Cosens |first=Ron |date=29 December 2017 |website=Photographers of Great Britain and Ireland 1840 to 1940 |access-date=29 December 2017}}</ref> but later successfully went to court to be freed early from the indentures of his seven-year apprenticeship.<ref name=":0">{{Cite journal |last=Davis |first=Bertram |date=March 1947 |title=WILLIAM FRIESE GREENE |journal=The Elizabethan |volume=XVIII |pages=10–14}}</ref> He married the [[Swiss people|Swiss]], Helena Friese (born Victoria Mariana Helena Friese),<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://www.rootschat.com/forum/index.php?topic=506001.0 |title=Helena Friese-Greene (The Common Room) Page 1 RootsChat.Com |last=Friese-Greene |first=Helena |website=www.rootschat.com |access-date=2018-12-16}}</ref> on 24 March 1874 and, in a remarkable move for the era, decided to add her maiden name to his surname. In 1876, he set up his own studio in [[Bath, Somerset|Bath]] and, by 1881, had expanded his business, having more studios in Bath, [[Bristol]] and [[Plymouth]].<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.victorianphotographers.co.uk/ |title=Victorian Photographers of Great Britain and Ireland 1840–1940}}</ref>

==Cinematic inventor==
===Experiments with magic lanterns===
In Bath he came into contact with [[John Arthur Roebuck Rudge]]. Rudge was a scientific instrument maker who also worked with electricity and [[magic lantern]]s to create popular entertainments.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.victorian-cinema.net/rudge |title=John Arthur Roebuck Rudge |access-date=29 December 2017}}</ref> Rudge built what he called the Biophantic Lantern, which could display seven photographic slides in rapid succession, producing the illusion of movement.<ref>{{Cite web 
|url=http://www.cinematheque.fr/fr/catalogues/appareils/collection/lanterne-de-projectionap-94-33.html |title=The Biophantic Lantern |website=Catalogue des appareils cinématographiques de la Cinémathèque française et du CNC |access-date=29 December 2017}}</ref> It showed a sequence in which Rudge (with the invisible help of Friese-Greene) apparently took off his head.<ref name=":4">{{Cite journal |last=Domankiewicz |first=Peter |date=25 November 2024 |title=William Friese-Greene & The Art of Collaboration |journal=Early Popular Visual Culture |volume=22|issue=3 |pages=218–247 |doi=10.1080/17460654.2024.2428487 |doi-access=free }}</ref> Friese-Greene was fascinated by the machine and worked with Rudge on a variety of devices over the 1880s, various of which Rudge called the Biophantascope.<ref>{{Cite journal |title=Collection Will Day: les débuts du cinéma anglais |journal=1895, revue d'histoire du cinéma |volume=1997 |pages=162, 163}}</ref> Moving his base to London in 1885, Friese-Greene realised that glass plates would never be a practical medium for continuously capturing life as it happens. Hence he began experiments with the new Eastman paper roll film, made transparent with castor oil, before turning his attention to experimenting with [[celluloid]] as a medium for motion picture cameras.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Celluloid and photography, part 3: The beginnings of cinema |date=17 November 2012 |url=https://blog.scienceandmediamuseum.org.uk/celluloid-and-photography-part-3-the-beginnings-of-cinema/ |publisher=[[National Science and Media Museum]] blog |access-date=1 May 2020}}</ref>

===Movie cameras===
{{multiple image
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 | image1 = Hyde Park, London (William Friese-Greene, 1889–1890).webm
 | image2 = King's Road (William Friese-Greene, 1890).webm
 | footer = Moving images captured by Friese-Greene at [[Hyde Park, London|Hyde Park]] (left) and [[King's Road]] (right)
}}
In 1888, Friese-Greene had some form of moving picture camera constructed, the nature of which is not known. On 21 June 1889, Friese-Greene was issued patent no. 10131 for a motion-picture camera, in collaboration with a civil engineer, Mortimer Evans.<ref name=":4" /> It was apparently capable of taking up to ten photographs per second using paper and celluloid film. An illustrated report on the camera appeared in the British ''Photographic News'' on 28 February 1890. On 18 February, Friese-Greene sent details of the camera to [[Thomas Edison]], whose laboratory had begun developing a motion picture system, with a peephole viewer, later christened the [[Kinetoscope]]. The ''Photographic News'' report was reprinted in ''[[Scientific American]]'' on 19 April.<ref>Marta Braun, 1992. ''Picturing Time: The Work of Etienne-Jules Marey (1830–1904)'', p. 190, Chicago: University of Chicago Press {{ISBN|0-226-07173-1}}''';''' David Robinson, 1997. ''From Peepshow to Palace: The Birth of American Film'', p. 28, New York and Chichester, West Sussex, Columbia University Press, {{ISBN|0-231-10338-7}}</ref> In 1890 he developed a camera with Frederick Varley to shoot [[Stereoscopy|stereoscopic]] moving images. This ran at a slower frame rate, and although the 3D arrangement worked, there are no records of projection.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Zone |first1=Ray |title=Stereoscopic Cinema and the Origins of 3D Film, 1838–1952 |date=2014 |publisher=University Press of Kentucky |isbn=9780813145891 |page=59 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UXTAAgAAQBAJ&q=William+Friese-Greene+stereoscopic&pg=PA59}}</ref> Friese-Greene worked on a series of moving picture cameras into the early 1890s, but although many individuals recount seeing his projected images privately, he never gave a successful public projection of moving pictures{{fact|date=February 2025}}. Friese-Greene's experiments with motion pictures were to the detriment of his other business interests and in 1891 he was declared [[bankrupt]]. He had sold the rights to the 1889 moving picture camera patent for £500 to investors in the City of London. The renewal fee was never paid and the patent lapsed.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Breverton |first1=Terry |author-link=Terry Breverton |title=Breverton's Encyclopedia of Inventions: A Compendium of Technological Leaps, Groundbreaking Discoveries and Scientific Breakthroughs that Changed the World |date=2012 |publisher=Hachette |isbn=9781780873404 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=VepgBQAAQBAJ&q=William+Friese-Greene+chronophotographic+patent&pg=PT418}}</ref>

===Colour film===
Friese-Greene's later exploits were in the field of colour in motion pictures. From 1904 he lived in Brighton where there were a number of experimenters developing still and moving pictures in colour. Initially working with [[William Norman Lascelles Davidson]], Friese-Greene patented a two-colour moving picture system using prisms in 1905. He and Davidson gave public demonstrations of this in January<ref>{{Cite book |title=Moving Pictures |last=Talbot |first=Frederick |publisher=William Heinemann |year=1912 |location=London |pages=295}}</ref> and July 1906<ref>{{Cite news |title=Novelties at the Convention |date=2 August 1906 |work=Bath Chronicle and Weekly Gazette}}</ref> and Friese-Greene held screenings at his photographic studio.<ref name=":2"/><ref>{{Cite journal |date=28 December 1906 |title=Cinematography in Colours |journal=British Journal of Photography|pages=1033}}</ref>

He also experimented with a system which produced the illusion of true colour by exposing each alternate frame of ordinary black-and-white film stock through two or three different coloured filters. Each alternate frame of the monochrome print was then stained red or green (and/or blue). Although the projection of prints did provide an impression of colour, it suffered from red and green fringing when the subject was in rapid motion, as did the more popular and famous system, [[Kinemacolor]].

In 1911, [[Charles Urban]] filed a lawsuit against Harold Speer, who had purchased rights in Friese-Greene's 1905 patent and created a company 'Biocolour', claiming that this process infringed upon the [[Kinemacolor]] patent of [[George Albert Smith (filmmaker)|George Albert Smith]], despite the fact that Friese-Greene had both patented and demonstrated his work before Smith. Urban was granted an injunction against Biocolour in 1912, but the Sussex-based, racing driver [[Selwyn Edge]] funded an appeal to the High Court. This overturned the original verdict on the grounds that Kinemacolor made claims for itself which it could not deliver. Urban fought back and pushed it up to the House of Lords, which in 1915 upheld the decision of the High Court.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Cinema-by-Sea |last=Fisher |first=David |publisher=Terra Media |year=2012 |location=Brighton |pages=141–146}}</ref> The decision benefited nobody. For Urban it was a case of hubris because now he could no longer exercise control over his own system, so it became worthless. For Friese-Greene, the arrival of the war and personal poverty meant there was nothing more to be done with colour for some years.

His son [[Claude Friese-Greene]] continued to develop the system with his father, after whose death in the early 1920s he called it "The Friese-Greene Natural Colour Process" and shot with it the documentary films "[[The Open Road (1926 film series)|The Open Road]]", which offer a rare portrait of 1920s Britain in colour.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web |url=https://player.bfi.org.uk/free/film/watch-the-open-road-2006-online |title=Watch The Open Road – BFI Player |website=BFI Player |language=en |access-date=2018-02-15}}</ref><ref name=":1"/> These were featured in a BBC series ''[[The Lost World of Friese-Greene]]'' and then issued in a digitally restored form by the BFI on DVD in 2006.<ref name=":3"/>

==Death==
[[File:The Friese-Greene grave in Highgate Cemetery.jpg|thumb|upright|The Friese-Greene grave in [[Highgate Cemetery]]]]
On 5 May 1921, Friese-Greene – then a largely forgotten figure – attended a stormy meeting of the cinema trade at the [[Connaught Rooms]] in London. The meeting had been called to discuss the current poor state of British film distribution and was chaired by [[Max Aitken, 1st Baron Beaverbrook|Lord Beaverbrook]]. Disturbed by the tone of the proceedings, Friese-Greene got to his feet to speak. The chairman asked him to come forward onto the platform to be heard better, which he did, appealing for the two sides to come together. Shortly after returning to his seat, he collapsed. People went to his aid and took him outside, but he died almost immediately of heart failure.<ref>{{Cite news |date=10 May 1921 |title=Inquiry into Death of Mr Friese Greene |page=6 |work=Dundee Evening Telegraph}}</ref>

Given his dramatic death in poverty (his pockets contained only one [[shilling]] and ten pence when he died), surrounded by film industry representatives who had almost entirely forgotten about his role in motion pictures, there was a spasm of collective shock and guilt. A very grand funeral was staged for him, with the streets of London lined by the curious. A two-minute silence was observed in some cinemas, and a fund was raised to commission a memorial for his grave. He was buried in the eastern section of London's [[Highgate Cemetery]], just south of the entrance and visible from the street through the railings.<ref>{{NHLE |num=1378873 |desc=Tomb of William Friese-Greene in Highgate (Eastern) Cemetery |access-date=30 December 2017}}</ref> However, his memorial was not designed by [[Edwin Lutyens]], as is often stated. It describes him as "The Inventor of Kinematography", a term Friese-Greene never used in talking about his achievements. Indeed, he often spoke generously about other workers in the field of capturing movement.<ref>{{Cite journal |date=11 December 1896 |title=Croydon Camera Club meeting |journal=British Journal of Photography |volume=43 |pages=703}}</ref>

His second wife, Edith Jane, died a few months later of cancer<ref>{{Cite news |title=Death of Mrs Friese Greene |date=23 July 1921 |work=Bath Chronicle |page=26}}</ref> and is buried with him, as are some of his children.

==Family==
After the death of his first wife, with whom he had one daughter, Friese-Greene married Edith Jane Harrison (1875–1921) and they had six sons, one dying in infancy.<ref name="FGODNB">{{Cite ODNB |id=33539 |title=Greene, William Friese-|first=Peter |last=Carpenter |date=6 January 2011}}</ref> The eldest, [[Claude Friese-Greene|Claude]] (1898–1943), and the youngest, Vincent (1910–1943), are buried with their parents.<ref>Friese-Greene grave, Highgate</ref> Vincent was killed in action during the [[Second World War]].<ref>CWGC records: Friese-Greene.</ref>

His great-grandson is the musician [[Tim Friese-Greene]].

==Legacy==
In 1951 a biopic was made, starring [[Robert Donat]], based on the biography, ''Friese-Greene, Close-Up of an Inventor'',<ref name=":2">Ray Allister (pseudonym for Muriel Forth) (1948) ''Friese-Greene, Close Up of An Inventor'', Marsland Publications, London<br> (reprinted by Arno Press Cinema Program (1972) [Facsimile, Hardcover] {{ISBN|0-405-03908-5}})</ref> as part of the [[Festival of Britain]].<ref name=":1">{{Cite web |url=http://www.victorian-cinema.net/friesegreene.php |title=Who's Who of Victorian Cinema |website=www.victorian-cinema.net |access-date=2017-12-29}}</ref> The film, ''[[The Magic Box]],'' was not shown until the festival was nearly over and only went on full release after it had finished. Despite the all-star cast, positive reviews, and much praise for Robert Donat's performance, it was not a financial succes.<ref>[http://bufvc.ac.uk/oldwebsite/publications/articles/festofbritain.pdf Film and the Festival of Britain 1951]</ref>  Nonetheless, Martin Scorsese has many times cited it as one of his favourite films, and one that inspired him.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://robert-donat.com/2011/12/02/martin-scorseses-hugo-inspired-by-the-magic-box/ |title=Martin Scorsese's Hugo inspired by The Magic Box |date=2011-12-02 |work=Robert Donat |access-date=2018-10-23 |language=en-US}}</ref>

The film did not portray Friese-Greene as the inventor of motion pictures, only a "pioneer", but some of the British press represented the film as if it did. The pro-Edison American film historian [[Terry Ramsaye]] called the film a "perversion of history". In 1955, Kodak employee Brian Coe wrote an article in the ''[[British Journal of Photography]]'' called "The Truth About Friese Greene" in reaction against the biography and the film, which expressed the view that Friese-Greene had not made any contribution to the development of the motion picture.<ref>{{cite magazine|magazine=[[Motion Picture Herald]]|date=7 January 1956|url=https://mediahistoryproject.org/reader.php?id=motionpictureher202quig|page=17|title=Ramsaye Finally Vindicated On Legend Of Friese Greene|via=[[Internet Archive]]}}</ref> Although Coe's work was much cited for decades, it has been discredited by more recent research.<ref name=":4" />

Friese-Greene was from then on more or less banished to obscurity by film historians, but newer research is rehabilitating him, giving a better understanding of his achievements and influence on the technical development of cinema.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Cinema-By-Sea |last=Fisher |first=David |publisher=Terra Media |year=2012 |location=Brighton}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |url=https://friesegreene.com/ |title=William Friese-Greene & Me |website=William Friese-Greene & Me |language=en-UK |access-date=2018-10-23}}</ref><ref>Archived at [https://ghostarchive.org/varchive/youtube/20211211/s_MA4LQmrYQ Ghostarchive]{{cbignore}} and the [https://web.archive.org/web/20200806104608/https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_MA4LQmrYQ Wayback Machine]{{cbignore}}: {{Citation |title=William Friese-Greene & The Art of Collaboration |date=2018-04-24 |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_MA4LQmrYQ |access-date=2018-10-23}}{{cbignore}}</ref>

Despite a campaign by Bristol photographer [[Reece Winstone]] for the retention of Friese-Greene's birthplace for use as a Museum of Cinematography, among other purposes, it was demolished by Bristol Corporation in 1958 to provide parking space for six cars.<ref>{{Cite book |title=Bristol As It Was 1956–1959 |first=Reece |last=Winstone |publisher=Reece Winstone Archive and Publishing |pages=57–59 |year=1972 |isbn=0-900814-39-X}}</ref>

[[File:Friese-Greene plaque.jpg|thumb|Plaque at Middle Street, Brighton]]
Premises in Brighton's Middle Street where Friese-Greene had a workshop for several years are often wrongly described as his home. They bear a plaque in a 1924 design by [[Eric Gill]] commemorating Friese-Greene's achievements, wrongly stating that it is the place where he invented cinematography. The plaque was unveiled by [[Michael Redgrave]], who had appeared in ''The Magic Box'', in September 1951. A modern office building a few yards away is named Friese-Greene House. Other plaques include the 1930s Odeon Cinema in Kings Road, [[Chelsea, London|Chelsea]], London, with its iconic façade, which carries high upon it a large sculpted head-and-shoulders medallion of "William Friese-Greene" and his years of birth and death. There are busts of him at [[Pinewood Studios]] and [[Shepperton Studios]].<ref>{{Cite web |title=Diana Thomson FRSS |url=https://sculptors.org.uk/artists/diana-thomson |publisher=British Society of Sculptors |access-date=27 July 2022}}</ref>

In 2006 the [[BBC]] ran a series of programmes called ''[[The Lost World of Friese-Greene]]'', presented by [[Dan Cruickshank]] about Claude Friese-Greene's road trip from [[Land's End to John o' Groats]], entitled ''The Open Road'', which he filmed from 1924 to 1926 using The Friese-Greene Natural Colour Process.<ref>[http://bufvc.ac.uk/dvdfind/index.php/title/AV69017 ''The Open Road'' (2007) British Universities Film & Video Council]</ref> The British Film Institute then worked on a new version, using post-production techniques to reduce the problems of flickering and colour fringing around moving objects, which Kinemacolor and this process had when projected. The result was a unique view of Britain in colour in the mid-1920s and extracts of it continue to frequently circulate virally on social media.

==See also==
*[[History of film technology]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
{{commons category}}
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQ5MZt3qEW0/ ''King's Road 1891''] Early Friese-Greene test film, shot in London on perforated celluloid
*[https://friesegreene.com/ William Friese-Greene & Me] Blog covering latest research on Friese-Greene
*[http://zauberklang.ch/filmcolors/timeline-entry/1220/ Friese-Greene on Timeline of Historical Film Colors]
*{{YouTube|BfrHAvxhfYg|Short film about William Friese-Greene by his great grandson}}.

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Friese-Greene, William}}
[[Category:1855 births]]
[[Category:1921 deaths]]
[[Category:Photographers from Bristol]]
[[Category:People from Maida Vale]]
[[Category:Burials at Highgate Cemetery]]
[[Category:People educated at Queen Elizabeth's Hospital, Bristol]]
[[Category:British cinema pioneers]]
[[Category:British inventors]]