At 110 Years Old, These Are the First Color Movies Ever Made

His entry in the Who’s Who of Victorian Cinema claims that Edward Raymond Turner (along with Frederick Marshall Lee) patented the first three-color film process that led to a usable system. After you get over the shock of there being a Who’s Who of Victorian Cinema, check out the first color movies from the National Media Museum.

Shot in 1902, the images were created by shooting the images through red, green and blue frames before projecting them one on top of the other. The restoration process is just as fascinating as the images themselves, and the new version of history that was uncovered in a storage room is something to think on. I wonder what Turner would think if he saw Avatar. I also wonder what antiques the people of 2122 will uncover from their archives to marvel at their primitiveness.

Scott Beggs: Movie stuff at VanityFair, Thrillist, IndieWire, Film School Rejects, and The Broken Projector Podcast@brokenprojector | Writing short stories at Adventitious.