History of Editing

Before the invention of Non-linear editing in 1971, films used to be edited by hand. This would be done by looking at the film negative, cutting the parts you want and sticking them together in order with glue.

In the early years of film, films were made as one contionous shot. However by 1916 sophisticated films could be made, and people like David Wark Griffith or just D.W. Griffith, were creating films such as 'The Birth of a Nation'.

For many years editing was done by hand and with teh use of a Moviola or 'flatbed' machine. This machine had a viewer so when you passed the film through it you could see shots clearly.

In 1971 the CMX 600 was produced, and this allowed for non-linear editing style. Meaning instead of going through all of the film by hand, you could simple just select teh shots you wanted. From there editing became quicker to do, something which once could have taken a minute to do now would take only a few seconds.

Hollywood Editors

There are many editors in Hollywood, however they are usually forgotten about behind the directors, producers and stars of a film. However editors are reason why a film flows and the way films are edited helps to evoke different emotion. One editor that has worked on many big name films is Stephen E. Rivkin or just Stephen Rivkin.

Rivkin has worked on the first three Pirates of the Carribean films, however he is not working on the fourth film. He has also help edit Avatar, which went on a won 3 oscars after it's release. His work goes back to the mid 70's, with a short called 'Ain't we Having fun?' in 1976, then in 1982 he edited his first film called 'The personals'

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