Research

The Moving Image Source Research Guide is a gateway to the best online resources related to film, television, and digital media.

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  • Thanhouser Company Film Preservation Inc.  
    This nonprofit organization is engaged in "the research, acquisition, preservation and publication of educational materials related to the early silent motion picture era," specifically by making available films by the Thanhouser Film Company, an early silent-cinema studio. The website also offers a general history of Thanhouser as well as information on its players and filmmakers.
  • The Criterion Collection  
    Since 1984, the Criterion Collection has been dedicated to gathering important classic and contemporary films from around the world and publishing them in editions that offer the highest technical quality and award-winning, original supplements. The website offers an “online cinematheque” with the possibility to buy or watch films online, film essays, interviews, reviews, top-ten lists, and festivals online.
  • Thomas Edison Historical Site  
    Basic biographical information on Edison, plus a bibliography and links to his sound and film recordings. Users can also find out how to visit the site's archive and artifact collection and view a full list of Edison's 1,093 patents.
  • Thomas Edison Information from the Library of Congress  
    Includes biographical information about Thomas Edison and historical information about his breakthroughs in moving image and sound recording technology. Users can also view Edison's films.
  • TV Heroes  
    A site edited by Richard G. Elen that features profiles and interviews of pioneering TV engineers, directors, tycoons, announcers, technicians, and more. Focused primarily on the UK.
  • UCLA Film & Television Archive Catalog  
    UCLA Film & Television Archive holds over 250,000 films and television programs produced from the 1890s to the present. The collection includes independent and studio-produced shorts and feature films, local and network TV programming, and 27 million feet of Hearst newsreels.
  • Virtual Silver Screen  
    A site by the Library and Archives of Canada featuring early Canadian films and information about them
  • Who's Who of Victorian Cinema  
    Biographies of actors and directors, as well as rigorously researched articles about the technology, creation, and exhibition of early film. The sources page also functions as a comprehensive annotated bibliography of the topic. Created by Luke McKernan, a British film historian.
  • William K. Everson Collection at New York University  
    The William K. Everson collection features a growing number of downloadable film-related advertisements, including full reproductions of press kits. There is also a photo section, which contains portraits of film stars autographed to Everson.
  • World's First Television Recordings  
    A website devoted to the pre-history of television in Great Britain, featuring early experiments in television by John Logie Baird in 1926. Archived are some of the earliest known television recordings, including Baird's experiments with his Phonovision system and early BBC test recordings from the 1930s.