Finding His Voice (1929) is a short film, created as an instructional film on how the Bell System's sound-on-film recording system worked. It was originally intended to be a demonstration film to sell the system/concept of talkies to theater owners and projectionists. It specifically includes both talking and music.
Fleischer tells the story of sound on film through two characters, "Talkie" and "Mutie." "Mutie" earns his vocal cords halfway through the film and begins to talk. In the film there are some sly technical asides--"Mutie's" pulse needs to be raised from 60 to 90 (a reference to an increase in film speed with the sound system), and the story is by "W.E. Erpi," which refers to Western Electric, Electrical Research Products, Inc.
Inkwell Studios films for AT&T:
- How the Telephone Talks - 1924
- That Little Big Fellow - 1927
- Now You're Talking - 1927
- Finding His Voice - 1929
The Vitaphone system that this film used consisted of a flat disc (33 1/3 rpm, actually!) that was synced with the film. This system was prone to errors and was succeeded a few years later by Western Electric's Westrex system, which ran an optical audio track down the side of the actual film. This type of soundtrack-on-film system remained basically the same until multi-channel and digital sound came to prominence in the early 1990s.
Directors: F. Lyle Goldman and Max Fleischer
Produced by Inkwell Studios
Footage courtesy of AT&T Archives and History Center, Warren, NJ
