Association With The Motion Picture Industry
Peters began his photography work in the motion picture industry around 1899, with the Pathe Freres film company of France. Later, when he left them, he continued to work throughout Europe at various companies in the motion picture industry to develop his skills. He also did photography and motion picture work at Karnak and Luxor in Egypt.
Peters was associated with the Cosmos Film Company in San Francisco, California, which later became Exactus Photo Film Corporation of Palo Alto. He became its first president and general manager when it officially started operations on August 28, 1914. The company stated that its purpose was
| “ | to produce, sell, rent and exchange educational and industrial moving picture films for the use of schools, academies, and universities throughout the state of California, and later throughout the United States. | ” |
In the beginning, Exactus had a list of well-respected California educators to serve on its board of directors. However, a lack of good business management and closing skills in obtaining financial backing caused its failure only two years later. There were also clashes of misunderstandings between the educators and Exactus' technicians that exacerbated the situation. By the end of 1916, Peters held an auction of the physical items held by the bankrupt company to raise money to pay off its creditors. What little stock left was turned over to the Palo Alto Film Company.
Peters kept the technical and educational value of the Exactus films at a high quality in spite of these tumultuous times. At the Panama-Pacific International Exposition in 1915, his company won two gold medals and one bronze medal for films they had produced.
Read more about this topic: Thomas Kimmwood Peters
Famous quotes containing the words association, motion, picture and/or industry:
“The aim of every political association is the preservation of the natural and imprescriptible rights of man. These rights are liberty, property, security and resistance to oppression.”
—French National Assembly. Declaration of the Rights of Man (drafted and discussed August 1789, published September 1791)
“We must not suppose that, because a man is a rational animal, he will, therefore, always act rationally; or, because he has such or such a predominant passion, that he will act invariably and consequentially in pursuit of it. No, we are complicated machines; and though we have one main spring that gives motion to the whole, we have an infinity of little wheels, which, in their turns, retard, precipitate, and sometime stop that motion.”
—Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)
“No sacrifice was too great to get the film right, to get it accurate, true, and perfect. We weren’t important in our minds; only the picture was.”
—Lillian Gish (1896–1993)
“Do not put off your work until tomorrow and the day after. For the sluggish worker does not fill his barn, nor the one who puts off his work; industry aids work, but the man who puts off work always wrestles with disaster.”
—Hesiod (c. 8th century B.C.)