John Ott

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John Ott
Occupation Banker,
time-lapse cinematographer,
medical researcher,
inventor
Known for Time-lapse cinematography, medical light-therapy research, full-spectrum lighting development

Dr. John Nash Ott was a banker who was most notable as a pioneer in the cinematic use of time-lapse photography.

Ott's initial "day-job" career was that of a banker, with time-lapse movie photography, mostly of plants, initially just a hobby. Starting in the 1930s, Ott bought and built more and more time-lapse equipment, eventually building a large greenhouse full of plants, cameras, and even self-built automated electric moving camera systems (the first movie camera motion control systems ever built) for moving the cameras to follow the growth of plants as they developed. He even time-lapsed his entire greenhouse of plants and cameras as they all worked, a virtual symphony of time-lapse movement. His work was featured on an episode of the second incarnation of the request TV show, You Asked For It in the late 1950s.

Ott also discovered that the movement of plants could be manipulated by varying the amount of water plants were given, and varying the color temperature of the lights in the studio, with some colors causing the plants to flower and other colors causing the plants to bear fruit. Ott even discovered ways to change the gender of plants merely by varying the light source color-temperature.

By using these techniques, Ott time-lapse animated plants "dancing" up and down in sync to pre-recorded music tracks. The film, completed in the 1950s, was titled, simply, Dancing Flowers.

His cinematography of flowers blooming in such classic documentaries as Walt Disney's Secrets of Life (1956), pioneered the modern use of time-lapse on film and television. Ott wrote a book on the history of his time-lapse adventures, My Ivory Cellar (1958).

Ott's experiments with different colored lighting systems and their effects on the health of plants led to experiments with colored lights on the health of animals, then humans, then on individual cells, using time-lapse micro-photography. Ott discovered that only a full spectrum of natural light (including natural amounts of infra-red and ultra-violet) worked to entirely promote full health in plants, animals and humans. Ott made a second film, Exploring the Spectrum completed in the 1960s.

Ott also discovered that the color temperature of lights affects mental health, with balanced light reducing hyperactivity in classrooms and reducing negative behavior in prisons and mental health facilities. Ott discovered that even individual cells' ability to properly reproduce in both plants and animals (including human) is affected by variances in lighting as it entered the body through the eyes. A second book, Health and Light, detailing these experiments followed in 1973. Medical research facilities, such as in the The University of Oregon Health Sciences Center (OHSU) in Portland, Oregon, and others, experiment with his lights for both physical and mental health benefits.

In the 80s and 90s, Ott also published a series of seven articles in the International Journal of Biosocial Research, a medical journal out of Tacoma, Washington that studies links between physical and mental health. Titled Color and Light: Their Effects on Plants, Animals, and People, the articles summed up Ott's decades of independent research, which was contrary to the established "wisdom" of sunglasses manufacturers who warned of the "sudden" negative effects of full, natural sunlight on the human eyes and skin.

Further, Ott developed lighting systems for businesses and homes that delivered his full-spectrum light, now available at many lighting stores worldwide.

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