Lenny Lipton

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Leonard (Lenny) Lipton (b. May 18, 1940, Brooklyn, New York) is a well known author, filmmaker and stereoscopic vision system inventor.

Lipton wrote the lyrics to the song Puff the Magic Dragon as a 19-year-old at Cornell University. He graduated from Cornell University where he majored in physics. The song was a hit in 1963 for Peter Paul and Mary. Two of Lipton's books, The Super 8 Book (San Francisco: Straight Arrow Books. 1975) and Independent Film Making (San Francisco: Straight Arrow Books, 1972) have become known as classics in the world of independent filmmaking.

Lipton is also a prolific filmmaker, having independently produced 25 films, including Far Out, Star Route and Children of the Golden West. Lipton has been granted twenty-five patents in the area of stereoscopic displays.

He has written many articles and four books, three of which were published by Simon & Schuster, including Independent Filmmaking, which was the standard text on the subject for twenty years. In 1982 Van Nostrand Reinhold published his book, Foundations of the Stereoscopic Cinema, which provides a wide ranging analysis of many stereoscopic topics. The book's primary focus is the stereoscopic cinema, however the book's many background sections are equally relevant to the many different types of stereoscopic display devices available today. This book provides a wealth of information for both the novice and also those already active in the field of stereoscopic imaging.

He has also been a contributor to national magazines such as Popular Photography and American Cinematographer. He is a member of The Society for Information Display, the Society of Photo-Instrumentation Engineers, and he was the chairman of the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers working group which established standards for the projection of stereoscopic theatrical films.

Contents

[edit] Filmmaker

He has, to date, independently produced twenty-five films, which are in the collection of the Pacific Film Archive of the University of California. His films have been shown on PBS, Italian Television, and the BBC.

In his role as a filmmaker, on two occasions, he was a representative of the U.S. Department of State to countries in Latin America.

[edit] StereoGraphics

He founded StereoGraphics Corporation in 1980, and created the electronic stereoscopic display industry. He is the most prolific inventor in the field and has been granted twenty-five patents in the area of stereoscopic displays. In 1996 he received an award from the Smithsonian Institution for this invention of CrystalEyes, the first practical electronic stereoscopic product for computer graphics and video applications. StereoGraphics was acquired by Real D Cinema in 2005.

Lipton now serves as CTO of StereoGraphics and has 31 patents in the field of stereoscopy and another 30 pending. The 3-D system now showing in theaters under the Real D name is his invention. It is based on the push-pull electro-optical modulator called the ZScreen.

He has lived in Los Angeles for forty years with his wife, three children and pets.

[edit] Lenny Lipton Movies Work

Title Year Duration 16mm S8mm
Adirondack Holiday 1975 17 min x
Below the Fruited Plain 1966 9 min x
Children of the Golden West 1975 59 min x
Cornucopia 1968 8 min x
Doggie Diner and The Return of Doggie Diner 1969 7 min x
Dogs of the Forest 1972 5 min x
The Dunes of Truro 1966 7 min x
Far Out, Star Route 1971 64 min x
Father's Day 1975 9 min x
Happy Birthday Lenny 1965 8 min x
Hilltop Nursery 1975 24 min x
Ineluctable Modality of the Visible 1966 9 min x
The Last March 1970 11 min x
Let a Thousand Parks Bloom 1969 27 min x
Life on Earth 1972 58 min x
LP 1969 33 min x
Memories of an Unborn Baby 1966 4 min x
My Life, My Times 1955-1970 11 min x
Nadine's Song 1975 12 min x
People 1969 3 min x
Powerman 1966 5 min x
Revelation of the Foundation 1975 68 min x
Show and Tell 1968 24 min x
The Story of a Man (Going Down in Flames) 1975 11 min x
We Shall March Again 1965 8 min x

[edit] External References