A few people sitting on the front porch of a Barryville home on the Delaware River last weekend learned firsthand what movie makers in the region discovered more than 100 years ago. There is a light that sweeps down the river valley shortly before dusk that is pure magic.
G.W. “Billy” Bitzer, the master cameraman who accompanied influential director D.W. Griffith to Cuddebackville, in western Orange County, NY, in the early part of the last century, dubbed it magic hour, and “the light Mr. Griffith waited for.” It brought Griffith and his crew back to the area year after year before he discovered the advantages of filming in California and became known as “the man who invented Hollywood.” [Read more…] about D.W. Griffith’s Orange County ‘Magic Hour’ Discovery