No abstract

No abstract

Why are some films regarded as classics, worthy of entry into the canon of film history? Which sorts of films make the cut and why? Movie Greats questions how cinema is ranked and, in doing so, uncovers a history of critical conflict, with different aesthetic positions battling for dominance. The films examined range across the history of cinema: The Battleship Potemkin, The 39 Steps, Modern Times, Citizen Kane, It's a Wonderful Life, Black Narcissus, The Night of the Hunter, Lawrence of Arabia, 8*, 2001: A Space Odyssey, The Godfather, Raging Bull, The Piano and Kill Bill: Vol. 1. Each chapter opens with a brief summary of the film's plot and goes on to discuss the historical context, the key individuals who made the film, and initial and subsequent popular and critical responses. Students studying the history of film, canon formation or film aesthetics will find this book relevant, provocative and absorbing.

Localization of acoustic sources has been an area of research starting primarily with underwater acoustics. Recently, localization of sources in air has become a topic of interest for automatic detection, surveillance and tracking for military applications. Other application include novel teleconference devices, specifically automatic focusing on the person currently speaking. Current technology relies on free-field localization arrays, and there is a plethora of literature on array beam-forming of these arrays. This paper introduces a new technology of diffracting arrays and novel signal processing methods for characterization of these arrays and localization of acoustic sources. The theory and experimental implementation of an acoustic diffracting array (ADA) is presented, including singular value decomposition and the effect of robustness. The results indicate that ADA results in increased localization accuracy, and more directional point spread functions due to increased magnitude and phase differences compared to a free-field array.