Page "History of film" Paragraph 126

A very noticeable technical development was the widespread adoption of irising-in and out to begin and end scenes.

This is the revelation of a film shot by its appearance inside a small circular vignette mask which gradually gets larger till it expands beyond the frame, and the whole image is in the clear.

D. W. Griffith, who used it relentlessly, was responsible for the popularization of this device.

By 1918 the use of the iris to begin and end sequences was starting to decrease in the United States, though in Europe it was just starting to become fashionable.

At that date it is quite easy to find American films such as Stella Maris in which only fades are used.