What is "parvo"

n. (context informal English) ''Parvovirus''.

n. any of a group of viruses containing DNA in an icosahedral protein shell and causing disease in dogs and cattle; not known to be associated with any human disease [syn: parvovirus]

The Parvo was a 35mm motion picture camera developed in France by Joseph Jules Debrie, in 1908. The camera was relatively compact for its time. It was hand-cranked, as were its predecessors. To aid the camera operator in cranking at the correct speed, the camera had a built in tachometer.

The Parvo held up to of film inside without the need for an external film magazine, yielding almost 6 minutes of film when cranked at the standard 16 frames per second silent film rate. It allowed the camera operator to focus the camera lens but - as all other cine cameras of its era - had a side optical viewfinder to be used during actual filming.

The Parvo was immensely popular in Europe during the silent film era, straight through the 1920s. Directors who relied on the camera included Dziga Vertov, Abel Gance, Leni Riefenstahl, and Sergei Eisenstein. The latter's cinematographer, Eduard Tisse, would use the camera into the sound era, i.e. filming the duelling sequence in Alexander Nevsky. Vertov animated a Debrie Parvo as mechanical protagonist and used it to make several hand-held sequences in his 1929 documentary, Man with a Movie Camera.