Reading Task 1
Прочитайте тексты и установите соответствие между текстами и их заголовками: к каждому тексту, обозначенному буквами А-G, подберите : соответствующий заголовок, обозначенный цифрами 1-8. Используйте каждую цифру только один раз.
A. Cameras have come a long way since the time of our grandparents. The days of using film cameras are almost gone. Even the digital camera has come far since its beginning. Now there are digital cameras that fit in your pocket, and there are those for use among professional photographers. Even the movie industry has taken to using a kind of digital camera for shooting films.
B. Digital cameras perform a wide range of functions. They can zoom in on an object, just like a film camera, but they can also zoom in digitally for an even closer shot. They can make the colours brighter or darker, and they can make the image sharper. They can even make the photo come out in black and white, for a more artistic look.
C. One great feature of a digital camera is the ability to delete unwanted photos. As soon as you take a photo, you can view it on the camera screen and decide if you want to keep it. If not, you can erase it from the cameras memory and take another photo. Its better than having the photo developed from film, which takes time and money.
D. A digital camera records an image in basically the same way as a film camera. The difference is that, with a film camera, a chemical process occurs to create the image. With a digital camera, the process is electronic. A sensor records the colours and details of an image, which then appear on the cameras screen.
E. You can use a digital camera just as you would a film camera. An obvious difference is that with a digital camera, you don’t have to load film. You basically just point and shoot. As with any other camera, though, you have to use the flash in dark places, and you can adjust the lens to take photos from far away or up close.
F. You can attach extra lenses to digital cameras to take special pictures, just as you can with a film camera. Unlike film cameras, though, a digital camera also has a cable that you can use to attach it to a computer, to save your images for emailing and storing on your computer’s hard drive, or sending to a printer for easy printing.
G. The first digital cameras were used in military and scientific settings. This was around the time of their invention in 1975. These early cameras weighed about 3 kilograms and took black and white photos. A few years later, digital cameras were used in medical facilities. It wasn’t until the early 1990s that digital cameras were made available to consumers.
Reading Task 2
:Прочитайте текст. Определите, какие из приведённых утверждений соответствуют содержанию текста (True), какие не соответствуют (False) и о чём в тексте не сказано, то есть на основании текста нельзя дать ни положительного, ни отрицательного ответа (Not stated).
Richard III was an English king who ruled England from 1483 until his death in battle in 1485. He is one of the most famous people in English history – so how is it possible that, after being king for only two years, he is still so widely remembered?
In the years after his death, much was written about the character of Richard III. Some of this shows a positive side of the man and his period as king, but most was rather negative. Why?
Firstly, the man who defeated Richard in battle became king next, and his family ruled England for much of the next 120 years. Also, many people hated Richard while he was alive. Since historians of the time often wrote histories based on opinions rather than facts, they made sure his name was remembered for negative reasons. They wrote about Richard’s desire for power, claiming it was something he would kill for, and perhaps this was true. It didn’t help that Richard III had a physical condition that gave him a strangely twisted back and one shoulder much higher than the other.
One of the items that was discovered was a piece of bronze. It was in such poor condition that no one was sure what it was. One archaeologist suggested that it was some kind of clockwork mechanism, but no one believed him and it was put away for storage in a museum. It was nearly fifty years before anyone else took any interest in the item.
That is the description of Richard III which is shown in William Shakespeare’s 1592 play, Richard III. The brilliant play is a large part of the reason why we remember Richard III today. Shakespeare created his character as an incredibly evil but intelligent and funny king who, in the end, died for wrongly claiming power.
Richard III came to power after his brother, Edward IV, suddenly died. Edward IV’s young son, Edward V, was supposed to become king, but a group of powerful people decided the young boy did not have the right to rule, and so Richard III became king. Edward V and his younger brother were never seen again, leading people to believe – rightly or wrongly – that Richard III had the two boys killed.
Today we are more aware of the positive things that Richard III did in his short time as king. For example, he created a court where poor people could have legal cases heard for a low cost. He also had English laws, which were written in traditional French, translated into English.
Another reason we know of Richard III today was the recent discovery of his bones beneath a car park in Leicester, in central England. After his defeat and death on the battlefield, he was buried nearby, with no official ceremony, in an old church which was later destroyed. Five hundred years later, after years of searching through historical records, a team of archaeologists began digging where they believed he was buried. On the very first day, they found the bones of a man with a twisted back and battle wounds. Further research and tests proved that the bones were those of Richard III.