William Joyce, 85; Filmmaker, Aviation Photography Pioneer

William Franklin Joyce, 85, a filmmaker and pioneer in the field of aviation photography, died at his retirement home in Amherst, Mass., on July 3 after a long illness. He was 85.

Joyce embarked on a professional movie career in Manhattan, working with filmmaker Louis de Rochemont on “Lost Boundaries,” “Walk East on Beacon!” and “Martin Luther.” After founding the now-defunct Motion Picture Techniques, Joyce produced films such as “Canyon Crossroads.”

In 1963, he formed Aerolog Productions in Bethpage, N.Y., and wrote, directed and produced commercial and educational films for Grumman Aerospace, the Navy, IBM and the Smithsonian Institution. In 1975, Joyce co-founded Franklin-Douglas Inc., a music publishing company, with his son-in-law, composer Doug Wood.

Joyce worked as a photographer for McGraw-Hill publishers in high school, then studied engineering at Cornell University. He joined the Army Air Forces in 1941, and served as a major during World War II. During his service, he was a photographic tests officer at the Air Force Proving Ground Command in Florida, and traveled to the Bikini Islands in the Pacific to photograph the first postwar atomic bomb tests.