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MITCHELL The Standard

by L. Sprague Anderson


From the J uly/December 1997 issue of the
Operating Cameraman

On September 13, 1917, a camera maker named J ohn Leonard walked through
the doors of the Static Club (soon to become the ASC) in Hollywood, shook
hands with President Charles Rosher, stepped in front of the membership, and
demonstrated the prototype of the most famous camera in cinema historythe
Leonard camera.

Never heard of it, you say? Maybe that's because its name changed. Within two
years, Leonard sold his designs to Henry Boger and George A Mitchell, who
used Leonard's work as the heart of their new machine the Mitchell Standard.

Leonard's patented work defined the Mitchell's look and ensured the Mitchell's
popularity. He filed for the first two patents in 1917: these covered the variable
shutter, driven by planetary gears (US Patent No 1,297,703); and the distinctive
rackover device (US Pat No 1,297,704), which, even in the patent drawings, set
the Mitchell's appearance for the next half-century.

The Leonard film movement revealed his familiarity with Albert Howell's work; it
used a flexible film guideway, pinned at the top, that alternately placed the film
on either the pulldown claws or the fixed register pins. This is the same method
Howell used in his first eight cameras, the wooden Bell & Howells.

In 1920, Leonard added the patent for this movement to the package (US Pat
No 1,390,247). According to a Mitchell company history being prepared in 1954,
the Leonard movement wasn't very satisfactory and a new design had to be
substituted on short notice. The modified version added a third cam to improve
the lateral stability, and it brought movable registration pins in from behind,
rather than fixing them in front. This design worked much better; it became
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known as the AA movement and it was the only drive available for the Mitchell
until 1925. George Mitchell filed for a patent for this variation on May 12, 1920
and it was issued on J anuary 10, 1922 (US Pat No 1,403,339).

Only nine years prior to the Mitchell's appearance, the Bell and Howell 2709 had
spawned a revolution that doomed the beautiful wood-bodied Victorian cameras
to obsolescence. The Leonard/Mitchell Standard wasn't a surprise on the same
grand scale. It was a child of the 2709, a natural enrichment of the new themes:
all-metal construction, single piece "mouse ear" magazines, built-in ground
glass with an improved rackover, and so on. Leonard and Mitchell reflected on
the 2709, saw its shortcomings, and found solutions that made life easier on the
set.

Cameramen showed their gratitude by swamping the Mitchell Camera
Company with orders, completely overwhelming the firm's limited production
facilities. Between the time Floyd J ackman bought the first Mitchell camera in
1921 and the sale of a Standard to Fox Case Corp two days before Christmas in
1927, Mitchell sold 104 cameras (about one third the sales that the Bell &
Howell 2709 achieved in its first seven years). As of J une 29, 1923, Mitchell
had delivered thirty-two of these cameras, and the company was operating 72
hours a week to catch up with their back orders, which at that point were
running six months behind.

Production may have been slow at first, but the camera itself was fast. Efficiency
is a recurring theme in the ads. "The Mitchell lined up with exceptional
quickness," Scott Sidney tells us.(1) "Owing to its wonderful equipment and
mechanical arrangements, we are able to photograph at nearly twice the speed
we formerly used," reports Victor Schertzinger at Fox, but he doesn't say what
they shot with before.(2) Victor Seastrom at MGM went even further: "I have
found through experience that during the course of a production, it will save in
overhead cost an amount almost equal to the original cost of the camera."(3)
Even better of course when the original cost was picked up by your
cameraman.

Actually MGM had at least six Mitchells in their camera department, all bought
new in 1922 and 1923; the studio was Mitchell's second best customer. First
National did the best, picking up eleven in a two-year stretchthey had one out
of every ten Mitchells in circulation and that's just counting the ones they bought
new. Other studios also made multiple purchases: Christie took four, Fox put
three on their lot and United Artists laid claim to a couple. Still, it was individual
cameramen who bought most of the company's output in the 1920s.

Many of Hollywood's most sought-after shooters became the camera's first
owners. In 1921 Gaetano Tony' Gaudio was near the head of the line to buy a
Mitchell camera; he got #10. He'd been a cameraman since 1902, kept Carl
Laemmle's IMP going photographically in the days of the Trust and went on to
spend much of the 1920s behind his Mitchell as Norma Talmadge's
cameraman.
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The beginning of 1921 was exciting for Charles Van Enger: He bought the
second Mitchell off the line to use on his pictures with Madame Nazimova. The
spring of 1922 was even better: In March he was voted into the ASC and in April
he left for Europe, first making a stop in Chicago to demonstrate his Mitchell to
30 cameramen in that town, practically in the Bell & Howell Company's parking
lot. During the next two years he worked with Maurice Tourneur, King Vidor and
Victor Seastrom. In 1924 he began a two-year stint as cameraman for Ernst
Lubitsch, taking enough time off to shoot Lon Chaney's "The Phantom of the
Opera" for Universal.

Charles Rosher, an enthusiastic and outspoken Mitchell fan, began shooting
with Mary Pickford's Mitchell (#8) in the middle of 1922 and bought his own
(#61) in 1925, but several sources say he was photographing Pickford films with
Mitchells as early as her first feature, "The Love Light" in 1920, before Mitchells
had serial numbers. Rosher was one of the best-known cinematographers in
the silent era and not just because he was Mary Pickford's cameraman. He was
one of the earliest lensmen at Nestor Films, the first permanent studio in Los
Angeles. Always excited by innovations, he experimented with panchromatic
filmstocks as early as 1919, long before they became practical. Among his
numerous talents he was a master of split-screen work. During the 1920s
Rosher spent a great deal of time in Europe and at least one trip abroad
stimulated a European order for Mitchell cameras. Not long after his return from
Germany in 1924, UFA Films ordered 2 Mitchell camera outfits with all built-in
features, 10 magazines, 2 universal finders, 2 extension arms, 2 matte cutters, 2
sunshades, 6 tripods, heads and cases, a total sale of $10,000. On New Year's
Eve 1924 the Mitchell company sent them cameras #45 and #47.

Fellow ASC member J ames C. Van Trees was also an enthusiastic Mitchell
owner; as an independent cameraman he'd use camera #4 throughout the
1920s at Lasky Studio, Metropolitan and the flashy and aggressive First
National, working with the likes of William Desmond Taylor and Rudolph
Valentino and lensing pictures like "Flaming Youth." After picking up his Mitchell
on April 30, 1921, he kept a Pathe camera (#1110) around for a while, but finally
put it up for sale in the fall of 1924.

George S. Barnes joined the growing family of Mitchell owners some time prior
to May 1922. He carried it with him to the King Vidor Studios, to Metro, to
Cosmopolitan and on to Samuel Goldwyn Productions, shooting a wide variety
of films including "Son of the Sheik", "The Winning of Barbara Worth" and
"Sadie Thompson".

Norbert F. Brodine bought a Mitchell around J une 1922, vowing to use nothing
else from then on. His Mitchell captured a three-year series of Frank Lloyd
pictures as well as "The Sea Hawk" and "The Silent Watcher" among his two-
score silent features.

Sol Polito bought a Mitchell camera in J une 1922, becoming the 7th ASC
member to own the new machine. (The other six are named above.)
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Attracted by the rackover feature, Arthur Miller joined the Mitchell club in 1923.
His Standard replaced the Bell & Howell he got from Famous Players-Lasky,
which in turn replaced the Pathe he'd bought as a newsreel cameraman. At
least one other cinematographer, Charles Rosher, followed this pattern of
ownership.(4)

Georges Benoit started cranking his new Mitchell (#32) in J uly 1923. Benoit
epitomized the wide-roaming cameraman of the early days in film; he already
had 16 years of experience in France, Africa, South America and on both coasts
of the United States.

His physical dexterity and camera skills were honed to a fine edge; in one scene
for "The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam" he made 49 overlapping exposures. Less
than a year after buying his Mitchell he had one of the "scares of his life" when
the wind knocked a reflector against his camera and it rolled 35 feet down a
bluff. The camera was undamaged, a testament to its rugged construction.



As of November 1923 Alvin Wyckoff was reportedly a Mitchell owner but he
didn't show up in the company's sales records till he bought #99 in October of
1927. The man who shot "Joan the Woman", "Male and Female", "Blood and
Sand" and "The Cheat" would have no trouble making good use of a Mitchell
during his ongoing relationship with Cecil B DeMille, a relationship that ended
abruptly and permanently when Wyckoff helped establish the first union for
cameramen, Local 659. (Editor's note: Now Local #600.) (5)

In 1925 J R Lockwood owned Mitchell camera #49, which he was offering for
sale "new" in the "American Cinematographer". He spent many years shooting
comedies for Mack Sennett beginning in 1914 and ran an active camera rental
business throughout the silent period and on into the coming of sound. By 1930
he had three Mitchell sound cameras available for rent and more than one Bell &
Howell 2709 for sale, a clear reflection of the changing technology.

Later in 1925 J D "Dev" J ennings was shooting with Mitchell #25 at the
Metropolitan Studios on a horse racing picture called "The Million Dollar
Handicap". On the same film he's also reported to have used J ohn Boyle's
invention that piggy-backed a 2709 and an Akeley on a single tripod (2709 on
top). Within a year J ennings would be working with Buster Keaton on "Battling
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Butler". I'm not sure whether Mitchell #25 was his camera or the company's,
but I'll wager he kept it close to him. Four years earlier at Christmas his own Bell
& Howell (#474) had been stolen from the Robertson-Cole studios.

The "Ben Hur" chariot race was a great workout for cameras and cameramen,
drawing in much of the cinematographic talent of Hollywood. There were six
Mitchells among the battery of cameras, and the director of the race, Reeves
Eason, was especially pleased with how quick the Mitchell was to operate. "Its
saving in time alone proved of inestimable value."(6)

No camera has ever been so well equipped for special effects work; it was
another reason for the Mitchell's immediate popularity. The lenses could be
swung off-axis in the turret, giving the same effect as the rising front on a large
format still camera: the equivalent of a 15 tilt without the converging verticals
that you see when a negative is actually tipped back. Early Mitchell Standards
could also be equipped with an extensive array of optional effects devices between
the lens turret and the shutter. The first layer was an iris that could be adjusted
to any part of the frame. Below that lay a set of four straight-edged mattes that
could be adjusted independently into the picture area from top, bottom, left and
right. Deeper yet was a wheel with nine pre-cut mattes (binoculars, keyholes
and the like) that could be swung into place behind the lens and an equal
number of blank matte holders for custom mattes; these proved suitable for gel
filters in later years. In fact later Mitchells eliminated the pre-cut mattes on this
wheel and provided blank holders in all the positions. Later still the matte wheel
was eliminated completely along with the iris.

All these early Standards had the original AA drive which limited their frame rate
to about 32 fps. It was Friend F. Baker who field tested the first high-speed
Mitchell AB movement at the end of 1925. In a letter written May 24, 1927 he
tells the Mitchell Co. that he's exposed over 150,000 feet with the movement at
all speeds and making multiple exposures at as much as eight times normal
speed. He used it to do the photographic trick work on eight films, including "The
Better 'Ole", "The Winning of Barbara Worth" and "Old San Francisco". On the
last-named film he tested two additional high speed movements on an
earthquake shot and all three cameras worked fine.(7)



A few months later in 1927, perhaps influenced by Friend Baker's endorsement,
Donald Keyes bought a super-speed Mitchell with a range of lenses from 35mm
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to 12 inches. By now the serial numbers were up to 101 and the silent era was
drawing swiftly to A close. Mitchell cameras on the other hand were just
beginning a long and productive service life. I saw one on the street just the
other day, shooting wild footage for a commercial.

Let's see this camera as it first appeared in 1921.

MITCHELL STANDARD CONSTRUCTION

Painted or enameled metal. Available in smooth black or crackle black finish.
Machined to the highest standards of precision. Mitchells were hand-built one by
one. As a result, parts are not necessarily interchange able between cameras,
even of the same model. On used cameras, check the serial numbers carefully;
most parts have them.



MAGAZINES

External, metal, double-compartment "mouse-ears" holding 400 feet of 35mm
film. (1000 foot mags became necessary with the advent of talkies).

FOCUSING

The camera box holding the gate, shutter and movement, and supporting the
magazine, slides left and right on an "L"-shaped bed. At the front of the
assembly is the upright of the "L," holding the four-lens turret as well as all lens-
related effects devices. The under side of the bed attaches to the tripod. On the left
side of the camera box, integral with the door, is a tube with a focusing
eyepiece. A "T"-shaped handle on the rear edge of the bed controls the
movement of the camera box across the bed. Turning the handle
counterclockwise slides the camera box to the left side of the bed; in this
position the film is behind the taking lens and the focusing tube is looking at a
blank spot on the back of the upright. On turning the handle clockwise, the
camera box shifts to the right, moving the gate away from the aperture and
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placing the focusing tube there instead. Focusing can then be done on a full
aperture ground glass mounted at the front of the focusing tube. To turn the "T"-
shaped handle, depress the button in the center of the spindle, as soon as the
handle begins turning, release the button; the handle will then lock in the right
place.

WARNING: If you don't release the button, you could be risking damage
because some Standard cameras have no stop to prevent the camera box from
sliding past the end of the track and detaching from the bed. If the handle does
slip off the gears and you have to crank it back on, be sure that in its left and
right locked positions the handle doesn't extend below the plane of the camera
bottom; if it does, there's a risk that someone will rest the camera weight on the
protruding handle and distort it.



The improvement that this rackover method offers over the similar method found
on the Bell & Howell Studio camera may not be evident at first glance, but a few
minutes of operation with both systems clearly reveals the advantages of the
Mitchell technique. Both provide full-aperture viewing at the exact position the
taking lens will occupy during the exposure, and in theory neither method
requires the operator to disturb mattes and adjustments in front of the lens. But
in practice it's usually necessary with the Bell & Howell to slide the matte box
out on its rails in order to rotate the lens and shift the camera. With the Mitchell
all the movement takes place behind the lens standard, and the lens with its
preset effects remains truly undisturbed.
The cameraman is less reluctant about taking that last look at the scene to
double-check just before shooting. This in itself is a major reason that the
Mitchell so quickly became a popular competitor.

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Viewing

Viewing is possible on the ground glass when the camera is shifted to the
focusing position, and this is the only absolutely reliable check for critical
framing and effects; of course it's not possible during the actual taking of the
scene. From the first the Mitchell Camera Co offered the conventional
"spyglass" finders with individual objectives matched to the taking lenses.
Beginning in the late Twenties the company also manufactured an excellent
patented side finder that shows the scene upright and laterally correct on a large
ground glass. Masks are inserted in this finder to indicate correct fields of view
for the various lenses. The finder pivots to compensate for parallax. (Later
finders have built-in matte ribbons to set the field of view.)

Lenses

A wide range of lenses is available in Mitchell micrometer focusing mounts for
installation on the four-lens turret. These mounts very closely resemble the
focusing mounts for Bell & Howell lenses and it's almost possible to use Mitchell
lenses and
Bell & Howell lenses interchangeably. However, certain modifications are
necessary to install one camera's lenses on the other. The most critical
difference lies in the distance from the turret face to the film planethe "flange
focal distance." In the Mitchell the depth behind the lens mount is 1.695". In
the Bell & Howell this distance is 1.6875". The difference between the two is
.0075", which is enough to affect the focusing scale of any lens switched from
one camera to the other. In adapting a Mitchell lens mount to a Bell & Howell
you can use shims to correct the disparity. The simplest way to correct the
focus on a Bell & Howell lens, which will be too long on a Mitchell, is to scribe a
new witness mark on the barrel, but this will place it in an awkward position for
viewing.

Two other physical problems need to be addressed. The four machine screws
that secure the lens in place are positioned differently on the Mitchell than they
are on the Bell & Howell. To mount a Bell & Howell lens mount on a Mitchell
turret face, it's necessary to recut the screw holes on the mount farther from the
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center of the lens barrel, that is, to center the holes on the circumference of a
larger circle. This alteration positions the holes right at the edge of the mounting
flange. It follows then, in mounting Mitchell lenses on a Bell & Howell, the screw
holes have to be re-tapped closer to the center of the mount. In this case to
provide clearance for the screw heads, grooves must be routed in the edge of
the protruding barrel of the mount. The final clearance that needs to be re-cut is
on the inside edge of Mitchell mounting flanges. When mounting them on a Bell
& Howell, in order to clear the wider shoulder in the center of the turret, a small
arc has to be cut into the edge of the Mitchell mounting flange.

Any qualified machinist can make these changes and they don't jeopardize the
integrity of the lens which will perform equally well on either body, but
cameramen should be aware that a significant amount of machining is required
to do the job right; there are
dealers in used equipment who will assure you that "Oh yes; you can use these
lenses on your camera, no problem," without telling you how much tinkering is
involved.

Drive

The earliest Mitchells had a "clapper" movement with many similarities to the
original Bell & Howell drive. A pivoting carrier pinned at the top alternates the
film between the fixed registration pins and the pulldown claws, which are driven
by a drunken screw. Probably only a handfulif anyof these Leonard
movements still exist.

The Type AA movement was initially installed in about 60 Mitchells. It uses three
cams to control the pulldown, insert the register pins and apply lateral pressure
to the film while at rest in the gate. Many of these movements were later pulled
out and replaced with high speed movements, the type most commonly seen
today.

Beginning in 1925 Mitchell was building cameras with the improved High Speed
cam and gear movement and with the coming of sound they began offering it in
two versions: Type AB (ball-bearings) and Type AC (sleeve bearings, much
quieter). In spite of the "High-Speed" designation, only the AB movement can
handle really high speeds (up to 140 frames per second but recommended to
about 110); the AA and AC movements are rated to 32 fps. In all these
movements, four claws engage the film, two on either side below the aperture.
The movement can be cranked in either direction.

The shutter is a 170 degree disc with a planetary gear dissolving mechanism.
The automatic dissolve on the Standard works at three speeds: 2, 4 and 8 feet.
Manual shutter adjustments can be controlled with a lever at the rear of the
camera which moves along a calibrated arc and can be locked at specific
positions. The camera stops automatically at the end of the dissolve; a button
unlocks the movement when you're ready to start up again. (Later models have
no auto dissolve).

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NOTE: In the Bell & Howell camera the shutter acts in front of the viewing
system as well as the taking system; if you do a fade-out as the first half of a
dissolve, when you go to do your setup for the incoming shot, you're unable to
view and focus on the ground glass because the variable shutter is fully closed
and can't be opened without risk of flashing the film. This isn't the case with the
Mitchell because the shutter shifts away from the aperture to make room for the
magnifying eyepiece--no matter how the
shutter is set, it has no influence on parallax- free viewing between shots.

Effects

A metal disc mounted just in front of the gate is cut with these masks: keyhole,
round, small oval, large oval, binocular, horizontal split stage and vertical split
stage. An index pin assures proper positioning. This is in addition to a standard
mask slot which also accepts frames of film shot during previous sessions, for
perfectly aligned match dissolves (another valuable Mitchell innovation).

A built-in iris can be positioned anywhere in the frame and closed to any size.
From the rear of the camera the right hand knob on top controls the horizontal
position of the iris in the frame and the left-top knob aligns the iris vertically. The
iris itself is opened and closed with the large knob on the left side just above the
finder.
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Four individually controlled mattes are also built-in. Two concentric knobs on top
center of the front standard control the upper and lower mattes. Two concentric
knobs on the left side of the standard control the left and right side mattes. Nor
is that all: using a knob next to the turret, the lenses can be rotated slightly to
give the effect of a rising and falling front standard, which allows the field of view
to be raised or lowered an equivalent of 15 degrees without tilting the camera
and altering perspective.

The versatility of these arrangements can be matched on other cameras with a
number of accessories, but nowhere is so much control over the frame available
within the body of the camera itself.

NOTE: Though each of these devices is precision machined and positively
controlled, operators should be cautioned that they can be moved into the frame
inadvertently during the course of a day's shooting, and it's prudent to be aware
of their settings.

Other Features

A tachometer is available to indicate cranking speed. One accessory item
available for hand-crankers was a special door with an additional shaft yielding
64 frames per turn; two turns per second on this shaft drives the camera at 128
frames per second.

References

1. Scott Sidney's letter in a Mitchell ad, back cover of the American Cinematographer,
February 1927
2. Letter in a Mitchell ad, back cover, American Cinematographer, March 1927
3. Letter in a Mitchell ad, back cover, American Cinematographer, February 1926
4. In many photos from the silent period, you'll see a Bell & Howell working as first
camera and a wooden Pathe or Eclair as second camera, making the European
negative. After 1921 you'd increasingly see the Bell & Howell as the second camera
and the Mitchell as number one.
5. Brownlow: The Parade's Gone By.... Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1968, p.227
6. The Mitchell Company used his letter as an ad on the back page of the American
Cinematographer, October 1926
7. Mitchell ad in American Cinematographer, J uly 1927, back cover

All photos accompanying the article
are copyright L. Sprague Anderson.



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