I played a lot of catch-up this week, getting several cameras finalized and ready to be listed on our website. Work is now complete on the VistaVision Butterfly camera, as well as the ARRI BL2, and the ARRI BL 4S is currently on the workbench undergoing a final inspection. All 3 cameras are now available […]
Camera Housekeeping Read More »
It was a rare privilege to explore and repair this 20th Century-Fox Cine Simplex 35mm production camera. The engineering of this camera is extraordinary and it is disappointing that it never became as ubiquitous as the Mitchell BNC. The level of thought that went into all aspects of the design and function of this camera
An Extraordinary Camera In Need of a New Home Read More »
As we wind down 2022 I wanted to revisit some of the highlights of the past year. Starting off the year, we were hard at work bringing the amazing Fox Cine Simplex camera and Freehead Camera Mount back to life: http://bit.ly/3hwC8WC After an in-depth restoration of the Dykstraflex camera crane and trojan head for the
2022: The Year in Review Read More »
The Twentieth Century-Fox Cine Simplex camera represented a revolutionary change in the design and intended use of a studio sound production camera. From its inception, this camera was designed specifically to be sound silent without the added size and weight of a blimp housing. To achieve this, the camera’s designers rethought everything about how the
Fox Cine Simplex Now Available! Read More »
I have come as close to completion on the Fox Cine Simplex as time allows. This camera is 95% complete and in good working order, with the exception of a few parts that make the automatic slater and follow focus units work. Some of the parts that attach the automatic slater to the camera are
An End of the Journey, and Some Reflections Read More »
The camera is all back together and, as you’ll see in the video, it is amazingly quiet. I hope you will forgive the road noise in the background, but frankly I just couldn’t drag the camera back upstairs where it is quieter. At the end of the video is a demonstration of the unique rackover
A Penultimate Update on the Fox Camera Read More »
My disappointment was palpable, though not unexpected, when I turned the camera on for the first time and heard the terrible sound of the shutter scraping against the innards of the camera. The journey now returned to taking the camera apart again, and removing the camera from the rackover cradle so I could get to
Oxidation Troubles with the Fox Camera Shutter Read More »
After powering up and running the camera for only a few seconds, I noticed that the camera was producing a horrible scraping noise. The noise was very similar to what you get on a Mitchell camera when the shutter blades scrape against the forward-most light trap. This, unfortunately, was a sign that I needed to
Not So Silent, Silent Camera Read More »
While I was struggling this week with a strange shutter noise on the Fox camera, I helped a private collector from back East to transfer these two amazing cameras to another private collector here in Los Angeles. The first camera is a 1910 Debrie Le Parvo Special, which is unique in that the camera housing
Two Beautiful Hand-Crank Cameras, ca. 1910 Read More »
Happy new year everyone! A brief progress report on the Freehead for this first Friday of the new year: It’s as finished as I have time to work on it. Because this project is so interesting, it has gone way over the time I had set aside to finish it. There is still some air
Fox Freehead Restoration Complete! Read More »
