{"id":1788,"date":"2023-07-28T10:55:00","date_gmt":"2023-07-28T17:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/?p=1788"},"modified":"2023-07-18T15:15:40","modified_gmt":"2023-07-18T22:15:40","slug":"an-interlude-with-the-mitchell-mk-ii","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/2023\/07\/28\/an-interlude-with-the-mitchell-mk-ii\/","title":{"rendered":"An Interlude with the Mitchell MK II"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

You all know how much I enjoy playing with this equipment. This afternoon I was revisiting John Hora\u2019s Mitchell MK II S35R camera. It brought back to mind how much I hate the door on this camera, but love everything else the camera can do. John\u2019s camera features the BNCR hard front, a swing-away video tap, and a Fries Engineering crystal motor. The magazine John put on this camera is from his Cinema Products XR35, which was sadly lost when John passed away. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"Mitchell<\/a>
Mitchell MK II S35R with the video tap in the shooting position<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Mitchell<\/a>
Mitchell MK II S35R with the video tap in door opening position<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The MK II represents a step forward in high speed 35mm spinning mirror reflex cameras, capable of shooting from 1 frame per second to 128 frames per second. It features many of the same conveniences that Mitchell cameras were famous for, like a variable shutter, as well as critical focus, contrast filter, and color filter all built into the viewfinder door. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"Mitchell<\/a>
Mitchell MK II S35R with the camera door open<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"a<\/a>
A close-up of the high speed movement of the Mitchell MK II S35R<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

The Mitchell MK II S35R uses NC style magazines, and this model can still use the shoulder mounted magazines if you can find them (though I don\u2019t know why you\u2019d want to). While not Mitchell\u2019s most elegant design, this camera is easy to thread, easy to maintain, features a lot of accessories, and can be used for animation, live action, or high speed cinematography, all in one reasonably portable package.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"the<\/a>
Mitchell MK II S35R from the operator\u2019s position along with the shoulder mount magazine port<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"the<\/a>
Fries crystal motor and the shoulder mount magazine port on the the Mitchell MK II S35R<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Mitchell did manufacture a blimp for the MK II (which I had the misfortune of picking up once, do not recommend) which did make the camera reasonably quiet. The two blimps I have used were not super quiet, but if you need a spinning mirror reflex high speed camera, this is a pretty good choice.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n
\"the<\/a>
BNCR hard front on the the Mitchell MK II S35R<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"the<\/a>
Riser and accessory plate designed and built by my mentor John Russel of JAR Enterprises<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You all know how much I enjoy playing with this equipment. This afternoon I was revisiting John Hora\u2019s Mitchell MK II S35R camera. It brought back to mind how much I hate the door on this camera, but love everything else the camera can do. John\u2019s camera features the BNCR hard front, a swing-away video […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1774,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"disabled","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[33,147,10,92,26],"class_list":["post-1788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cameras","tag-35mm","tag-john-hora","tag-mitchell-camera","tag-mitchell-camera-co","tag-mitchell-mk-ii"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1788"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1790,"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1788\/revisions\/1790"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cinemagear.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}