Michael Cleveland

You have to remember the time and circumstances. Filmos were expensive equipment, selling to people who were far more apt than most of us to take off on a world cruise and golf was as much a social phenomenon among the wealthy as it was a sport, so there was much 16mm film footage devoted to golf pros and how-to instructions. I have no interest in golf swings. Ideally I would like to locate one to purchase to complete a collection of early Filmos, but I would be happy enough just to find an example to have a look at it. Outside of the inaccessible Morgana Color Filmo, it is the only model from about the first decade that I don't have in the collection.

That is a good way to date these, provided you are fairly certain the lens is the original one with the camera. Yours also fits in sequence so probably is, but I would be cautious in general trying to date these that way because lenses were often switched, upgraded, added by later owners, or simply replaced, so it's one of those things that warrants care and is most credible when all the numbers are in the proper range.

There have been others made for that purpose, but this is specifically a movie camera.

The standard Filmo had a 216 degree shutter.

There may have been other uses, but it was made specifically for analyzing golf swings, so probably had a limited market.

Yes, I know. That's why I'm looking for it.

That number is in the correct sequence to be the original mag.

Kodak very likely does not have a reference for this, but I've been collecting serial numbers on these for years. Part of my reply to Simon below should have been addressed to you. Proportionally, yours would fall sometime around 1940, so maybe give or take a year.

There is no such connection. The number is just a straight sequential serial number. No production year, no codes. Just a number. The number of your camera would place it somewhere around 1940, if production was fairly consistent from year to year. There were about 9000 CS-I cameras made between 1933 and 1948.

Does anyone have or has anyone seen a Filmo 70-DB? Certainly interested in buying one, but would be happy just to know there's something out there, and perhaps see photos?

Now that's a job I could love. Have fun.

Frank, I wouldn't bother with this. I left this discussion when I realized I was arguing with someone who shows all the signs of crackpot-itis: Certain that he alone has the answers, has a pet theory, treats speculation as evidence, invents evidence, molds evidence (both real and speculative) to fit the theory, ignores or refuses to acknowledge any evidence that does not agree with pet theory, ignores timelines, and so on. I would say you are wasting wear on your keyboard. On the other hand, if you find it entertaining...

I had a rather lengthy reply underway, and somehow this computer switched to another screen on its own and erased it (as it often does), so for now a shorter answer. I'm not really sure what you are trying to say. You say that Howell could not have invented the 2709, yet the camera exists, and no one else invented it. As for mechanical knowledge, there is nothing absent in the time that he could not have drawn on. The claw pull-down dates to the invention of the shuttle sewing machine, at least as early as 1846; pin register is a fairly obvious improvement on that for extreme accuracy of placement of the frame behind the aperture; twin lens still cameras, with one lens for focusing the image, had been on the market at least as early as the 1890's, so there was nothing unusual in applying that to cine cameras. I don't understand your issues with his age. The 20's are considered the most creative and productive years, and you can extend that backwards for a particularly intelligent and inventive mind. As for mechanical knowledge, and access to information, I have a book that was originally published in the 1860's, and several times reprinted, which catalogs diagrams of hundreds of mechanical movements, with pulleys, gears, levers, eccentrics, and anything else you can imagine. It's exactly the kind of reference that would have been quite naturally in the hands of a mechanical inventor. There is simply no shortfall that should have prevented an imaginative inventor like Howell from doing what he is known to have done. As for your criticism of Le Prince, I think you forget that this was the first time such a thing had been done, and the standards you want to apply to his work are only in hindsight based on expectations that derive from later improvements, so they make no sense as critique of his pioneering work. I think you are over-thinking this, over-imaging.

Much more to say about this when I have time, but regarding the Edison article: I haven't had time to do any verification, but I am always suspicious of things unlikely that appear online. I do not put the murder past Edison, though Le Prince was hardly his only rival, and he was not in the habit of murdering rivals, but he was an intelligent man, and it is absolutely inconceivable that he would have put any such admission on paper, especially since the note served no purpose against the surrounding context of his technical notes. So until I can find some kind of verification, I take this with a very large grain of salt. More as time permits.

I meant to note also, that Bell & Howell had completed the tooling for the 17.5mm Filmo, and had at least a couple of demonstration cameras prepared by the time they saw the 16mm demonstration at Kodak. It was a huge decision to scrap all of the investment in the original Filmo in favor of 16mm. The brochures I mentioned suggest the possibility of a limited production run of the earlier Filmo, but may themselves also be from a run printed for the demonstration. There was one other situation in the company's history when they did a similar about-face. The Morgana Color System was announced in Filmo topics, followed by an issue with questions and answers, then disappeared altogether. There was an article in the SMPE Journal many months after the initial announcement, describing the system in detail, complete with photos of a physical camera and projector, but by then B&H had been long silent about it. The actual system apparently never went to market. There was no more mention of it by Bell & Howell, and it's disappearance remains a mystery.

I wouldn't be too literal with the dollar equivalents between 1935 and now. It's a lot more complicated than a simple multiple. As for Le Prince, I think you may be indulging in a bit of wishful thinking. The lack of trace and other evidence say just the opposite, that he was made to disappear. First, he had no reason to make himself disappear. He was on the verge of announcing successful completion of his work of many years (his prototype camera works), work that was virtually obsessive. He scraped to keep that work going, so he did not have the means to slip away and support himself comfortably for the rest of his life, and would not have abandoned his family, to whom he was devoted, to fend for themselves. He would hardly have continued in secret to support someone else's efforts in a field in which he should have earned credit as the pioneer, and there is absolutely no evidence of his survival. It just doesn't hold up. If I recall correctly, it was his family who suggested that Edison might have had him killed. Not impossible; Edison was far from the legend that everyone wants to remember; he was, in fact, a thief and a scoundrel, a very evil, greedy man, but connecting him with Le Prince's disappearance is purely speculative, based on his greed and their mutual (therefore conflicting) objectives. His own relative lack of interest in motion picture at that stage also would make such an act extremely unlikely. It wasn't until later, after he had stolen the Jenkins/Armat projector that monetary interest took over. I think the evidence points to Le Prince's death on the train. He may have fallen off, or been pushed off, but there is nothing to suggest that he survived the trip. Then there is Albert Howell. There is no great difference between projection mechanisms and basic camera mechanisms, especially for a person mechanically inclined. He had a solid knowledge of projectors, and would have gained experience converting that knowledge to camera use in building the original wooden camera. I see no problem crediting him with creation of the 2709. It would have come down to the question of "What do you want this camera to do?" followed by a skilled machinist's translation into a working mechanism.

Lot to add to this, but not much time at the moment. There is a possibility that the 17.5mm Filmo made it into very limited production before it was scrapped in favor of 16mm. Bell & Howell had gone so far as to print advertising brochures, one of which I have. Externally it was a very different camera from the Filmo. If there are extant examples, they would most likely be in one of those stored boxes at DeVry. I have a very solid history of the Cine-Kodak and Victor from the beginning; in fact, have the two known metal prototypes of the six that were produced, as well as the Victor prototype and first production model, and the earliest known Filmo, the sixth one produced. The problem with Bell & Howell's early work in amateur equipment is that the initial marketing of the Filmo was literally door to door, so there was no advertising literature produced that can be used to derive dates, until early 1925, and the company records are very likely destroyed by now. There would have been instruction books with the first cameras, possibly dated, but the earliest ones have remained elusive. I didn't mean to suggest that the 2709 was designed out of a vacuum. Earlier inventions certainly had contributed to the general knowledge of mechanical possibilities, but it was a huge leap beyond anything that existed prior to its creation, and there is no evidence to suggest it was anything but the work of Howell, who had knowledge of the mechanisms of motion picture taking and projection. Le Prince could not have been the other backer of B&H's incorporation, because he was long dead by then. He disappeared from a train (1888?--maybe earlier; have to look up the date, but it was about the time William Kennedy Laurie Dickson was putting together Edison's camera and projectors. In fact, there is a conspiracy theory that Edison himself was behind Le Prince's disappearance, but scoundrel that he was, I doubt there is any substance to it.) The rest of Le Prince's family were frustrated by his disappearance, but to my knowledge, none continued involvement in motion picture development in any capacity. I'm sure Jack Fay Robinson's book served it's intended purpose, but it is agonizingly deficient in details. Someone at what's left of Bell & Howell was kind enough to take the time to Xerox the book, page by page, several years ago when I could not find an original copy, but it contained little of the information I was looking for. I knew someone who may have known when the first Filmos went to market, and published a definite date without a reference, but he was quite elderly when I asked for his source and could not remember. He died a couple of years ago, but he was a careful historian, so I am inclined to accept his date (which fits with some other very tenuous evidence), though I can't back it up with anything solid. It always struck me as odd that B&H's straight 8 failed in the market (and now marks two of the rarest of B&H cameras), while Univex sold millions, and double 8 went on to great success with virtually everyone who made it. Price was surely the market maker for Univex, but I suspect Bell & Howell's marketing may have been a factor in that early failure.

Simon Wyss: I'm just curious, upon what do you base your assertion that Howell did not have the expertise to design and build the 2709? The meager information I do have says that he was a mechanical genius who designed the camera based on his experience building the projection equipment that the company started with. That may also be myth, but the fact of the camera says somebody had to build it, and there was no army of design engineers in those early days of the company. I also disagree that it would necessarily have been a process of years and years to develop. As for sand casting, these were the days when automobile engines were being invented in village machine shops, so it's not surprising that a trained machinist would have that knowledge. Someone above mentioned the lag between patent application and grant for the perforator. Nothing unusual in that, either, as that was often a process of years. I also have been looking for Bell & Howell documents. Patricia Zimmermann (Reel Families) told me several years ago that she had been given access to the company records when they were stored in a warehouse somewhere in the Chicago area, but the very large amount of incorrect historical information in her book leaves one wondering, and she couldn't say where it had been located (though if it still exists and one could find the right person at DeVry...). My interest in this is more related to Bell & Howell's early role in 16mm equipment production, which is even more obscure, since they didn't get around to putting anything in print until 1925. I can tell you the exact dates that Kodak and Victor introduced their cameras, but in spite of the usually offered 1923 date for Bell & Howell, which I have reason to believe is wrong, can't even state the year with any certainty.

Just acquired a nice Model 150 myself, with motor, mag, and the big finder, all working nicely. No lenses, but I have 100 or so C-mounts, including a few that aren't already on cameras, so fitting it won't be a problem. Impressive quality of construction. Don't know why it isn't as familiar as the Mitchells and Bell & Howell, but it's a beautifully made camera.

There is another form of identification that I think no one has mentioned. Within months after the 16mm format was introduced, the cameras included a camera identification code in the form of some geometric shape cut out of the aperture plate. This opening exposed that shape onto the edge of each frame between the sprockets. It was present on all but the cheapest cameras, and continued on some as late as the 1950's, though I'm not sure how long the practice endured universally. However, on early films, from 1920's and 30's, and probably even later, the code will be visible on camera originals, but will not appear on duplicate imagery. It's a narrower application than some other methods, but if you know the age of the film, it's a good indicator. When I see a 1920's home movie offered, it's the first thing I want to know about it before buying, since for my purposes, only camera originals are acceptable.

Can anyone here make a recommendation for a commercial processor for 16mm B&W reversal? Location and point of contact if possible. I need a reliable company, preferably one that makes daily processing runs in this kind of film. It's only one 100-ft roll, but it's an important one. I'm located in Nebraska. Close by is good, but not essential. Thanks.

Well, $60 is about what it should bring, but ebay is more likely to bring $20 to $30. Yours is the early version of the f/3.5 Model B, and somewhat scarcer than the later one, but not so much that anyone would pay more. $12 is still a good buy, though.

Much depends upon which Filmo you purchased, and exactly what you did to the central screw, and how the lenses are "larger". It's unlikely you could fix it yourself. Alan Gordon Enterprises in California bought up all the Filmo parts, so they may be able to help. You should also be aware that not all 1-inch threaded lenses are C-mount. There are early lenses out there in A and B mounts with the same thread but different mounting depths which are not interchangeable with C-mount. That could be the case with the Cooke lenses, but not with the Computar, so that may not be the issue. I can't tell you much more without details of the modification, and serial numbers of the lenses and camera, along with the specific Filmo model.

Sorry, late-comer to this, but couldn't help commenting. A 1923 Cine-Kodak for $12 is a real steal, and they are doing more than holding their value. Five or six years ago you could buy a clean example for $250. Now they can bring upwards of twice that. Last good one on ebay went for over $600. If collectors get interested in later high-end 16, some prices for cameras previously valued for their utility may go back up on cameras sought for display only. It's interesting that a clean Nikon I will bring upwards of $25,000 from collectors in a world-class auction. The number of the earliest version of the Cine-Kodak Model A's produced is essentially identical, yet these--with an arguably similar degree of historical significance--won't bring even $1000...yet.