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Arri 35 IIC


Boris bruno

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Hi I just purchased an arri 35mm IIC, I’m new to using it I’m use to using 16mm. It has bncr mount. I need help understanding camera as in gates, what lens is good to use, or how to operate. Also what accessories do I need for it in order to shoot short films and longer features. Also does anyone know where to convert to pl mount. 

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I've got one too Bruno and am hoping the both of us can learn some good things from this thread. There are some brilliant technicians here who regularly advise. My question at the moment is can I get away without a fuse in the battery line from a Bescor 12V battery to the camera.

There's basically two main gates that are generally found in a IIC, and both are 4 perf and off-centre slightly, due to the practice in the past of making room for an optical soundtrack about 2 mm wide to the side of the image. One is Academy, roughly 1.33, and the other is Scope, approximately 1.2, so nearly square in shape.

Edited by Jon O'Brien
Spelt name wrong
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- To check what gate you have, take a piece of unexposed camera film, put it in the gate, turn the shutter so you can see the film from the front and take a black magic marker and trace the gate with it. Then pull the piece of film you traced out and see if the markings are centered or slightly shifted to one side. If the markings go all the way to the perforations on BOTH sides, then its super 35. If there is a 2mm gap between the perforation and the marking, then it's academy or "normal" 35mm. 

- There have been several motors made for the IIC over the years, so how to operate really depends on the motor. The Arri stick motors are easiest, they have a flick switch on/off. Some also have a potentiometer adjustment for speed.  Some of the later Cinematography Engineering pancake motors are pretty nice and can control speed electronically. 

- In terms of loading and such, there are gobs of videos on YouTube. It's a very easy camera to load and run, probably one of the easiest made. They are workhorses and after you remove the aging grease and replace it with good grease, they should last a long time. This is something a tech should do however, as they may want to dismantle the drive system in order to do this which leads to the camera falling out of time, which is not something a user can deal with. 

- In terms of lenses and mounts, if it's a BNCR mount then simply go to eBay and check out lenses that have that mount. You should have no problem finding something inexpensive to start with. Older, not very fast primes in BNCR mount should be easily available on eBay. Here is an unusual 15mm wide angle lens for BNCR mount on eBay. 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Samcine-Nikon-15mm-lens-BNCR-mount/274356136099?hash=item3fe0e668a3:g:2fkAAOSwHv1esFLM

- If the 3 lens turret system has been removed (which I assume it has been if it's BNCR) then changing the mount isn't too difficult. You will have to see a professional to do it, as they will have to re-calibrate the flange distance. 

- In terms of a fuse system, it depends on the motor really. If memory serves me, the stock motor has a soldered on fuse which is hard to replace if failed, so maybe it's a good idea to have a fuse between the battery and the camera to avoid blowing that fuse? 

 

Edited by Tyler Purcell
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4 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

- To check what gate you have, take a piece of unexposed camera film, put it in the gate, turn the shutter so you can see the film from the front and take a black magic marker and trace the gate with it. Then pull the piece of film you traced out and see if the markings are centered or slightly shifted to one side. If the markings go all the way to the perforations on BOTH sides, then its super 35. If there is a 2mm gap between the perforation and the marking, then it's academy or "normal" 35mm. 
 

We’ve had this conversation before. As far as I know Arri never made a S35 gate for the 2C. There may have been after market versions (usually with a PL hard front) but shifting the lens port over to S35 centring caused potential problems with some lenses hitting the mirror, and the original viewfinder optics won’t cover S35 either.

6 hours ago, Boris bruno said:

Hi I just purchased an arri 35mm IIC, I’m new to using it I’m use to using 16mm. It has bncr mount. I need help understanding camera as in gates, what lens is good to use, or how to operate. Also what accessories do I need for it in order to shoot short films and longer features. Also does anyone know where to convert to pl mount. 


We’ve covered the common 2C gates in a few threads now, eg:

https://cinematography.com/index.php?/topic/60916-arri-2c-high-speed/

I posted pictures of the Academy and Scope gates here:
https://cinematography.com/index.php?/topic/62077-questions-about-anamorphic-35mm-that-have-me-wondering/page/2/&tab=comments#comment-467798

The Scope one is for anamorphic lenses, where the image will be unsqueezed in post.

You should have a ground glass that matches the gate, so see what aspect ratio it has. By looking through the front and inching the mirror back and forth you can compare the gate opening to the reflected ground glass marks, they should match.

These days you will most likely just scan the neg and extract what you want anyway, but the right ground glass marks are necessary to frame properly.

There are plenty of user manuals online, eg:

https://www.manualslib.com/manual/997443/Arri-Arriflex-35-Ii-C.html#product-Arriflex 35 II C

This forum also has lots of info on these cameras if you search the archives (or do a google search within this site).

As far as converting to PL, that could be an expensive exercise. I don’t know who might do it these days, but I suspect you’d be looking at a lot more than you paid for the camera. It might be easier to just find BNCR mount lenses. Roughly double the focal lengths you are used to with 16mm for a similar field of view.

These are noisy MOS cameras, so unless you invest in a sound proof blimp and a flat base or ADR everything or shoot a silent film, a feature film isn’t very feasible. 

The accessories you might need depend on what you have and what you want to do. Is it a flat base, or in hand held configuration? Do you have a head that can work with it, a set of legs? Did it come with a matte box? Do you have batteries and cables? These cameras were originally designed to be handheld and focussed by hand, so there are no rails for a follow focus or zoom lens support, but there were various solutions made over the years, sometimes incorporated in a flat base, sometimes gerry built. You can just start with no accessories and shoot hand-held.

5 hours ago, Jon O'Brien said:

My question at the moment is can I get away without a fuse in the battery line from a Bescor 12V battery to the camera.

A fuse is a safety precaution. You can get away with it like you can get away with not insuring your car. In the rental houses I’ve worked in we always fused the batteries for film cameras, but I guess it’s not essential.

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8 hours ago, Tyler Purcell said:

- To check what gate you have, take a piece of unexposed camera film, put it in the gate, turn the shutter so you can see the film from the front and take a black magic marker and trace the gate with it. Then pull the piece of film you traced out and see if the markings are centered or slightly shifted to one side. If the markings go all the way to the perforations on BOTH sides, then its super 35. If there is a 2mm gap between the perforation and the marking, then it's academy or "normal" 35mm. 

- There have been several motors made for the IIC over the years, so how to operate really depends on the motor. The Arri stick motors are easiest, they have a flick switch on/off. Some also have a potentiometer adjustment for speed.  Some of the later Cinematography Engineering pancake motors are pretty nice and can control speed electronically. 

- In terms of loading and such, there are gobs of videos on YouTube. It's a very easy camera to load and run, probably one of the easiest made. They are workhorses and after you remove the aging grease and replace it with good grease, they should last a long time. This is something a tech should do however, as they may want to dismantle the drive system in order to do this which leads to the camera falling out of time, which is not something a user can deal with. 

- In terms of lenses and mounts, if it's a BNCR mount then simply go to eBay and check out lenses that have that mount. You should have no problem finding something inexpensive to start with. Older, not very fast primes in BNCR mount should be easily available on eBay. Here is an unusual 15mm wide angle lens for BNCR mount on eBay. 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/Samcine-Nikon-15mm-lens-BNCR-mount/274356136099?hash=item3fe0e668a3:g:2fkAAOSwHv1esFLM

- If the 3 lens turret system has been removed (which I assume it has been if it's BNCR) then changing the mount isn't too difficult. You will have to see a professional to do it, as they will have to re-calibrate the flange distance. 

- In terms of a fuse system, it depends on the motor really. If memory serves me, the stock motor has a soldered on fuse which is hard to replace if failed, so maybe it's a good idea to have a fuse between the battery and the camera to avoid blowing that fuse? 

 

This was so helpful, thank you so much.

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Hi guys so I as in accessories I only have camera and gates. I also have motor and two mags. I don’t know what else I need besides lens. can you guys lead me to where to find accessories I checked eBay and didn’t really find much. I need battety I have power cord. Also I’m looking into to buying tripods and how to assemble with video monitor. 

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I don’t think you need to rush into buying accessories. Take it slow, keep checking eBay to get a sense of what there is, and spend time researching the camera and getting familiar with using it.

I would suggest just starting with a battery and a BNC mount lens (maybe something in the “normal” 25-50mm range), and have a tech give the camera and lens a quick check over. Then shoot something and go from there.

For battery options there are heaps of informative threads in the archives here. It will depend on the requirements of the motor you have. Google “Arri 2C battery site:cinematography.com“. You’ll find lots of other good info on theses cameras here too with more general searches.

For head and legs options, if you just have a hand held motor, not a flat base, you need a specific type of head or adapter to mount the camera on a tripod. See my blog on 2Cs where there are pics of one type of head adapter stand and other info:

http://cinetinker.blogspot.com/2014/04/arriflex-35-iic.html
You can also see what the original matte box hood looks like, but maybe you don’t have the square rod clamp at top for mounting it because your camera has been modified with a BNCR hard front. Without pics it’s hard to know what you need.

If you don’t have a flat base, this sort of head and legs might work, as the head has space for the motor to protrude underneath, but you’d need to check with the seller:
https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ARRI-IIC-35MM-MOVIE-CAMERA-HEAD-AND-WOODEN-TRIPOD-/132826088098

For some reason it doesn’t show up in eBay USA.

There are a few video assist options if you google it, but you’re generally looking at thousands of dollars. The best ones replace the door entirely. I’m not sure a video split on a 2C is always worth it. Why do you think you need one?

The choice of other accessories you might need depends on what you want to do down the track. If you’re just exploring 35mm and maybe shooting little silent hand held pieces you don’t really need anything, maybe just a mattebox hood. If you want to shoot a feature with recorded dialogue you’ll need a blimp and all that goes with it, which really isn’t practical anymore (just get a sync sound camera instead). Google 2C flat bases if you want more control options or more normal head compatibility or the option of rails (which then opens up the option of other accessories like a follow focus or motors, different matte boxes, lens supports etc). Apart from eBay, some rental houses may have old 2C accessories they want to get rid of, or there are places like Visual Products that may be able to help you.

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13 hours ago, Dom Jaeger said:

I don’t think you need to rush into buying accessories. Take it slow, keep checking eBay to get a sense of what there is, and spend time researching the camera and getting familiar with using it.

I would suggest just starting with a battery and a BNC mount lens (maybe something in the “normal” 25-50mm range), and have a tech give the camera and lens a quick check over. Then shoot something and go from there.

For battery options there are heaps of informative threads in the archives here. It will depend on the requirements of the motor you have. Google “Arri 2C battery site:cinematography.com“. You’ll find lots of other good info on theses cameras here too with more general searches.

For head and legs options, if you just have a hand held motor, not a flat base, you need a specific type of head or adapter to mount the camera on a tripod. See my blog on 2Cs where there are pics of one type of head adapter stand and other info:

http://cinetinker.blogspot.com/2014/04/arriflex-35-iic.html
You can also see what the original matte box hood looks like, but maybe you don’t have the square rod clamp at top for mounting it because your camera has been modified with a BNCR hard front. Without pics it’s hard to know what you need.

If you don’t have a flat base, this sort of head and legs might work, as the head has space for the motor to protrude underneath, but you’d need to check with the seller:
https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/ARRI-IIC-35MM-MOVIE-CAMERA-HEAD-AND-WOODEN-TRIPOD-/132826088098

For some reason it doesn’t show up in eBay USA.

There are a few video assist options if you google it, but you’re generally looking at thousands of dollars. The best ones replace the door entirely. I’m not sure a video split on a 2C is always worth it. Why do you think you need one?

The choice of other accessories you might need depends on what you want to do down the track. If you’re just exploring 35mm and maybe shooting little silent hand held pieces you don’t really need anything, maybe just a mattebox hood. If you want to shoot a feature with recorded dialogue you’ll need a blimp and all that goes with it, which really isn’t practical anymore (just get a sync sound camera instead). Google 2C flat bases if you want more control options or more normal head compatibility or the option of rails (which then opens up the option of other accessories like a follow focus or motors, different matte boxes, lens supports etc). Apart from eBay, some rental houses may have old 2C accessories they want to get rid of, or there are places like Visual Products that may be able to help you.

 

592B0DAD-579F-4688-8CA5-01D5E0959E59.jpeg

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What aspect ratio ground glass is installed? There are usually a few used 1.37:1 and 1.85:1 ground glasses avail on eBay, the latter of which is pretty close to 1.78:1 (16x9).

Also, the Cinematography Electronics 2C Crystal Motor Base is good to have if you want to mount to tripod:

https://cinemaelec.com/products/2c_crystal_motor_base

The power connectors on it are standard XLR4, so you can use modern 12v batteries. You might need a second battery to run in parallel if want to shoot higher frame rates. The CE motor also has a hot shoe mount in front for a ARRI SR style lightweight 15mm hot shoe rod bracket, so you can avoid a heavy Studio baseplate. 

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22 hours ago, Boris bruno said:

 

F878870B-0F5A-41BC-A835-EDA04D5A49F6.jpeg

That's a lot of gates! Can you post photos of them closer up with the pressure plates open so we can see what the cut out aspect ratios are? What do the labels say? Is there another one fitted to the camera?

And to echo Satsuki, what framelines are on the the ground glass?

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7 hours ago, Dom Jaeger said:

That's a lot of gates! Can you post photos of them closer up with the pressure plates open so we can see what the cut out aspect ratios are? What do the labels say? Is there another one fitted to the camera?

And to echo Satsuki, what framelines are on the the ground glass?

I will 

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Well, none of them look like Scope (1.2:1). It's difficult for me to see as it's in the shade but one of the gates looks a bit like 1.85:1 or thereabouts, which I find unusual. I presumed the usual practice when shooting 4 perf spherical was to shoot 'full' academy frame and crop to 1.85 either in the print making process or in the projector. Or maybe I'm just not seeing it well enough in the picture. Or is it a 2-perf gate (I'm referring to the bottom RH gate)? Doesn't seem quite to be 2.40:1. What do the labels say?

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Looks like 1.66:1, 1.85:1, the standard Academy gate of 1.37:1 and maybe 1.33:1 (or another Academy gate), but knowing what the labels say would be helpful. There's no 1.20:1 Scope gate as far as I can tell.

1.85 was pretty standard for cinema release. Masking at the camera gate rather than during printing or projection or transfer was more common before the 90s.

These days you could just use the full Academy gate and extract the desired aspect ratio during post, but for composition/framing the ground glass framelines are what matter. It's possible the ground glass is a combo. It can be removed to properly measure it, OP can check the manual instructions if unsure how to do that.

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I hope these photos of my IIB battery set-up help somewhat (I know very little about electricity). It came with an empty shoulder-strap battery case. I bought the batteries at Battery-Plus and I think they may have made up the wiring. Rechargeable and quite cheap. Volts add to 18; I think Arri called for 16.8, but amps were on target. Two-prong battery case outlet to two-prong variable speed handgrip motor. Battery-Plus or a similar outfit should be able to make something up for you.

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20200829_123542.jpg

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Yes I had seen that, but my main purpose was to correct my prior post saying 16.8 volts.

For the OP,  just in case, the IIC manual is readily available on-line (for example, from Visual Products), an Arri  Parts and Repair Manual is available from I can't remember where but I downloaded it, and our Mr. Dom Jaeger's Cinetinker website has CLA instructions for the II-C.

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