Francis Ford Coppola American Zoetrope Mitchell Technovision R205 used to film Apocalypse Now on 4-wheel dolly....

Description

Francis Ford Coppola American Zoetrope Mitchell Technovision R205 used to film Apocalypse Now on 4-wheel dolly. (1970s) In the 1970's David Pringle partnered with his brother-in-law forming Technovision to support filmmakers in Europe with new camera and lens technology. So impressed was a young film student, Vittorio Storraro, ASC, AIC, that he chose to make their camera system a part of his master tools. Sometime in the late 1970's Technovision purchased the latest Mitchell camera technology. The Mitchell R205 was considered the finest camera ever designed and manufactured by the Mitchell Camera Corporation. Mitchell had built virtually every camera used to photograph the greatest motion pictures made by Hollywood. Storraro used the R205 on all of his projects until Francis Ford Coppola hired him to photograph Apocalypse Now in the Philippines. He insisted that Coppola hire the Technovision R205 and lenses. The weather, including a great typhoon, was incredibly difficult on personnel and equipment. The camera needed to be cleaned and repainted several times to overcome the fungus acquired in the humid jungles of the Philippines. Because of the length of production and the damage caused by jungle fatigue, the R205 was purchased by Coppola from Technovision and was used as the master camera throughout production. Disassembling the camera revealed it had been repainted a number of times including it's famously brown color. Additionally, the sound magazine blimp cover was shattered sometime later and was replaced with a more conventional Mitchell BNCR housing. Behind the Scenes photographs reveal this camera on numerous Storraro projects including One From the Heart, Last Tango in Paris (with the addition of the newer Arriflex BL) and La Luna. Comes with letters of provenance from Roy H. Wagner, ASC and David Pringle.

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