Page 1 of 1

Mitchell Sportster 164 16mm camera

Posted: Fri Nov 21, 2014 4:44 pm
by Cinemachinery
I found an ad for the Sportster 164 camera dated April 1974. Has anyone had any experience with this camera? I did not find any price lists or descriptive flyers about this camera. So, if anyone has printed material or pictures of this camera, please add it to this link. Thank You.

In a paper titled "The Mitchell Camera: The Machine and its Makers" by Laurence J. Roberts, published in the SMPTE Journal February 1982, he comments briefly on the Sportster.......

"Mitchell also manufactured a hand-held camera for sports filming called the Sportster 164. This camera used zoom lenses with their own reflex finders, and featured internal film loads up to 200 ft on daylight spools. It had a registration-pin movement, and the ability to change filming speeds during a shot to detail sports action."

The attached ad says it takes 400 ft loads, so possibly a typo in Roberts paper.

While looking through American Cinematographer magazines for the year 1974, Mitchell only ran the attached ad 3 times during the year, then nothing after that in 1975 or 1976.