American Cinematographer - December 1980 - 30

EYE WITNESS REPORT FROM

By HERB A. LIGHTMAN
COLOGNE, West Germany
After

landing at the airport that serves
this ancient Roman colony and bustling
modern city on the Rhine, I head not for
the stately Dorn Hotel, where I have
stayed during the past several Photokinas, but for one of the Rhine cruise
ships which serve as floating hotels dur¬
ing this busy season. I'm looking forward
to it, because ever since childhood I have
always enjoyed sleeping on boats and
trains.

mind. It encompasses

14 gigantic halls
(some of them two-story), packed wallto-wall with still photography, motion pic¬
ture photography and audio-visual
equipment-the very latest. Fortunately,

tended and

greetings have been

ex¬

get down to talking shop,

Horst

stand, you see the results of a generation

(which is being
used for the first time), one of the newest
and largest of the lot, but even so, one
literally needs a "road map" to find one's
way around the exhibits.
More than 1,000 exhibitors from 32

something of a luxury liner, with two
swimming pools (one outdoors, one in¬
doors), a sauna, solarium, lavishly ap¬
pointed bar and restaurant. However, I
know that I shall not have time to enjoy

year's show occupies 120,000 square
meters of space. It is the biggest of these
events so far and I am hoping it will also
be the best in terms of new equipment for
motion picture production.
It has become something of a tradition
for me to stop by the Arriflex stand first,
not because it is among the largest, but

Photography" is a
morning-till-night preoccupation for the
entire week that it runs. I am charged with
seeking out, analyzing and reporting on
each new item of motion picture equip¬
ment which might be of interest to Ameri¬
can Cinematographer readers.
The immensity of the complex which
houses PHOTOKINA '80 boggles the

President of Arriflex Corporation.

mann,

When the initial

is concentrated in Hall 13

countries

ennial "World's Fair of

Bergmann, Marketing Manager for

most of what our readers are interested in

As these vessels go, the Fleur, which
will be my home for the next week, is

these amenities because, for me, the bi¬

Horst

Arnold & Richter, and Volker Bahne-

are

taking part in PHOTOKINA

'80-the 16th in the series-and this

because it

seems

to be a kind of central

meeting place where I can be sure of
encountering old friends from all over the
world whom I usually get to see only
every two years.
I'm not disappointed. There are several
old friends there already-among them

Every two years, PHOTOKINA, the "World's Fair of Photography" is held in Cologne, West
Germany, filling 14 vast halls of a huge exhibition complex on the banks of the Rhine River.
The famed Cologne Cathedral, the twin towers of which can be seen in these photographs,
has long since become a familiar symbol of PHOTOKINA.

Bergmann

says,

"Here,

on our

change. The company is now dedicated
to four product divisions: motion picture
cameras, film processing equipment,
editing tables and film handling equip¬
ment, and motion picture and television
lighting equipment."
This diversity is evident in the products
displayed on the stand-and so is the
"generation change". What this refers to
is the fact that a vital young second gen¬
eration of management has taken over at
Arnold & Richter and it

seems

to have

supercharged the organization.
"One of the

areas

where

foresee

changes yet to come is in motion picture
production for television," says Volker
Bahnemann. "We believe that it is only a
matter of time until there is

a trend, even
America, to shoot those shows which
are not intended for international theatri¬

cal distribution, but only for television, in
16mm original. There is no reason not to,
once you reassess state-of-the-art 16mm
technology, including ultra-speed lenses,
the new sharp zoom lenses, the excellent
Eastman 7247 color negative stock, and
the flying spot scanners available for
transfer to broadcast-quality tape. All of
the logical and known advantages of
35mm are not necessary. This shift to
16mm will happen very soon, and I feel
we are ready with our equipment."

Quite
whose

statement from

executive

equipment also includes two

models of 35mm

cameras:

new
the Arriflex 35

III and the Arriflex 35 BL III.

Over at the Cinema Products stand
that statement

might give them pause

also, because they are showing the first
prototypes of their elegant new CP35
camera. It is a clean, sleek design with an
operating simplicity that belies its elec¬
tronic

sophistication.

On the Continental Camera

Systems
yet another new 35mm
the Feathercam CM-35. As the

stand there is
camera,

American Cinematographer - December 1980

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