THE MOVIE MAN

WORKING FROM A LAB and factory in Essex, Ken Richter invented and built specialized aviation and camera equipment that was used around the world. As a globe-trotting pilot and cinematographer himself—in 1974, The New York Times named him one of the top travel film–lecturers in the country—many of these inventions were born of his own desire for better equipment.

Even as a youth in Randolph, Massachusetts, in the 1930s, Richter was obsessed with the clarity of images. He ground his own telescope lenses, and earned a scholarship to Harvard to study astronomy. It was a short leap to photography, where he experimented with both still and motion-picture cameras. After college, Richter worked as a cameraman in Hollywood, shooting everything from comedy shorts at Columbia Pictures to outdoor