Do you consider Pertwee complete

[kurt devery]

The Jon Pertwee stories were very much part of the junkings of archive programmes. The restoration team and many others have made sterling efforts to bring the episodes back to life by:
1) Returning prints to the archive
2) Restoring to colour black and white prints with various methods.

A question for fans: do you believe the Pertwee era is now back to it's former glory or what else would you like to see done/improved.

[PAUL WOOD]

Feb 6, 2021 18:13:24 GMT kurt devery said:

The Jon Pertwee stories were very much part of the junkings of archive programmes. The restoration team and many others have made sterling efforts to bring the episodes back to life by:
1) Returning prints to the archive
2) Restoring to colour black and white prints with various methods.

A question for fans: do you believe the Pertwee era is now back to it's former glory or what else would you like to see done/improved.

This is a really good question!

No, I don't regard the Pertwee era as back to its former glory from a technical stand point. That would require the recovery of 2" PAL videotape copies which, after all these years, is looking increasingly unlikely. But I would be the first to applaud the amazing restortion work that has been done done on various stories which has yielded some incredible results. And the work has continued as the content of the upcoming Season 8 blu ray set shows.

But, heck, I love the Pertwee era to bits whatever format it survives on!

[John Wall]

It’s worth noting that we’ve got a veritable smorgasbord of material:

- 625 line
- 525 line reverse standards conversion
- 16mm telerecordings with colourisation
- 16mm telerecordings with colour recovery
- 16mm telerecordings with luminance/colour from 525 line sources
- combinations

There may be others but I think I’ve got everything.

Of the episodes that have had to be “recovered”, some are better than others.

PotD3 is as near to a 625 line original as makes no difference. It’s a 16mm telerecording with a mix of colourisation and colour recovery and I can’t fault a single frame 👍

Sea Devils is a mixture of 625 line and 525 line with reverse standards conversion. The latter, imho, are very good but a bit of digital noise reduction would take them from very good to excellent.

Then there are things like IotD1 which is a 16mm telerecording with colour recovery and mixed quality. This really needs another colour source which would have to be a colourisation - and someone would have to fund that.

There are some 16mm telerecordings with 525 luminance and colour which are pretty good but could benefit from another colour source. These predate colour recovery, where possible, and it would be interesting to see the results of mixing in the results of colour recovery.

Overall imho Pertwee is pretty good but I think some improvements to some episodes are possible.

There’s probably a list somewhere that shows the exact status of every episode. Start with that and look at what options are still available.

[PAUL WOOD]

Feb 7, 2021 0:54:42 GMT John Wall said:

It’s worth noting that we’ve got a veritable smorgasbord of material:

- 625 line
- 525 line reverse standards conversion
- 16mm telerecordings with colourisation
- 16mm telerecordings with colour recovery
- 16mm telerecordings with luminance/colour from 525 line sources
- combinations

There may be others but I think I’ve got everything.

Of the episodes that have had to be “recovered”, some are better than others.

PotD3 is as near to a 625 line original as makes no difference. It’s a 16mm telerecording with a mix of colourisation and colour recovery and I can’t fault a single frame 👍

Sea Devils is a mixture of 625 line and 525 line with reverse standards conversion. The latter, imho, are very good but a bit of digital noise reduction would take them from very good to excellent.

Then there are things like IotD1 which is a 16mm telerecording with colour recovery and mixed quality. This really needs another colour source which would have to be a colourisation - and someone would have to fund that.

There are some 16mm telerecordings with 525 luminance and colour which are pretty good but could benefit from another colour source. These predate colour recovery, where possible, and it would be interesting to see the results of mixing in the results of colour recovery.

Overall imho Pertwee is pretty good but I think some improvements to some episodes are possible.

There’s probably a list somewhere that shows the exact status of every episode. Start with that and look at what options are still available.

John, this is superbly summed up!

[Jaspal Cheema]

I'm just glad that the entire run of Pertwee stories are available to view and I'm not bothered what their remastering statutes are . I'm probably of the minority that thinks his surviving 16mm film prints are highly nostalgic and evocative of the era and so atmospheric-the original B/W VHS release of The Mind Of Evil being a case in point!After all,iconic series such as Timeslip and The Jenson Code only exist as mostly monochrome prints so I wouldn't have minded if Pertwee's era was the same!But of course I'm incredibly grateful that the restoration team have gone the extra mile to bring the Pertwee era up to it's original broadcast quality and I'm really looking forward to the stunning remastering of the stories in the up-coming season 8 Blu-ray boxset!

[Richard Marple]

Planet of the Daleks part 3 is very well recolourised, if I didn't know it's history I wouldn't have known it wasn't the original tape!

[Krisander T. Weum]

I think the Pertwee era is complete, all of the episodes have a good enough quality and those that was missing in Colour has been restored to full colour in their own ways. Even if the colours wasn't restored it would still be watchable in Black & White, its a lot worse for the episodes from the 60s.

[georgee]

It’s been difficult making up my mind on this but what I’ve landed on is that it is technically incomplete yet it is what I would consider complete on a personal definition. I would consider it complete because every episode not only survives but also survives in an extremely watchable form. If the Troughton and Hartnell’s were entirely complete and the only missing material from the series is what is currently missing from the Pertwee era then I may have different feelings on the matter, I simply cannot think about this subject without an analysis that is comparative to the poor survival of the preceding eras’ materials. I am personally more than satisfied with what remains of the Pertwee era simply by virtue of the fact that it is so much better than what it could be. However I do think it is incomplete in a technical manner, it’s just the fact that each episode is represented in the archives makes me automatically feel that it is complete.

[Robert Lia]

Having grown up with the third Doctor (1975-77) I would say his era is complete, all of the episodes exist in full so no missing material. How ever they could improve some things yes. The Restoration Team has done a wonderful job (and will continue to do so) as more third Doctor seasons are given the Blue Ray treatment. There may be some problems with "The Ambassadors of Death" and "Invasion" #1 but for the most part we have come a long way since 1993.

[Timothy Austin]

I consider the Pertwee era to be complete. The colour restoration is great on all the episodes, even Invasion of the Dinosaurs part one 'Invasion'is pretty good.

[Darren Jones]

Purely from a story standpoint, I do consider the Pertwee era to be complete even if not all the stories are in the original broadcast format.
The amazing restoration and recovery work carried out by The Restoration Team have brought the episodes as close as possible to how they were on original broadcast and,I think,the best I'll see in my lifetime (unless they get Babelcolour to manually colourise IoD1).
For myself, it's the best result we could hope for out of a, at one time, hopeless situation.

[Andrew Dunn]

I also consider the Pertwee episodes complete with the exception of IOTD1, given the complete collection bluray sets coming out over the next few years it would be a shame if this last remaining episode wasn't fully colourised, I would hope that it's a priority for someone?

[John Wall]

Feb 14, 2021 9:14:27 GMT Andrew Dunn said:

I also consider the Pertwee episodes complete with the exception of IOTD1, given the complete collection bluray sets coming out over the next few years it would be a shame if this last remaining episode wasn't fully colourised, I would hope that it's a priority for someone?

It needs another colour source which means funding the likes of BabelColour. Crowdfunding anyone?

[Andrew Dunn]

John Wall wrote "It needs another colour source which means funding the likes of BabelColour. Crowdfunding anyone?"

Out of interest, how much money are we talking to get that episode into a decent colour state?

Having said that if IOTD gets a decent budget for the S11 bluray set I'd like to think it would have new CGI on the special effects, the only downside to a cracking story.

[richardwoods]

I thought a esteemed member of the forum was already working on colourising IOD 1!