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Post by John Green on Jan 23, 2012 19:32:19 GMT
John, It's a good point that the person who had the means of getting hold of say,Doctor Who recordings might not have worked on the show himself so wouldn't be on the most obvious list. I wonder if the Volunteer group I mentioned might not be useful too,having legitimate reasons for visiting former staff and talking about the old days. Could you or I have worked for the BBC and left with no souvenirs?
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Post by David Pountney on Jan 23, 2012 20:06:54 GMT
With people being confused about being asked about missing Who episodes, would it be a little bit better to ask whether they had any 16mm film or any film prints from when they worked at the BBC?
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Post by John F Brayshaw on Jan 24, 2012 0:08:58 GMT
I think the production crews are highly unlikely to have had access to the prints for distibution. Some of the actors might have kept some 16mm of their performances still that is low chance. You need to get into who had their actual hqands on the prints and Paul has and is still looking. Of course has anyone ever checked with Murdoch's "The London Times"? As an American my stomach turns
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Post by John Curley on Jan 25, 2012 18:39:10 GMT
Ok then..so have the people that worked in Enterprises at the time of the junkings and before (because I am guessing some copies/prints probably went from there in the early 70s too, the majority seem to have been junked by 74) been asked for any leads? Or been interviewed for the story of how junkings took place and how often, who came to take the stuff away etc. I know it might have been just a another trip to the skip job but it might be interesting to hear and a bit depressing!! Maybe there are written records? Maybe these people are not around any more...its 40 years ago after all. Can anyone shed any light on this?
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Post by Dave Wood on Jan 25, 2012 19:31:55 GMT
With regards to Enterprises and staff the junkings were probably continuous right through the 1970s and maybe even later? Even if the BBC had junked all their own Dr Who videotapes, film negatives and film prints by 1974 there may have been foreign sales copies gradually dribbling their way home throughout the rest of the decade? The foreign broadcasters had the option to destroy, return or send the films on to the next broadcaster. Presumably the existing UK records don't cover duplicate sales prints once those countries had fulfilled their contractual obligations (?) so wouldn't it be utterly horrible if some of those items did eventually wind their way back home to Enterprises, only to be junked for a fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh time etc.
It's not just BBC staff that might be of interest, as I guess they would have had to use contractors (e.g. skip hire) to take the items away to landfill. The question is, who was responsible for despooling the films and did they always do it (perhaps not always if the Galaxy Four/Underwater Menace prints were Enterprise rejects).
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Post by Jon Preddle on Jan 25, 2012 20:21:23 GMT
..... there may have been foreign sales copies gradually dribbling their way home throughout the rest of the decade .... .... so wouldn't it be utterly horrible if some of those items did eventually wind their way back home to Enterprises, only to be junked for a fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh time etc. But that is precisely what did happen with many of the episodes. Bear mind it wasn't until after 1978, when the archive was established, that the BBC and fans started properly recording and documenting the return of prints from overseas. The return of material had been on-going long before 1978. We just don't have a record of what and when. Who knows - maybe every single copy of Marco Polo was returned to the BBC, and when sales had dried up by 1969, and an extension to the rights (probably) wasn't granted, the negs and all prints as and when they dribbled in were disposed of. It's not coincidental that many of the recovered episodes have bits missing from them (either censor edits or broken film, as in the case of "Air Lock"). That's the reason why they were junked; Enterprises had no use for them, because they wouldn't pass them on to subsequent buyers.
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Post by Dave Wood on Jan 25, 2012 20:30:07 GMT
..... there may have been foreign sales copies gradually dribbling their way home throughout the rest of the decade .... .... so wouldn't it be utterly horrible if some of those items did eventually wind their way back home to Enterprises, only to be junked for a fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh time etc. But that is precisely what did happen with many of the episodes. Bear mind it wasn't until after 1978, when the archive was established, that the BBC and fans started properly recording and documenting the return of prints from overseas. The return of material had been on-going long before 1978. We just don't have a record of what and when. Who knows - maybe every single copy of Marco Polo was returned to the BBC, and when sales had dried up by 1969, and an extension to the rights (probably) wasn't granted, the negs and all prints as and when they dribbled in were disposed of. It's not coincidental that many of the recovered episodes have bits missing from them (either censor edits or broken film, as in the case of "Air Lock"). That's the reason why they were junked; Enterprises had no use for them, because they wouldn't pass them on to subsequent buyers. That's such a horrible and depressing thought that I've had to go and grab myself another whisky (well it is Burns' Night)! I suppose our only real glimmer of hope, following the two most recent recoveries, could be that junking procedures (de-spooling and sent to landfill) might not have always been followed completely to the letter?
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Post by David Cann on Jan 25, 2012 20:53:12 GMT
Even if the BBC had junked all their own Dr Who videotapes, film negatives and film prints by 1974 there may have been foreign sales copies gradually dribbling their way home throughout the rest of the decade? As Jon has said, this (the return of foreign sales copies) was indeed the case, and it is thanks to this that we have many of the early Hartnells. The BBC had not, however, junked all of their own film prints before 1974 - when Enterprises' remaining stock of early episodes was discovered at Villiers House in 1978, at least some of them were Enterprises' own prints, though many (including an Arabic-dubbed set of prints for 'The Daleks') had been returned from foreign stations. Sadly, these foreign returns of often met the same fate as their Enterprises counterparts. However, we know that not all of the BBC's film prints were junked before 1974 (according to the dates in Wiped!, from the recollections of Ian Levine, several stories were disposed of after 1974 - remember at this point, the sales rights for some stories had not yet expired). An example of one such story would be 'Galaxy 4', which was junked circa 1976 - though when the Lively Arts team were taking stock of Enterprises for their Whose Doctor Who documentary in November 1976, 'Galaxy 4' was listed as existing. We know that prints were definitely returned to BBC Enterprises from overseas, but many of them were junked as well - either due to cuts being made, or the fact that Enterprises simply had no further use for them after their sales rights had expired. Hearteningly, though, the two episodes recently recovered appear to have been returns from an overseas broadcaster, as you said, meaning that not all films were neccesarily taken out of their cans and de-spooled (or un-spooled - I don't know the technical term ) before being junked. It gives us some hope for similar recoveries in the future... Edit: You beat me to it with that last suggestion Dave Let's hope so...
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Post by John Green on Jan 25, 2012 21:30:41 GMT
People were so ingenious back then-kids would make their dads fretwork pipe-holders from plans in the Boy's Own Paper.Might an amateur re-spool un-spooled prints? In a way,a sprung can of film is liable to attract more attention than a neat tin can at the bottom of a skip,though I agree it'd be more difficult to shove under your jumper. I can just imagine a manger coming round to check that all the films are unspooled,then the minute his back's turned...
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Post by Jon Preddle on Jan 25, 2012 21:55:13 GMT
We know that prints were definitely returned to BBC Enterprises from overseas, but many of them were junked as well - either due to cuts being made, or the fact that Enterprises simply had no further use for them after their sales rights had expired. It has been asked why did Enterprises go to the trouble of having material returned (and at some expense) only for them to junk the films - why not just have the o/s station junk them and save money? AIUI, this was the process: Enterprises had negs of all episodes. From those, they made X number of prints. Those were sent to X number of countries. In most cases the films were then bicycled from place to place. Ents probably kept at least one full set of prints on the shelf in reserve. From time to time, countries would require replacement print/s, because the one/s they had been supplied with were damaged or unuseable. The reserve stock would then be used to supply replacement episodes if they couldn't be sourced from the prints already in circulation. Enterprises also had prints returned to them for the purpose of stocking up the reserve; this saved them the expense of having to run off fresh prints all the time. From time to time fresh prints would be struck, but only if the required replacement was not available in the reserve stock or in circulation, or when a new country had purchased a set of serials and needed that full set of episodes, but did not want to wait till they could acquire prints from elsewhere. There was also held a handful of low quality viewing prints, made for internal use. After the old Suppressed Field negs were replaced by Stored Field negs in 1967, the reserve stock of old Suppressed Field prints and any that were returned were biffed as a matter of course. The Beeb preferred the better Stored Fields to be in stock and in circulation. Dribs and drabs of prints - both Suppressed and Stored - continued to come back at the Beeb's request if only to fill up the reserve stock. Sometimes complete stories were returned, but more often than not it would have been orphaned episodes needed to fill the gaps in the reserve stock. Enterprises junked the Suppressed ones and any of the Stored that were damaged. And if they already had say two copies of an episode 'on the shelf', they wouldn't want another, so they biff it, or would not request the return of that episode still in circulation. And if it was a story they no longer had the rights to sell, they wouldn't want those back, either. The way I see it, the handful of prints found at Villiers in 1978 (and indeed what was on the shelf when the Whose Doctor Who researchers visited in 1976) was what was left of this reserve stock - some of which had been returned and some of which were new prints - plus a few of the viewing prints that had been struck for internal use.
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Post by dennywilson on Jan 26, 2012 11:39:19 GMT
On a similar notes, I take it all the (Living, or before they passed on) directors and writers have been asked if they had any telesnaps at this point?
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Post by Richard Bignell on Jan 26, 2012 12:01:38 GMT
On a similar notes, I take it all the (Living, or before they passed on) directors and writers have been asked if they had any telesnaps at this point? Yes, they have, but there's no evidence that any tele-snaps were taken of currently missing episodes other than Marco Polo #4.
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Post by Ken Griffin on Jan 26, 2012 23:31:33 GMT
Might an amateur re-spool un-spooled prints? Yes. If they have a film core and at least two hours to spare.
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