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Post by John Wall on Aug 20, 2023 8:15:00 GMT
One thing that’s puzzled me for some years is the missed opportunities wrt the Pertwee seasons. When a station goes from b&w to colour they need material, and lots of it, to encourage people to upgrade their TVs. There’s a limit to what you can produce in-house, feature films are a quick win but you’re looking round for material. By the mid 70s both the US and UK had been making film series in colour for a decade so that’s a rich seam. Auntie had been making colour programmes since at least 1968 when BBC2 introduced it, so that’s things like “Civilisation”. DW, of course, had been in colour since 1970 and there were 128 colour Pertwee episodes. Why didn’t Enterprises sort out the clearances and offer these to stations going to colour, that would have been 128 half hour slots, five or seven nights per week, with a family action/adventure show. Answers on a postcard…. First time poster, long time lurker here! If I may be allowed to try and help, I think what John Wall has been trying to say is that the beeb should’ve had more foresight when it came to the colour Pertwee stories. They were filmed in colour but primarily offered abroad as b/w film prints, and really it seems like the fact that they were originally taped in colour was an afterthought. The reason stuff like Thunderbirds enjoyed such longevity is because ITC had the foresight to film them in colour, even though they were only able to be shown in b/w in the UK at the time. It was partly to sell to America, yes, but as other countries moved to colour broadcasting throughout the 70s it was a lucrative colour programme to help fill up schedules. I think the point is that the BBC were sitting on a potential goldmine, having hours of colour family entertainment at a time when the demand for this was heating up, and much of the world’s television back-catalogue was in b/w. We know that after Australia moved to colour transmission they weren’t interested in b/w tele recordings anymore. The BBC must have know that they would eventually move to colour broadcasting, and that they would want colour programmes, but allowed the colour master-tapes of Pertwee serials be wiped as early as ‘73. Absolutely! The BBC had been broadcasting in colour since 1968 and had thousands of hours of colour material, not just DW, that just needed the appropriate clearances to fill schedules around the world. |
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Post by andyparting on Aug 20, 2023 8:17:39 GMT
One thing that’s puzzled me for some years is the missed opportunities wrt the Pertwee seasons. When a station goes from b&w to colour they need material, and lots of it, to encourage people to upgrade their TVs. There’s a limit to what you can produce in-house, feature films are a quick win but you’re looking round for material. By the mid 70s both the US and UK had been making film series in colour for a decade so that’s a rich seam. Auntie had been making colour programmes since at least 1968 when BBC2 introduced it, so that’s things like “Civilisation”. DW, of course, had been in colour since 1970 and there were 128 colour Pertwee episodes. Why didn’t Enterprises sort out the clearances and offer these to stations going to colour, that would have been 128 half hour slots, five or seven nights per week, with a family action/adventure show. Answers on a postcard…. First time poster, long time lurker here! If I may be allowed to try and help, I think what John Wall has been trying to say is that the beeb should’ve had more foresight when it came to the colour Pertwee stories. They were filmed in colour but primarily offered abroad as b/w film prints, and really it seems like the fact that they were originally taped in colour was an afterthought. The reason stuff like Thunderbirds enjoyed such longevity is because ITC had the foresight to film them in colour, even though they were only able to be shown in b/w in the UK at the time. It was partly to sell to America, yes, but as other countries moved to colour broadcasting throughout the 70s it was a lucrative colour programme to help fill up schedules. I think the point is that the BBC were sitting on a potential goldmine, having hours of colour family entertainment at a time when the demand for this was heating up, and much of the world’s television back-catalogue was in b/w. We know that after Australia moved to colour transmission they weren’t interested in b/w tele recordings anymore. The BBC must have know that they would eventually move to colour broadcasting, and that they would want colour programmes, but allowed the colour master-tapes of Pertwee serials be wiped as early as ‘73. I don't understand this wiping of the Pertwee master tapes, considering that colour material had already gone out by then to US/Canada/Japan. It's like someone in the department had a bee in their bonnet about Dr Who - like that nutter in '66 who went round blasting AA phone boxes with a shotgun. The Police drew the same line of reasoning. |
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Post by Ralph Rose on Aug 20, 2023 9:02:25 GMT
Of the major networks, I'd be interested to know that myself. My point was that stations converted to color here in stages. It didn't happen overnight. Independents took longer... The magical full color conversion was not 1966, that was prime time on the big three. |
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Post by John Wall on Aug 20, 2023 10:57:31 GMT
First time poster, long time lurker here! If I may be allowed to try and help, I think what John Wall has been trying to say is that the beeb should’ve had more foresight when it came to the colour Pertwee stories. They were filmed in colour but primarily offered abroad as b/w film prints, and really it seems like the fact that they were originally taped in colour was an afterthought. The reason stuff like Thunderbirds enjoyed such longevity is because ITC had the foresight to film them in colour, even though they were only able to be shown in b/w in the UK at the time. It was partly to sell to America, yes, but as other countries moved to colour broadcasting throughout the 70s it was a lucrative colour programme to help fill up schedules. I think the point is that the BBC were sitting on a potential goldmine, having hours of colour family entertainment at a time when the demand for this was heating up, and much of the world’s television back-catalogue was in b/w. We know that after Australia moved to colour transmission they weren’t interested in b/w tele recordings anymore. The BBC must have know that they would eventually move to colour broadcasting, and that they would want colour programmes, but allowed the colour master-tapes of Pertwee serials be wiped as early as ‘73. I don't understand this wiping of the Pertwee master tapes, considering that colour material had already gone out by then to US/Canada/Japan. It's like someone in the department had a bee in their bonnet about Dr Who - like that nutter in '66 who went round blasting AA phone boxes with a shotgun. The Police drew the same line of reasoning. Agreed 100%. |
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Post by John Wall on Aug 20, 2023 11:06:09 GMT
Of the major networks, I'd be interested to know that myself. My point was that stations converted to color here in stages. It didn't happen overnight. Independents took longer... The magical full color conversion was not 1966, that was prime time on the big three. I’m not sure how relevant the US is. Yes, it was a big market but a notoriously difficult nut for foreign, i.e., British, material to crack. There were two approaches; make pseudo-American shows as Gerry Anderson did, think of all the American accents in the puppet shows and the American leads in UFO and Space 1999, or trade on “Britishness” as a gimmick, like the Avengers. DW sold to dozens of countries in the 60s. From the 70s these started converting to colour and, of course, new national broadcasters were arriving, sometimes going straight for colour. |
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Post by jmoss on Aug 20, 2023 11:27:31 GMT
I don't understand this wiping of the Pertwee master tapes, considering that colour material had already gone out by then to US/Canada/Japan. It's like someone in the department had a bee in their bonnet about Dr Who - like that nutter in '66 who went round blasting AA phone boxes with a shotgun. The Police drew the same line of reasoning. It really does seem to me like colour was an afterthought. Other than the opening titles, I wouldn’t really say there were any great strides to try and capitalise on the colour aspect of the program (the Earth setting didn’t help, but the colour pics we have show plenty of 60s stories with far more vibrant sets and costumes than many Pertwees). Afaik the only reason a lot of early master tapes were kept around as long as they were was because they were waiting to make definitive Stored Field tele recordings, so once those had been made of the Pertwees the masters were deemed useless (i.e. they were being treated no differently to the b/w episodes). I do also wonder if the tapes were more valuable for reuse than the earlier ones which had been edited via physical cutting (were some late Troughtons the first to start editing digitally?) so there was a greater push to get them wiped and ready for reuse. |
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Post by John Wall on Aug 20, 2023 13:09:43 GMT
I don't understand this wiping of the Pertwee master tapes, considering that colour material had already gone out by then to US/Canada/Japan. It's like someone in the department had a bee in their bonnet about Dr Who - like that nutter in '66 who went round blasting AA phone boxes with a shotgun. The Police drew the same line of reasoning. It really does seem to me like colour was an afterthought. Other than the opening titles, I wouldn’t really say there were any great strides to try and capitalise on the colour aspect of the program (the Earth setting didn’t help, but the colour pics we have show plenty of 60s stories with far more vibrant sets and costumes than many Pertwees). Afaik the only reason a lot of early master tapes were kept around as long as they were was because they were waiting to make definitive Stored Field tele recordings, so once those had been made of the Pertwees the masters were deemed useless (i.e. they were being treated no differently to the b/w episodes). I do also wonder if the tapes were more valuable for reuse than the earlier ones which had been edited via physical cutting (were some late Troughtons the first to start editing digitally?) so there was a greater push to get them wiped and ready for reuse. The tapes were expensive, I recollect figures of several hundred pounds each in the early 70s, which would have probably bought a small car! wrt DW the BBC stopped making b&w telerecordings during Season 11 as the customers wanted 2” colour VT, there have been previous discussions here regarding some colour telerecordings made for broadcasters that hadn’t got VT, but everyone seemed to go to VT fairly quickly - I expect the cost reduced! It’s also worth remembering that peak psychedelic was at the end of the 60s, the 70s were somewhat more sober with things like oil shocks, etc. A lot of the younger folk haven’t been through the various transitions. To me there were two really major in TV, the first was b&w to colour and the second was CRT to flat screen. It’s easy to look back 50+ years and say that a programme didn’t “exploit” colour properly, but for those of us around it was wonderful and transformational. The listings in the Radio Times, etc identified what was in colour and b&w was banished to odd times of the day or night. Once you’d got colour, b&w was old fashioned and out of date. wrt DW, as I’ve previously noted, the average story length reduced making it faster paced. Colour also transformed sport and factual programmes, David Attenborough introduced snooker as something that only colour could do and the coverage of arts, natural history, etc was revolutionised. The other change was when I exchanged a very large and bulky 26” CRT for a 32” flat screen, I’d never go back. |
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Post by jmoss on Aug 20, 2023 13:31:47 GMT
It’s easy to look back 50+ years and say that a programme didn’t “exploit” colour properly, but for those of us around it was wonderful and transformational. The listings in the Radio Times, etc identified what was in colour and b&w was banished to odd times of the day or night. Once you’d got colour, b&w was old fashioned and out of date. wrt DW, as I’ve previously noted, the average story length reduced making it faster paced. Colour also transformed sport and factual programmes, David Attenborough introduced snooker as something that only colour could do and the coverage of arts, natural history, etc was revolutionised. I think that's the point, colour tv was a big deal, but when it came to overseas sales the BBC dropped the ball and very quickly destroyed any possibility of selling PAL colour tapes (or even potential colour tele recordings) to foreign markets. The fact that Australia would've bought Invasion of the Dinosaurs but didn't kind of proves this |
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Post by John Wall on Aug 20, 2023 13:35:49 GMT
It’s easy to look back 50+ years and say that a programme didn’t “exploit” colour properly, but for those of us around it was wonderful and transformational. The listings in the Radio Times, etc identified what was in colour and b&w was banished to odd times of the day or night. Once you’d got colour, b&w was old fashioned and out of date. wrt DW, as I’ve previously noted, the average story length reduced making it faster paced. Colour also transformed sport and factual programmes, David Attenborough introduced snooker as something that only colour could do and the coverage of arts, natural history, etc was revolutionised. I think that's the point, colour tv was a big deal, but when it came to overseas sales the BBC dropped the ball and very quickly destroyed any possibility of selling PAL colour tapes (or even potential colour tele recordings) to foreign markets. The fact that Australia would've bought Invasion of the Dinosaurs but didn't kind of proves this Yep, it could have been big earner but they blew it 👎 |
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Post by sonnybh on Aug 20, 2023 14:04:20 GMT
Australia was quite slow switching to colour, along with New Zealand so colour sales of the earlier Pertwee stories were limited.
Was Paul Temple considered a show-piece when it was first shown? I've heard it good things about it but it seems the BBC didn't consider it good enough to keep the original masters.
In 2010 I switched to a digital TV after using an analogue CRT set with a digibox after the digital switchover. The motivation to change was my Dad coming round to do some DIY while I was at work & complaining he couldn't work out how to get the TV to work!
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Post by John Wall on Aug 20, 2023 14:28:41 GMT
Australia was quite slow switching to colour, along with New Zealand so colour sales of the earlier Pertwee stories were limited. Was Paul Temple considered a show-piece when it was first shown? I've heard it good things about it but it seems the BBC didn't consider it good enough to keep the original masters. In 2010 I switched to a digital TV after using an analogue CRT set with a digibox after the digital switchover. The motivation to change was my Dad coming round to do some DIY while I was at work & complaining he couldn't work out how to get the TV to work! There were plenty of other places besides Australia and New Zealand converting to colour. I dunno about Paul Temple. 52 episodes at 50 minutes each would fill an hour slot with adverts for a year. |
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Post by Richard Bignell on Aug 20, 2023 15:24:37 GMT
I think that's the point, colour tv was a big deal, but when it came to overseas sales the BBC dropped the ball and very quickly destroyed any possibility of selling PAL colour tapes (or even potential colour tele recordings) to foreign markets. The fact that Australia would've bought Invasion of the Dinosaurs but didn't kind of proves this Yep, it could have been big earner but they blew it 👎 No, I don't think they did. Although various countries were converting to colour during the 1960s and 1970s, many didn't until well into the 1980s. However, the principal sales point for BBC Enterprises was always the Antipodean countries. Without sales being achieved there, it wasn't profitable to sell to many other countries around the world, as the revenues gained back from them were very small (hence the non-distribution of The Daleks' Master Plan). However, all those countries had already taken Doctor Who in its black and white form via cheap 16mm prints. So, for example, when Singapore got The Claws of Axos in 1973, they got and transmitted a b/w film print of it. When they started their main colour service a few years later, they'd already seen the story, so there was no impetus to buy it again in its colour format. When Australia got colour around 1974/1975, I very much doubt, they'd already shown Seasons 7-10 around the country together with repeats, so there probably seemed to be little point in paying for them all over again in colour on what would have undoubtedly been a pricier format. Videotapes were far more expensive than 16mm prints and would have cost an awful lot more to transport around the world - and of course, it relied on countries having the necessary technology to be able to play them out. And of course, it should be remembered that just because a colour service was available, it didn't mean that television stations stopped showing b/w material or that the majority of viewers were watching on colour sets. For instance, the UK began its colour service in 1967 on BBC2, with BBC1 and ITV following two years later. However, in terms of Doctor Who, the Radio Times was still prominently flagging the programme as being a colour series up until the end of Revenge of the Cybermen, and the programme itself didn't lose the "BBC Colour" caption underneath the director's credit until Season 16, just after the number of colour licences sold in the UK overtook their monochrome equivalents. |
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Post by garygraham on Aug 20, 2023 18:12:02 GMT
Black and white telerecordings looked terrible on colour TV. It was little more than a novelty to see, for example, the first episode of Coronation Street. There was no nostalgic culture of rewatching entire series in those days. That didn't start until the mid-1980s. There was a ferocious outcry whenever repeats, let alone in black and white, were shown. People had bought a colour TV and wanted their money's worth.
In the same way that for several decades very few people were interested in silent films after sound cinema began.
The Daleks were hugely popular in the early 1960s. Massive. But the culture was to look forward to what would come next.
I can see how this might be hard to understand for anyone who has grown up with VHS, DVDs and multiple channels.
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Post by Jon Preddle on Aug 20, 2023 21:16:41 GMT
In the early 1970s, the BBC was sending 16mm films to Australia, Singapore and Hong Kong, which could then by bicycled elsewhere if required.
NTSC conversions of seasons 7-9 had been sent to the USA in 1972 for duplicating locally by Time-Life, so there was no additional cost to the BBC for those.
It wasn't until 1973 that the ABC showed any interest in colour Pertwees for future repeats - they planned to screen season 10 in b/w in 73/74, then repeat it in colour after the switch-over in 1975, but this plan was dropped.
As there was no market for PAL tapes, the BBC started to wipe the tapes.
The NZBC hadn't shown DW for many years. Since it was converting to a nationwide colour service in mid-1975, it was hungry for colour material. They were offered colour Pertwees in late 1974, but by then most of the tapes had been wiped, so NZ could only purchase the seven PAL stories that existed in full.
If the ABC's plans in 1973 hadn't changed, or if NZBC had been offered the series a year or two earlier, who knows how many more PAL Pertwees would have survived.
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Post by John Wall on Aug 21, 2023 14:16:04 GMT
Black and white telerecordings looked terrible on colour TV. It was little more than a novelty to see, for example, the first episode of Coronation Street. There was no nostalgic culture of rewatching entire series in those days. That didn't start until the mid-1980s. There was a ferocious outcry whenever repeats, let alone in black and white, were shown. People had bought a colour TV and wanted their money's worth. In the same way that for several decades very few people were interested in silent films after sound cinema began. The Daleks were hugely popular in the early 1960s. Massive. But the culture was to look forward to what would come next. I can see how this might be hard to understand for anyone who has grown up with VHS, DVDs and multiple channels. Yep, I was there. We got colour in late ‘73 or early ‘74 for the Commonwealth Gamesmanship from NZ. There’s an exercise for a masochist who enjoys looking through old Radio Times but I don’t recall a lot of b&w, maybe the occasional “Carry on Cabby”. This was probably because TV Centre - which I think was built in anticipation of colour - was a veritable TV “factory”. With only two (BBC) channels and virtually everything made in multi camera studios they must have produced quite a few hours of colour TV every day. Then, of course, the regional centres such as Pebble Mill were tooling up for colour. In the early evening the News was about 5-40 followed by, in my case, Midlands Today at 6-00 and Nationwide at 6-30. During Midlands Today there would always be a bit from the East Midlands (Nottingham, where I lived) which was b&w until one evening it went colour, they did the changeover live - I wonder if anyone recorded it? Repeats were very rare, and certainly not in b&w. There was the annual DW “omnibus” but I missed the first episodes of Genesis, I think because of a power cut due to a coal strike, and Blakes 7 and didn’t actually see either until many years later. I think the Changes, Carrie’s War and Long Chase were repeated, probably in the hope of a new, different, audience. Yes, the mentality was that those who’d paid for a colour licence expected colour and no repeats. It was possible then as, apart from a bit at lunchtime, TV started at about 4pm with, iirc, Playschool. No Breakfast TV, etc, etc. It was a different world. |
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