Doctor Who - Documentary s02e09 Episode Script
Roma Parva
When we had to plan studio productions, we had obviously nice plans drawn up of where the sets were going to be placed in the studios.
This is a plan of the big studio at Riverside, on a quarter-inch scale.
And we would have a model made to show the director and producer and lighting, what the thing was generally going to look like, and how it was all going to work, and then the director would go home with the floor plan and work out where he was going to put the cameras and booms for all the scenes he knew he had to shoot.
Sometimes he'd only need one camera on a scene and sometimes he'd need four.
And the cameras all came from outlets on the walls.
And there were outlets on every wall.
And outlets also, as here, for the power to power the crane.
And the director had to work out, and it was trial and error.
He would get a paper clip and a piece of string, which was attached to a little plastic cut-out of the actual size in the studio of each of the camera Pieces of camera equipment.
And he would go around the studio in the running order that the thing was to be shot, working out where he would need his cameras.
And where they would have to leave a set and go across to another set while another camera might have to go from there across to here.
And it was terribly important that he shouldn't get the cables crossed.
Because if he did, the camera would never get there.
And sometimes it was possible and it did happen that a couple of camera, cable, wallahs would come along and lift the cable up and let a camera go underneath.
And then, of course, it wouldn't be necessary for it to go back later.
And he'd go right through the show like this, and then when it came to a planning meeting, the model would be shown to everybody and the plan would be on the table and the director would go through and take everyone through the whole plan of the production.
So everybody knew exactly what was going to happen on the day.
This is a plan of the big studio at Riverside, on a quarter-inch scale.
And we would have a model made to show the director and producer and lighting, what the thing was generally going to look like, and how it was all going to work, and then the director would go home with the floor plan and work out where he was going to put the cameras and booms for all the scenes he knew he had to shoot.
Sometimes he'd only need one camera on a scene and sometimes he'd need four.
And the cameras all came from outlets on the walls.
And there were outlets on every wall.
And outlets also, as here, for the power to power the crane.
And the director had to work out, and it was trial and error.
He would get a paper clip and a piece of string, which was attached to a little plastic cut-out of the actual size in the studio of each of the camera Pieces of camera equipment.
And he would go around the studio in the running order that the thing was to be shot, working out where he would need his cameras.
And where they would have to leave a set and go across to another set while another camera might have to go from there across to here.
And it was terribly important that he shouldn't get the cables crossed.
Because if he did, the camera would never get there.
And sometimes it was possible and it did happen that a couple of camera, cable, wallahs would come along and lift the cable up and let a camera go underneath.
And then, of course, it wouldn't be necessary for it to go back later.
And he'd go right through the show like this, and then when it came to a planning meeting, the model would be shown to everybody and the plan would be on the table and the director would go through and take everyone through the whole plan of the production.
So everybody knew exactly what was going to happen on the day.