Ryan McAvoy said:
DrCrowTStarwars said:
the budget for Doctor Who was much lower then even children's shows in the states at the same time.
To give you some idea of just how much lower Doctor Who's budget was then the average American show I will compare the budget of two episodes of Doctor Who to one episode of Star Trek made in the 1960s since they have the same run time. Now remember Star Trek's special effects have been mocked from time to time. Well any way for the same run time Doctor Who had a budget of between five and six thousand pounds converted to dollars that makes just under ten thousand dollars give or take. Star trek had a budget of between one hundred and fifty thousand and one hundred and eighty thousand dollars for a fifty two minute episode. That means that Star Trek had a budget of around fifteen to eighteen times what Doctor Who did.
I know this conversion isn't perfect and that both shows had there own problems to contend with(Such as Star Trek's larger cast and model shots that were needed every week)but I bring it up to demonstrate why some times Doctor Who would come up short in the special effects department. Personally it never bothered me,even as a kid. As long as the actors reacted as if they were seeing monsters and space ships I believed in the monsters and space ships even if they were bits of clay and pieces of old toy. Then again I grew up watching a lot of stuff that had bad special effects and was always more interested in the ideas that made up a story then how it looked on screen so I know I do not represent your average viewer.
I'd wondered what the budget ratio between Dr Who and Star Trek was but never took the time to work it out thanks. I'm surprised it wasn't more.
Other things to consider though. A Dr Who serial is typically 4x 25 minute episodes long, meaning the set building budget is stretched twice as far as Star Trek. However Dr Who had to build entirely new sets for every story and often every episode (Tardis interior console room and The Doctor's UNIT laboratory room in the Pertwee era being two exceptions) where as I'd guess that around 75% of Star Trek is just shot on the single expensive looking Enterprise set every week, dramatically saving costs. On the other hand Dr Who used location filming to save on building sets for it's earthbound episodes, where as Star Trek shot damn near everything in the studio, so it all had to be built and paid for.
Yeah those are all really good point. Also filming on location was less costly them building sets a lot of the time for Doctor Who.
As for Star Trek's special effects i always thought they looked really good for Tv at the time and my hat goes off to the people who produced them but I grew up watching the show with of nongeeky people around and some aspects would get mocked. Scuh as the sets for alien planets,the fact that aliens looked mostly human,and the number of times glowing lights were passed off and alien spaceships. Still I think that did an amazing job.
One thing to remember with both Star Trek and Doctor Who is that the average TV set was much smaller back then,around 20 inches so every detail of the special effects shots couldn't be blown up the way it is now. Also they didn't have VHS tapes or any form of home recording back then so people didn't see the episodes over and over again so flaws in the special effects were much less likely to be spotted when most people were only ever going to see the episode once.
Still I think both shows did a very good job all things considered and yeah while POTD was a mistake(I am not sure I would have greenlit a story like that on Doctor Who's budget in the first place.)even the greats mess up from time to time so I never really saw it as that big a black mark on the show.
in the end I think with both shows it is up to the actors to sell you on the effects and I think you have to be willing to lose yourself in the moment. I think Shakespeare said it best "Think when we talk of horses, that you see them
Printing their proud hoofs i' the receiving earth;
For 'tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings"