Name: Sara and Hoppity. Now HD! B&W version. Restored & enhanced. Very spooky! Unaired pilot. early 60s @IKP1000
Uploaded: 2024-10-21T08:17:00-05:00
Duration: 8 min 17 s
Description: Sara and Hoppity. Now HD! B&W version. Restored & enhanced. Very spooky! Unaired pilot. early 60s

Sara and Hoppity. Now HD! B&W version. Restored & enhanced. Very spooky! Unaired pilot. early 60s

Iain Petrie 2024-10-21 | Sara and Hoppity. Now HD! B&W version. Restored & enhanced. Very spooky! Unaired pilot. early 60s

I animated thumbnails with AI to promo Jack Petries Movie Review Channel: See how (Results mixed!)

Iain Petrie 2023-09-26 | Here are some of my results using the Runway ml AI Suite to generate animations for thumbnails in YouTube. I was interested to see what the technology could do using my limited skills with it, and spoiler alert, results are very mixed but very interesting as well, I think, and something that's got legs in the future.
My main motivation was to try to help promote the videos of Jack Petrie, who has a superb Movie Review channel. (youtube.com/@jackpetrie9979) .
If you like what you see here, you're going to hear something now that you've probably never heard on a YouTube video before. If you like the video, please don't Subscribe and Like my channel, go to his and give him the sub instead! He's got a fantastic channel; it's growing; it's all about movies, movie reviews, old and new. And if you're here on this channel, that's probably the kind of thing you like as well. It's not getting exposure that I think he deserves, and I'd love to give him a little surprise by getting him some subs. There's nearly two and a half thousand lovely subscribers here on this channel. If only one in 10 of you found the time to pop over there and drop in a sub, that would be 250 new subs on top of the 64 he has at the moment, so something like this would be a fantastic thing for him and for me too. So, thank you in any case. An if you are now to this channel, you are very welcome, and very welcome to subscribe here, and over on Jack's channel ;-)
I reference this video too, (youtu.be/4SbZEDlGMa0?si=VSS625XA7_TrGPcl) which talks about the importance of the first 5 seconds of a video for YT engagement, now that so many devices have Auto-preview, so the thumbnail isn't always seen, hence my idea for an animated thumbnail at the beginning of a video.

I'll probably be doing more experiments like this as well, so please come back for future videos.

1936 Serial. 12/12 Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) AI Enhanced & Colourised! Ascent to the Upperworld

Iain Petrie 2023-06-05 | Here's the final episode of Undersea Kingdom! All 12 episodes have now been colourised and AI enhanced. OK, it took 7 months, but we got there in the end....
The first episode can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQIt's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial." The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more....

1936 Serial. Ep 11/12 Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) AI Enhanced & Colourised! Flaming Death

Iain Petrie 2023-06-03 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase." Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon. This is episode 11. The first episode can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQIt's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial." The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... Please consider subscribing if you enjoy this kind of content, as there is much more enhanced vintage material to come!

1936 Serial. Ep 10/12 Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) AI Enhanced & Colourised! Atlantis Destroyed.

Iain Petrie 2023-06-03 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon.
This is episode 10. The first episode can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other episodes over the coming weeks. It will take a few weeks / months to do them all, but I promise they will be done. Please consider subscribing if you enjoy this kind of content, as there is much more enhanced vintage material to come!

1936 Serial. Ep 9/12 Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) AI Enhanced & Colourised! Death in The Air.

Iain Petrie 2023-06-02 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon.
This is episode 9. The first episode can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other episodes over the coming weeks. It will take a few weeks / months to do them all, but I promise they will be done. Please consider subscribing if you enjoy this kind of content, as there is much more enhanced vintage material to come!

1936 Serial. Ep 8/12 Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) AI Enhanced & Colourised! Into The Metal Tower

Iain Petrie 2023-05-13 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon.
This is episode 8. The first episode can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other episodes over the coming weeks. It will take a few weeks / months to do them all, but I promise they will be done. Please consider subscribing if you enjoy this kind of content, as there is much more enhanced vintage material to come!

1936 Serial. Ep 7/12 Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) AI Enhanced & Colourised! The Submarine Trap

Iain Petrie 2023-05-13 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon.
This is episode 7. The first episode can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other episodes over the coming weeks. It will take a few weeks / months to do them all, but I promise they will be done. Please consider subscribing if you enjoy this kind of content, as there is much more enhanced vintage material to come!

Goodbye (not quite...) to my channel, and Hello to the New! Major announcement to all Subscribers

Iain Petrie 2023-03-21 | This short video explains the reasons for the changes to this channel, and introduces the new one. Thank you for all the support and encouragement this channel has had over the years. I'll continue to upload the upscaled, colourised and enhanced videos here as promised, but new creative material will be moving to my new channel, Iain's Diary, and there are already a few Bleep and Booster creations there. See you there I hope! And if you choose to subscribe there too, I'd be very happy ;-)
The new channel: youtube.com/channel/UCKiIeVkp4OEqP6tN7oCTMxg
Thank you, Iain

1936 Serial. Ep 6/12 Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) AI Enhanced & Colourised! The Juggernaut Strikes.

Iain Petrie 2023-03-16 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon.
This is episode 6. The first episode can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other episodes over the coming weeks. It will take a few weeks / months to do them all, but I promise they will be done. Please consider subscribing if you enjoy this kind of content, as there is much more enhanced vintage material to come!

Re-imagining 1960s Bleep & Booster art using Midjourney AI

Iain Petrie 2023-02-16 | Here are the results of my first experiments with the amazing Midjourney AI.
There's a super tutorial video here to get you started if you are new to this:
youtu.be/SzixsknDoHM

Original 1960s Bleep & Booster artwork from 2D to 3D in Blender using Depth Maps

Iain Petrie 2023-02-14 | I've been looking for a way to create 3D versions of some of the wonderful original Bleep and Booster artwork from the 1960's annuals and recently discovered depth maps.
The results are very encouraging! I managed this by following this superb tutorial. If I can do it, anyone can!
youtu.be/6clJGacBo0U

Saying goodbye to the Rotundans! (for now...) Bleep & Booster (Blue Peter series BBC) Pt. 7

Iain Petrie 2023-02-13 | After posting several videos of my Blender learning journey with creating and animating Rotundans, it's time to move on to other Blender experiments before the patience of viewers is tested too much... though many will still be part of the series leading to, hopefully, a full 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster. This is Part 7, and Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
The Rotundans appears in 4 of the 5 Bleep and Booster annuals but none of the Blue Peter annuals. If you are interested in Bleep and Booster, or want to know more about how these character were created, visit the Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group! facebook.com/groups/1144646516087424

Saying goodbye to the Rotundans! (for now...) Bleep & Booster (Blue Peter series BBC) Pt. 7 (Short)

A Rotundan in my garden! Bleep & Booster (Blue Peter series BBC) Pt. 6 VFX / camera tracking Blender

Iain Petrie 2023-02-11 | First success with VFX / Camera Tracking in Blender. I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender, though I have very little experience of using Blender to create 3D character models in Blender and to animate them. This is a clip from Part 6 of a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
The Rotundans appears in 4 of the 5 Bleep and Booster annuals but none of the Blue Peter annuals. If you are interested in Bleep and Booster, or want to know more about how these character were created, visit the Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group! facebook.com/groups/1144646516087424

First Rotundan ever captured on film, in my garden!

Iain Petrie 2023-02-10 | I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender, though I have very little experience of using Blender to create 3D character models in Blender and to animate them. This is a clip from Part 6 of a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
The Rotundans appears in 4 of the 5 Bleep and Booster annuals but none of the Blue Peter annuals. If you are interested in Bleep and Booster, or want to know more about how these character were created, visit the Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group! facebook.com/groups/1144646516087424
#Short

Rotundan Rumba dancing to 30s Jazz (creation based on Bleep & Booster 1960s Blue Peter series BBC)

Iain Petrie 2023-02-09 | I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender, though I have very little experience of using Blender to create 3D character models in Blender and to animate them. This is a clip from Part 5 of what will hopefully be a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
I created the Rotundan but the dance moves were created by the AI Maximo software. The background free download from the superb online resource Blenderkit Asset Library.
The Rotundans appears in 4 of the 5 Bleep and Booster annuals but none of the Blue Peter annuals. If you are interested in Bleep and Booster, or want to know more about how these character were created, visit the Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group! facebook.com/groups/1144646516087424
#Short

Rotundan dances the Rumba! Mixamo AI magic & Blender. Bleep & Booster (Blue Peter series BBC) Part 5

Iain Petrie 2023-02-09 | I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender. This is Part 5 of what will hopefully be a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story. I learned how to use Mixamo from this superb tutorial:
youtu.be/wYqJ7AyEuhc
Part 1 of the Bleep and Booster "journey" can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
The Rotundans appears in 4 of the 5 Bleep and Booster annuals but none of the Blue Peter annuals.

3D Rotundans standing on planetoid (creation based on Bleep & Booster 1960s Blue Peter series BBC)

Iain Petrie 2023-02-08 | I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender, though I have very little experience of using Blender to create 3D character models in Blender and to animate them. This is Part 3 of what will hopefully be a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
I created the Rotundans but the wonderful alien world is a free download from the superb online resource Blenderkit Asset Library.
The Rotundans appears in 4 of the 5 Bleep and Booster annuals but none of the Blue Peter annuals. If you are interested in Bleep and Booster, or want to know more about how these character were created, visit the Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group! facebook.com/groups/1144646516087424
#Short

3D Rotundan creation: Space Walk (based on Bleep & Booster 1960s Blue Peter series BBC)

Iain Petrie 2023-02-07 | I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender, though I have very little experience of using Blender to create 3D character models in Blender and to animate them. This is Part 4 of what will hopefully be a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
The Rotundans appears in 4 of the 5 Bleep and Booster annuals but none of the Blue Peter annuals. If you are interested in Bleep and Booster, or want to know more about how these character were created, visit the Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group! facebook.com/groups/1144646516087424
#Short

A 3D boneless Rotundan walks for the first time! Bleep & Booster (Blue Peter series BBC) Part 4

Iain Petrie 2023-02-06 | After weeks of effort (I'm a slow learner) I've finally made a walking Rotundan! He's walking a "rotating road" which I got for free from the superb online resource Blenderkit Asset Library.
I later realised that I'd failed to connect the armature to the body, so it's actually a "boneless" character, but the accidental result is probably better than if I'd connected the bones, as its arms and legs don't appear to have proper joints in the cartoon drawings anyway.
I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender. The main problem is that I have very little experience of using Blender to create 3D character models in Blender and to animate them. This is Part 4 of what will hopefully be a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
The Rotundans appears in 4 of the 5 Bleep and Booster annuals but none of the Blue Peter annuals.

Blender 3D creation of Rotundans. Bleep & Booster (Blue Peter series BBC) Part 3

Iain Petrie 2023-02-04 | I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender. The main problem is that I have very little experience of using Blender to create 3D character models in Blender and to animate them. This is Part 3 of what will hopefully be a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
The Rotundans appears in 4 of the 5 Bleep and Booster annuals but none of the Blue Peter annuals. Part 4 will show a Rotundan walking (hopefully...) but in the meantime here are 4 of them standing on an alien world, which I downloaded for free from the superb online resource Blenderkit Asset Library.
It took about 9 hours to create the Rotundans, and at least the same again to learn how to rig these very basic characters, so it's certainly going to be a marathon not a sprint, but it's been a great way to get to grips with Blender, and hopefully the skills will be transferable to other projects...

First Blender animation attempt with 3D cartoon character. Bleep & Booster (Blue Peter series BBC)

Iain Petrie 2023-01-21 | I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender. The main problem is that I have very little experience of using Blender to create 3D character models in Blender and to animate them. This is Part 2 of what will hopefully be a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/YJm1JyVt0BA
It took over 10 hours to create the model, and a further 9 hours to create this very short, very basic animation, so it's certainly going to be a marathon not a sprint, but it's been a great way to get to grips with Blender, and hopefully the skills will be transferable to other projects...

Torchy the Battery Boy (1959) Colourised! 20) The Twins Learn a Lesson Gerry Anderson and R. Leigh

Iain Petrie 2023-01-17 | Director: Gerry Anderson
Writer: Roberta Leigh
And also featuring the wonderful Kenneth Connor's as the voice of the king.
All episodes were in black and white of course but I'm working my way through colourising Series 1 using Deoldify and with some further enhancements in PowerDirector 10.
"Torchy entrusts King Dithers to lock the twins in his dungeon, but the loonie king is the one who gets locked away. Fortunately, Polliken becomes wise to the situation and puts the bad siblings in their place." (Wikipedia)

Torchy the Battery Boy (1959) Colourised! 19) The Naughty Twins. Gerry Anderson & Roberta Leigh

Iain Petrie 2023-01-12 | Director: Gerry Anderson
Writer: Roberta Leigh
And also featuring the wonderful Kenneth Connor's voice.
"Torchy returns to earth to find Mr. Bumbledrop asleep. Not wishing to wake his friend, he sets the table and putters around the house doing nice things. Unfortunately, his battery wears out and he collapses in the garden, where he's found by twins Bobby and Babs. The dastardly duo decide to take him home and imprison him in a chicken run, but Mr. Bumbledrop figures out what has happened and comes to his rescue. The old man and toy-boy decide to go to Topsy Turvy Land and lure the twins into the rocket with a bag of toffee, but Mr. Bumbledrop is slow to react and gets left behind." (Wiki)
Note: Bobby and Babs were the first prototypes for Supermarionation.
All episodes were in black and white of course but I'm working my way through colourising Series 1 using Deoldify and with some further enhancements in PowerDirector 10.

First attempt at 3D cartoon character modelling in Blender. Bleep & Booster (Blue Peter series BBC)

Iain Petrie 2023-01-06 | I'm planning a 3D animation interpretation of the 1960's series Bleep and Booster using Blender. The main problem is that I have very little experience of using blender and no experience of creating 3D character models in Blender. This is Part 1 of what will hopefully be a set of videos showing progress to an actual animated 3D story, but since it took over 10 hours to get this far, it's certainly going to be a marathon not a sprint...

1936 Serial. Ep 5/12 Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) AI Enhanced & Colourised! Revenge of the Volkites

Iain Petrie 2022-12-26 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon.
This is episode 5. The first episode can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other episodes over the coming weeks. It will take a few weeks / months to do them all, but I promise they will be done. Please consider subscribing if you enjoy this kind of content, as there is much more enhanced vintage material to come!

Lost Bleep & Booster episode 1964. Part 2 of 2. Blue Peter recovered & animated in colour.

Iain Petrie 2022-12-24 | This is Part 2 of a 2 part story. Part 1 can be seen here: youtu.be/qtnMbuhbUHA
Made by the wonderfully talented William Timym (Tim) and narrated by the also wonderfully talented Peter Hawkins - voice of the Daleks and the Cybermen in Doctor Who and so much more - Bleep and Booster first aired on BBC's Blue Peter in 1964, and the first story was shown in 4 parts from 03/02/64 to 16/03/64. It was never repeated and has never been seen since, though 2 of the 4 episodes of this first story are said to exist in the BBC archives somewhere.
Following great work over on the Bleep and Booster Facebook group (thank you Geoff and Steven) we now have a brief summary of that very first episode from the Radio Times, 14th September 1964, where the entry for Story 2 has this to say:
“Booster’s adventures began last February when he built a rocket in his back garden and zoomed into orbit. Intercepted by Space Freighter 2000, he made friends with Bleep, a space boy and his father, the captain of the freighter. Together Bleep and Booster explored the mysterious planet Truga and were kidnapped by the wily Trugs. After a dramatic rescue, Booster returned to earth. But the space world was too tempting to leave for long…”
None of the 14 Blue Peter annuals which have Bleep and Booster cartoon strips in them tells the original story of how Bleep and Booster met, but the first Bleep and Booster story book in 1965 does:
'Booster builds a rocket and flies into space. He runs out of fuel and is saved by Bleep, who takes him to Miron, where he meets Bleep’s father the Captain, and they also have an adventure with a Space Dragon'.
This clearly differs significantly from the version outlined in the TV Times, but it seems this is the closest we can get to the original story unless it is ever uncovered in the archives, though after such a long time that seems unlikely.
I've taken the text and the images from the 1965 story book (shown in the thumbnail to this video) and added sound effects from one of the only 2 released TV stories, Solaron, 1968, and produced an "animation" of the story.
"Animation" is in quote marks since, like the original TV episodes, the method used is mainly animatic animation, which consists simply of panning and zooming the camera over still images to give the impression of movement. To make the images match the text, I had to adapt quite a few of them, adding extra elements and cutting out others, so you do get some actual movement in this version, but it can hardly be called animation in the traditional sense! If you like this kind of content, please consider subscribing, it really helps me when you do that, and and I'm planning on doing more of these soon.
I'm no Peter Hawkins, as you will hear, but I've tried to capture a little of his rhythms of speech and something of his accent though this is very much a work in progress.

1936 Serial Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) Ep 4/12. AI Enhanced & Colourised! Revenge of the Volkites

Iain Petrie 2022-12-03 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon.
This is episode 5. The first episode can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other episodes over the coming weeks. It may take a few weeks to do them all, but I promise they will be done. Please consider subscribing if you enjoy this kind of content, as there is much more enhanced vintage material to come!

Lost 1st episode of Bleep & Booster (1964) Blue Peter recovered & re-animated in colour. Part 1.

Iain Petrie 2022-11-21 | This is Part 1 of a 2 part story. Part 2 will be added as a link at the end of this episode when it's done, so please come back in a week or two. Or better still, subscribe ;-). It really helps me when you do that...
Made by the wonderfully talented William Timym (Tim) and narrated by the also wonderfully talented Peter Hawkins - voice of the Daleks and the Cybermen in Doctor Who and so much more - Bleep and Booster first aired on BBC's Blue Peter in 1964, and the first story was shown in 4 parts from 03/02/64 to 16/03/64. It was never repeated and has never been seen since, though 2 of the 4 episodes of this first story are said to exist in the BBC archives somewhere.
Following great work over on the Bleep and Booster Facebook group (thank you Geoff and Steven) we now have a brief summary of that very first episode from the Radio Times, 14th September 1964, where the entry for Story 2 has this to say:
“Booster’s adventures began last February when he built a rocket in his back garden and zoomed into orbit. Intercepted by Space Freighter 2000, he made friends with Bleep, a space boy and his father, the captain of the freighter. Together Bleep and Booster explored the mysterious planet Truga and were kidnapped by the wily Trugs. After a dramatic rescue, Booster returned to earth. But the space world was too tempting to leave for long…”
None of the 14 Blue Peter annuals which have Bleep and Booster cartoon strips in them tells the original story of how Bleep and Booster met, but the first Bleep and Booster story book in 1965 does:
'Booster builds a rocket and flies into space. He runs out of fuel and is saved by Bleep, who takes him to Miron, where he meets Bleep’s father the Captain, and they also have an adventure with a Space Dragon'.
This clearly differs significantly from the version outlined in the TV Times, but it seems this is the closest we can get to the original story unless it is ever uncovered in the archives, though after such a long time that seems unlikely.
I've taken the text and the images from the 1965 story book (shown in the thumbnail to this video) and added sound effects from one of the only 2 released TV stories, Solaron, 1968, and produced an "animation" of the story.
"Animation" is in quote marks since, like the original TV episodes, the method used is mainly animatic animation, which consists simply of panning and zooming the camera over still images to give the impression of movement. To make the images match the text, I had to adapt quite a few of them, adding extra elements and cutting out others, so you do get some actual movement in this version, but it can hardly be called animation in the traditional sense!
I'm no Peter Hawkins, as you will hear, but I've tried to capture a little of his rhythms of speech and something of his accent though this is very much a work in progress and I'm planning on doing more of these in the future.

1936 Serial Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) Ep 3 of 12. AI Enhanced & Colourised! Arena of Death

Iain Petrie 2022-11-08 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon.
The 1st Ep. can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other episodes over the coming days and weeks. It may take a few weeks to do them all, but I promise they will be done.

Creepy (sinister?) 1930 Stop-Motion animation AI Enhanced & Colourised. Once seen, never forgotten..

Iain Petrie 2022-11-07 | "Dolly Daisy in Hearts and Flowers" by Warner Brothers was directed by Howard Moss in 1930. This obscure, and frankly odd, short film was nearly lost, but was recovered by Mark Kausler, however, the soundtrack remains lost so I've added a Jazz piece, "Lovely Day in May," by Sound Ideas. AI enhanced in Topaz Video Lab and AI coloured with DeOldify.
Brace yourselves, this is a weird one...

Paul Starr - Space Agent! 1960s Sci-fi pilot show rarity by Roberta Leigh. AI Enhanced.

Iain Petrie 2022-11-05 | Created and written by Roberta Leigh following the success of Space Patrol, Paul Starr had a much bigger budget and was in full colour.
Topaz Video AI has done a great job on enhancing it, making it a lot sharper and clearer, so much so that you can see strings which are not visible in the original!
The pilot show is all that we have, as sadly the show did not get commissioned. Here Toonhound explains why: (http://www.toonhound.com/starr.htm)

"With its roaring rockets, aquatic-looking aliens, whirring robots, interplanetry
action and explosions, all the ingredients for TV success were present and
correct. But alas, "Paul Starr" never received a series commission. You see,
there was a sizable supermarionated elephant lurking around the production,
in the form of Gerry Anderson and AP Films. Their team had already
conquered the TV schedules with Fireball XL5 and Stingray, and those
Thunderbirds were blasting off for action at the same time as Roberta
Leigh's new pilot.
It's easy to speculate that, if those Anderson series weren't omni-present
"Paul Starr" would have been picked up, and soared. Oh, but then it
probably wouldn't have been made in the first place, because, there's no
escaping the fact that this was hugely derivative of those shows. There's
"Stingray" all over that underwater base, and "Thunderbirds" in the protracted
launch sequence. The robots have stolen Robert the Robot's electronic vocals
too, and we've got a slick singing star (Jerry Dane) crooning over the end
credits. Heck, there's even a rumbling bongo beat introducing the thing!"

Undersea Kingdom (1936) theatrical trailer. AI enhanced & colourised. See description for full Eps.

Iain Petrie 2022-11-02 | I'm colourising and AI enhancing all 12 episodes of this wonderful 1936 series, so please see my other uploads, or better still, subscribe for more content like this added regularly ;-) The 1st Ep. can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon. It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other 10 episodes over the coming days and weeks. It may take a few weeks to do them all, but I promise they will be done.

1936 Serial Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) Ep 2 of 12. AI Enhanced & Colourised!

Iain Petrie 2022-10-30 | The 1st Ep. can be seen here: youtu.be/rblkaP5KmrQ
In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon. It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. The lost undersea continent of Atlantis has evil dictators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other 10 episodes over the coming days and weeks. It may take a few weeks to do them all, but I promise they will be done.

1936 Serial Undersea Kingdom (Atlantis) Ep 1 of 12. AI Enhanced & Colourised!

Iain Petrie 2022-10-29 | In the words of author William C. Cline, Undersea Kingdom was a "totally unbelievable – but visually enjoyable – madhouse chase."
Undersea Kingdom (1936) is a Republic Pictures 12 chapter film serial released in response to Universal's Flash Gordon. It's so like Flash Gordon, if you forget your glasses you'd think it WAS Flash Gordon. The star of the serial is Ray "Crash" Corrigan. The name was created to sound similar to "Flash Gordon", in one of many similarities. Interestingly, he actually appeared in the first series of Flash Gordon in the same year, 1936. Wiki:
Corrigan's Hollywood career began as a physical fitness instructor and physical culture trainer to the stars. In the early 1930s he did stunts and bit parts in several films, billed as Ray Benard. Many of his early roles were in ape costumes, for example, as a gorilla in Tarzan and His Mate (1934) and an "orangopoid" in the first Flash Gordon serial."
The original is B&W of course, and is low resolution and quite poor quality. I've upscaled and enhanced it in Topaz Video AI and colourised it in DeOldify AI. Undersea Kingdom is mostly forgotten now, and has a low rating of 4.8 on IMDB. I think it's much better than that, see what you think. This is the first episode, which at 30 minutes is longer than the other 11 episodes. Most of this one is spent setting up the plot, but stick with it; things get much more exciting later on when they discover the lost undersea continent of Atlantis, with (of course) evil dicators, remote-controlled soldier robots, flying war ships, ray guns, and so much more.... I'll be listing the other 11 episodes over the coming days and weeks. This one took 13 hours to render, 3 hours to colourise and another hour or two to further enhance in PowerDirector 365, so it may take a few weeks to do them all, but I promise they will be done.

How to easily colourise Black & White video in 8 clicks with Deoldify AI. Free. No Download. Simple!

Iain Petrie 2022-10-28 | As you can see on my channel, I have colourised dozens of Black and White videos, all using the superb and incredibly easy to use AI software DeOldify. Most of these were done with the free version. You simply upload your video (ideally less than 20 minutes long) to YouTube as Unlisted. Open DeOldify (link below) and after clicking 8 boxes in order, you are ready to paste in the video link, then decide on the Render setting (21 is default), and click "Colorize" and you're done! This short and simple tutorial will tell you everything you need to know, which is little more than already outlined here, but just a couple of pitfalls to be aware of. Good luck, and I'd love to hear how you get on with it.
The link: colab.research.google.com/github/jantic/DeOldify/blob/master/VideoColorizerColab.ipynb

Beginner animated 3D golden Bleep and Booster logo in Blender. Final result at the end.

Iain Petrie 2022-10-24 | The final creation is shown at the very end of this very short video, which just outlines what I did. As a beginner, it took 3 days but I learned a lot.
The 2 tutorial videos I followed are listed below, as well as the free site for converting images to .svg files. Blender is free too, so give it a go if you haven't before. If I can do it, anyone can...
The tutorials. Both are excellent, and the first one is fantastic for complete beginners:
youtu.be/NMJQMFTYYdA
youtu.be/dMZQCRnD13Q
.svg conversion: convertio.co

Torchy the Battery Boy (1959) in colour. 18) The Hungry Money Box. Gerry Anderson & Roberta Leigh

Iain Petrie 2022-10-24 | Director: Gerry Anderson
Writer: Roberta Leigh
And also featuring the wonderful Kenneth Connor's voice as the King, and as Pongo. I had the pleasure of chatting with him a pub in High Wycombe in 1987, and he was a lovely unassuming and quietly-spoken man.
All episodes were in black and white of course but I'm working my way through colourising Series 1 using Deoldify and with some further enhancements in PowerDirector 10.
"Clinker is overjoyed to discover an enormous pile of coins that no one requires in Topsy Turvy Land, but Pongo the pirate decides to claim them for his own. Torchy uses his magic lamp to find a gold mine, which turns out to be empty. Fortunately for Clinker, on the grounds above, a money tree has bloomed". (Wikipedia)

Peter Pan playing cards 1912. Lucky car boot find! Wonderful art by Charles A Buchel.

Iain Petrie 2022-10-23 | What a great find. I found this full set of Peter Pan playing cards c1912 at the bottom of a box of "bits" I bought at a car boot sale the other day. Amazingly they are in excellent condition and the set is complete. As you'll see art by Charles A Buchel is wonderful. I'm now hooked on these antique and vintage playing cards so will be showcasing more soon.

Flash Gordons Trip to Mars.1938. Ep 10. Incense of Forgetfulness. AI enhanced. Colourised version

Iain Petrie 2022-10-19 | "Thongor Barbarian" has been involved in a project to clean up digitally the 1930's series of Flash Gordon featuring Buster Crabbe, and has kindly made this episode "Incense of Forgetfulness" from the 1938 series "Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars" available so that I could experiment with some further enhancement attempts using Topaz Video AI. The results are very encouraging, IMO, and I'm hoping we can collaborate on other episodes. There's a slight "cartoon" effect noticeable in parts, possibly because the original upload was compressed by YouTube so the AI had to "work harder" to get a sharp result. Colourised with DeOldify and further adjustments in PowerDirector 365. I've also uploaded the B&W enhanced version and you can see it here: youtu.be/V0pxEwDe9Ek

Flash Gordons Trip to Mars. 1938. Ep 10. Incense of Forgetfulness. AI enhanced. B&W version

Iain Petrie 2022-10-18 | "Thongor Barbarian" has been involved in a project to clean up digitally the 1930's series of Flash Gordon featuring Buster Crabbe, and has kindly made this episode "Incense of Forgetfulness" from the 1938 series "Flash Gordon's Trip to Mars" available so that I could experiment with some further enhancement attempts using Topaz Video AI. The results are very encouraging, IMO, and I'm hoping we can collaborate on other episodes. There's a slight "cartoon" effect noticeable in parts, possibly because the original upload was compressed by YouTube so the AI had to "work harder" to get a sharp result.
I've also colourised this enhanced episode, and will list that now.

Bleep & Booster Solaron. Ep. 6 (Finale) Peter Hawkins: Voice of Daleks! 1968. AI enhanced to HD

Iain Petrie 2022-10-17 | Bleep and Booster was an animated children's cartoon series by William Timym (Tim) originally shown on the BBC's Blue Peter. Bleep is an alien from the planet Miron, and Booster is a young human who travels with Bleep performing galactic missions for Bleep's father.
The narrator of all the Bleep and Booster stories was Peter Hawkins, who also provided the voices for the Daleks and Cybermen in many Doctor Who stories in the 1960s, and you can clearly hear the Dalek voice in the Controller of Space Project X!
A total of 39 episodes were shown between 1963 and c1971. Each episode was sub-divided into five or six 5 minute parts, with a cliffhanger at the end of each part. The 313 mini-episodes were shown once, and never repeated. There is a regularly-updated Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group which has a lot more information and images, if you are interested in finding out more about this much neglected cult series.
Only 2 story arcs are known to have survived: The Giant Brain, and Solaron, though it is said the other stories are "gathering dust" in the BBC archives somewhere...). As well as 5 Bleep and Booster annuals, they also featured in 14 of the Blue Peter annuals from 1964 to 1977, leading some sites online to state that the TV show also ran for this period of time too, but this is certainly not the case!
I've not seen a definitive date, but the show almost certainly started in 1963, and ran until the very early part of the '70s, I'm guessing 1971. If you remember it on TV later than that, do let us know please!
The surviving two stories make up around 66 minutes of play time, and I have upscaled this footage to 1536 x 1152 resolution, and further enhanced it using Topaz Video Lab AI and PowerDirector 365.
Here is the concluding part of Solaron, Episode 6. The Solaron story aired between 14th and 31st October 1968.
I've divided the episode up into roughly 6 minute parts, ending each one where (I'm guessing) the original cliffhangers were [Edit: the story seems to have cliffhangers in odd places, making some episodes less than 4 minutes long]. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/6Fkc1zkLgFs
In my mind, and others I've spoken to, Bleep and Booster ready did move, but actually they really did not! The show was not made with traditional animation, rather it employed animatic animation: the camera pans and zooms in and out of still images, giving the impression of movement.

Bleep & Booster Solaron. Ep 5. Peter Hawkins: Voice of Daleks & Cybermen! 1968. AI enhanced to HD

Iain Petrie 2022-10-16 | Bleep and Booster was an animated children's cartoon series by William Timym (Tim) originally shown on the BBC's Blue Peter. Bleep is an alien from the planet Miron, and Booster is a young human who travels with Bleep performing galactic missions for Bleep's father.
The narrator of all the Bleep and Booster stories was Peter Hawkins, who also provided the voices for the Daleks and Cybermen in many Doctor Who stories in the 1960s, and you can clearly hear the Dalek voice in the Controller of Space Project X!
A total of 39 episodes were shown between 1963 and c1971. Each episode was sub-divided into five or six 5 minute parts, with a cliffhanger at the end of each part. The 313 mini-episodes were shown once, and never repeated. There is a regularly-updated Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group which has a lot more information and images, if you are interested in finding out more about this much neglected cult series.
Only 2 story arcs are known to have survived: The Giant Brain, and Solaron, though it is said the other stories are "gathering dust" in the BBC archives somewhere...). As well as 5 Bleep and Booster annuals, they also featured in 14 of the Blue Peter annuals from 1964 to 1977, leading some sites online to state that the TV show also ran for this period of time too, but this is certainly not the case!
I've not seen a definitive date, but the show almost certainly started in 1963, and ran until the very early part of the '70s, I'm guessing 1971. If you remember it on TV later than that, do let us know please!
The surviving two stories make up around 66 minutes of play time, and I have upscaled this footage to 1536 x 1152 resolution, and further enhanced it using Topaz Video Lab AI and PowerDirector 365.
Here is Part 5 of Solaron. The Solaron story aired between 14th and 31st October 1968.
I've divided the episode up into roughly 6 minute parts, ending each one where (I'm guessing) the original cliffhangers were [Edit: the story seems to have cliffhangers in odd places, making some episodes less than 4 minutes long]. The following mini-episode will be linked at the end of each episode. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/6Fkc1zkLgFs
In my mind, and others I've spoken to, Bleep and Booster ready did move, but actually they really did not! The show was not made with traditional animation, rather it employed animatic animation: the camera pans and zooms in and out of still images, giving the impression of movement.

Bleep & Booster Solaron. Ep 4. Peter Hawkins: Voice of Daleks & Cybermen! 1968. AI enhanced to HD

Iain Petrie 2022-10-15 | Bleep and Booster was an animated children's cartoon series by William Timym (Tim) originally shown on the BBC's Blue Peter. Bleep is an alien from the planet Miron, and Booster is a young human who travels with Bleep performing galactic missions for Bleep's father.
The narrator of all the Bleep and Booster stories was Peter Hawkins, who also provided the voices for the Daleks and Cybermen in many Doctor Who stories in the 1960s, and you can clearly hear the Dalek voice in the Controller of Space Project X!
A total of 39 episodes were shown between 1963 and c1971. Each episode was sub-divided into five or six 5 minute parts, with a cliffhanger at the end of each part. The 313 mini-episodes were shown once, and never repeated. There is a regularly-updated Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group which has a lot more information and images, if you are interested in finding out more about this much neglected cult series.
Only 2 story arcs are known to have survived: The Giant Brain, and Solaron, though it is said the other stories are "gathering dust" in the BBC archives somewhere...). As well as 5 Bleep and Booster annuals, they also featured in 14 of the Blue Peter annuals from 1964 to 1977, leading some sites online to state that the TV show also ran for this period of time too, but this is certainly not the case!
I've not seen a definitive date, but the show almost certainly started in 1963, and ran until the very early part of the '70s, I'm guessing 1971. If you remember it on TV later than that, do let us know please!
The surviving two stories make up around 66 minutes of play time, and I have upscaled this footage to 1536 x 1152 resolution, and further enhanced it using Topaz Video Lab AI and PowerDirector 365.
Here is Part 4 of Solaron. The Solaron story aired between 14th and 31st October 1968.
I've divided the episode up into roughly 6 minute parts, ending each one where (I'm guessing) the original cliffhangers were [Edit: the story seems to have cliffhangers in odd places, making some episodes less than 4 minutes long]. The following mini-episode will be linked at the end of each episode. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/6Fkc1zkLgFs
In my mind, and others I've spoken to, Bleep and Booster ready did move, but actually they really did not! The show was not made with traditional animation, rather it employed animatic animation: the camera pans and zooms in and out of still images, giving the impression of movement.

Bleep & Booster Solaron. Ep 3. Peter Hawkins: Voice of the Daleks & Cybermen! 1968. Enhanced to HD

Iain Petrie 2022-10-14 | Bleep and Booster was an animated children's cartoon series by William Timym (Tim) originally shown on the BBC's Blue Peter. Bleep is an alien from the planet Miron, and Booster is a young human who travels with Bleep performing galactic missions for Bleep's father. The narrator of all the Bleep and Booster stories was Peter Hawkins, who also provided the voices for the Daleks and Cybermen in many Doctor Who stories in the 1960s, and you can clearly hear the Dalek voice in the Controller of Space Project X!
A total of 39 episodes were shown between 1963 and c1971. Each episode was sub-divided into five or six 5 minute parts, with a cliffhanger at the end of each part. The 313 mini-episodes were shown once, and never repeated. There is a regularly-updated Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group which has a lot more information and images, if you are interested in finding out more about this much neglected cult series.
Only 2 story arcs are known to have survived: The Giant Brain, and Solaron, though it is said the other stories are "gathering dust" in the BBC archives somewhere...). As well as 5 Bleep and Booster annuals, they also featured in 14 of the Blue Peter annuals from 1964 to 1977, leading some sites online to state that the TV show also ran for this period of time too, but this is certainly not the case!
I've not seen a definitive date, but the show almost certainly started in 1963, and ran until the very early part of the '70s, I'm guessing 1971 or 72. If you remember it on TV later than that, do let us know please!
The surviving two stories make up around 66 minutes of play time, and I have upscaled this footage to 1536 x 1152 resolution, and further enhanced it using Topaz Video Lab AI and PowerDirector 365.
Here is Part 3 of Solaron. It aired between 14th and 31st October 1968.
I've divided the episode up into roughly 6 minute parts, ending each one where (I'm guessing) the original cliffhangers were. The following mini-episode will be linked at the end of each episode. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/6Fkc1zkLgFs
In my mind, and others I've spoken to, Bleep and Booster ready did move, but actually they really did not! The show was not made with traditional animation, rather it employed animatic animation: the camera pans and zooms in and out of still images, giving the impression of movement.

J. Michael Straczynski (Babylon 5) reminisces about 60s puppet show, Space Patrol (Planet Patrol)

Iain Petrie 2022-10-14 | Joe Michael Straczynski, the creator of the science fiction television series Babylon 5, talking about his love of the Roberta Leigh puppet / marionette show, Space Patrol (Planet Patrol in the USA). I believe this was done to help promote the release of all 39 episodes on DVD. As an extra, the original Part 1 and Part 2 cards are the end of the clip. The original clip was very low quality and difficult to hear, so I have enhanced the sound and video of both the interview and the clips at the end,

Wonder Boy and Tiger 1967. AI enhanced oddity! Rare Roberta Leigh marionette show. Only surviving Ep

Iain Petrie 2022-10-13 | Roberta Leigh made some weird and wonderful puppet shows.
In my opinion this is far from the most wonderful of her creations but it may well be the weirdest...
Wonder Boy lives on a magic carpet with his talking cat, Tiger (not a pet tiger, as many sources say, including IMDb!). They are in permanent orbit around the Earth and can only land when a child calls for help.
The only surviving print of this only surviving episode is very compressed, grainy and blurry but Topaz Video AI has done a good job restoring it, and making it at least watchable again.
After working with Gerry Anderson and AP Films on the puppet shows "The Adventures of Twizzle", and "Torchy the Battery Boy", Roberta Leigh went on to make several other shows with Arthur Provis of AP Films. This partnership brought us - among others - "Sara & Hoppity", "Space Patrol" and "Send For Dithers" (All colourised and / or AI enhanced here on my channel. More oddities and rarities added regularly)

I've seen its production date listed as 1967 and 1968, so take your pick.

Upscaled to HD using Topaz Video Lab AI with further adjustments in PowerDirector 265.
Enjoy this weird and wonderful episode from a simpler time.
If you like this kind of content, please consider subscribing, as it really helps my channel when you do this.

Thanks for watching.

#Topaz #RobertaLeigh #GerryAnderson #WonderBoy

The Solarnauts 1967. Failed British Star Trek attempt. Pilot show AI enhanced & upscaled to HD

Iain Petrie 2022-10-12 | The Solarnauts was the final attempt by Roberta Leigh and Arthur Provis at producing science fiction shows. After creating children's classics like The Adventures of Twizzle, Sara and Hoppity and Torchy The Battery Boy, Roberta parted company with AP Films producer Gerry Anderson but continued to work with Arthur Provis, and they went on make the very successful Space Patrol, which ran for 39 episodes.

After the unsuccessful pilot film Paul Starr in 1964 (soon to be AI enhanced) came the Solarnauts in 1967. It's clearly an attempt to make a British Star Trek, and it's also clear that it had a decent budget for this one. I read that many models were recycled from Space Patrol though.

Like Star Trek, it's set far in the future but actually has a wonderful 1960s vibe. It's a shame that it was cancelled before it ever got started but it's still a great example of British 60s sci-fi. The only problem I have with it is that, in my opinion, neither of the two main characters is remotely likeable! The boss is ridiculously unpleasant too.
The 2X upscaling from the original SD resolution to 2048 x1152 and the AI enhancement in Topaz Video has made a remarkable difference to the quality of the film, taking it from a rather blurry low-res print to a sharp and detailed result.
I have colourised and upscaled The Adventures of Twizzle, Sara and Hoppity and most of the episodes of Torchy The Battery Boy using Topaz Video AI so please see my other videos here. And if you like this kind of content please consider subscribing to the channel. It really helps me when you do that!
Thank you.

Send For Dithers. 1966. Very Rare. Now AI enhanced to HD! Puppet show oddity by Roberta Leigh.

Iain Petrie 2022-10-11 | After working with Gerry Anderson and AP Films on the puppet shows "The Adventures of Twizzle", and "Torchy the Battery Boy", Roberta Leigh went on to make several other shows with Arthur Provis of AP Films.

This partnership brought us - among others - "Sara & Hoppity", "Space Patrol" and ... "Send For Dithers". This mostly forgotten oddity lasted for 13 episodes.

I've seen its production date listed as 1966 and 1969, so take your pick! The show used marionette puppets, as well as scale "modelive" models and live action. As far as I'm aware, this is the only surviving episode, and I believe that it was discovered in Roberta Leigh's garage, along with the believed lost pilot episode of "The Adventures of Twizzle", and a complete run of all 39 episodes of "Space Patrol", most of which were also believed lost. All of these were on 16mm film.

This is the first time the show has been upscaled to HD using AI, and the software - Topaz Video Lab AI - has done a superb job, I'd say.
Further adjustments in PowerDirector 265.
Enjoy this weird and wonderful episode from a different time...
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Thanks for watching.

#Topaz #RobertaLeigh #GerryAnderson #modelive

Bleep and Booster Solaron. Episode 2. Blue Peter. Oct 1968. Enhanced & upscaled to HD

Iain Petrie 2022-10-10 | Bleep and Booster was an animated children's cartoon series by William Timym (Tim) originally shown on the BBC's Blue Peter. Bleep is an alien from the planet Miron, and Booster is a young human who travels with Bleep performing galactic missions for Bleep's father.
A total of 39 episodes were shown between 1963 and c1971. Each episode was sub-divided into five or six 5 minute parts, with a cliffhanger at the end of each part. The 313 mini-episodes were shown once, and never repeated. There is a regularly-updated Bleep and Booster FaceBook Group which has a lot more information and images, if you are interested in finding out more about this much neglected cult series.
Only 2 story arcs are known to have survived: The Giant Brain, and Solaron, though it is said the other stories are "gathering dust" in the BBC archives somewhere...). As well as 5 Bleep and Booster annuals, they also featured in 14 of the Blue Peter annuals from 1964 to 1977, leading some sites online to state that the TV show also ran for this period of time too, but this is certainly not the case!
I've not seen a definitive date, but the show almost certainly started in 1963, and ran until the very early part of the '70s, I'm guessing 1971 or 72. If you remember it on TV later than that, do let us know please!
The surviving two stories make up around 66 minutes of play time, and I have upscaled this footage to 1536 x 1152 resolution, and further enhanced it using Topaz Video Lab AI and PowerDirector 365.
Here is Part 2 of Solaron. It aired between 14th and 31st October 1968.
I've divided the episode up into roughly 6 minute parts, ending each one where (I'm guessing) the original cliffhangers were. The following mini-episode will be linked at the end of each episode. Part 1 can be seen here:
youtu.be/6Fkc1zkLgFs
In my mind, and others I've spoken to, Bleep and Booster ready did move, but actually they really did not! The show was not made with traditional animation, rather it employed animatic animation: the camera pans and zooms in and out of still images, giving the impression of movement.