Reeltime Pictures

Reeltime Pictures is a British multimedia film and video production company founded in 1984 by Keith Barnfather.It is known for its many documentaries about the long-running television series "Doctor Who" (Barnfather was a founding member of the Doctor Who Appreciation Society) and in particular for "The Myth Makers", a series of interviews with people associated with the making of the series. Many of these programs were hosted by actor Nicholas Briggs, who would later provide the voice of the Daleks in the 2005 series of "Doctor Who".

Reeltime Pictures also pioneered a technique of creating direct-to-video "Doctor Who" spin-offs, despite the BBC's close guarding of the series, by building the spin-offs around incidental characters and monsters licensed directly from the writers who created them. Their first effort, 1987's "Wartime", was a small-scale piece built around Sergeant Benton of UNIT, a recurring character from the 1970s. In 1987, Reeltime produced "Myth Runner", a parody of "Blade Runner" written and directed by and starring Briggs and featuring outtakes from the "Myth Makers" video series.

Later and more ambitious productions include "Mindgame", "", "Downtime", and "Daemos Rising". Ironically, despite their non-BBC-licensed status, novelisations of both "Shakedown" and "Downtime" were released as part of the BBC licensed Virgin New Adventures "Doctor Who" spin-off novels, their narratives being expanded to incorporate the Doctor, a character missing from the video versions for copyright reasons.

The success of these ventures opened the door for later releases by Big Finish Productions and BBV of storylines featuring characters and races from "Doctor Who", but not necessarily the Doctor himself (although Big Finish would also obtain a license that allowed them to feature the Doctor).

Video Dramas

"Wartime"

"Downtime"

""

"Mindgame"

"Mindgame Trilogy"

"Daemos Rising"

External links

* [http://www.reeltimepictures.co.uk/ Official Reeltime Pictures site]