I think in one of the reference books that came out back in the 1980s it said that (after a coating of Artex to give the prop texture because the Pilot version was thought to be "too pristine") the TARDIS was painted "Peruvian Blue". Unfortunately all of those books are still in storage, but it would have been in one of these:

Doctor Who: A Celebration; Two Decades Through Time And Space
Doctor Who: The Early Years (this one dealt with only the Hartnell years)
Doctor Who: The Key to Time- A Year by Year Record (this was a 21st Anniversary Special - large book, hardcover... sort of a compendium of the show's progress from the beginning to Colin Baker's first season)
An aside: All of these are available via Amazon - at surprisingly great prices - in case anyone would like to get a copy.

My big questions have always been, what is "Peruvian blue"? Has anyone ever seen a color with this name? And if such a color does or did exist what shade was it, and how has it changed since 1963 if it can still be had today?

Dino.

Got the phone on the charger, so I thought I'd take the opportunity to upload a couple more shots.  RetroTV has been showing the classic series and they're up to K9 episodes.  As late as "Underworld" they're using what I assume is the 1:6 model.  At any rate, they've got a miniature that shows up pretty regularly with a white phone panel--although by this point it is missing the SJA badge.  As such I decided last weekend to take the SJA badge back off mine. 

But that's not the point.  The point is the leaves are gone from the trees above the TARDIS and the days are getting long enough to charge the battery on the solar powered signal lamp, so here's a few pictures with the signal lamp lit and a few more with the battery powered camp lantern hanging inside lit up.  It's a amazing how quickly that little window between when the lamp comes on and when it is too dark to use the cell phone camera closes. 

Shoot.  I had something else to add, but it keeps popping in and out of my brain and now that I'm trying to grab it, it has gone away.  Anyway, picture time: 


OK.  Got it.  The lamp.  Not completely thrilled with it yet.  I plan to add a "lip" under the drip cap.  This isn't on the TARDIS props, but it is on police boxes.  Since I didn't opt to spring for an actual Fresnel lens, I don't have any magnification to my light.  I'm considering picking up a plastic magnifier at an office supply store to get some of the magnification effect, but at some point you get to where you've spent as much as if you'd just bought a proper lens in the first place.  I also want to find something like a "crystal ball" for my lightbulb.  The lightbulb isn't functional--the lamp is lit by the LED in the drip cap--but if I had something there, it would look like a lightbulb and serve as a lens to catch and magnify the LED light.  I was going to use something filled with water, but experiments showed that glass shattered when it got below freezing and I don't trust the seal on a plastic bottle to not leak on everything under it.  So until I find a clear rubber ball or an appropriate crystal...huh.  I suppose I could fill a glass with gin or vodka.  That wouldn't freeze in my cliimate...an old burnt out lightbulb fills the role. 

She's looking really nice, volpone! I love that lighting! On the "bulb" thing... have you thought about trying one of those plastic bulbs, the kinds you can get at novelty stores? They look just like real frosted light bulbs, but aren't nearly as fragile. One of those might diffuse the light inside the lamp enough to give it a little more of a brighter look (larger surface area for the light to, well, light up).

Dino.

This one turned out well enough that I thought I'd add it too.  I think the light through the leaves gives it a nice weathered effect.  No work on this or updates.  Just being out in the elements.  My one nitpick is the freshly cut grass on the bottom edge.  If it had just materialized there, the grass clippings would be under it.  But I suppose she could have landed long enough ago that someone had to mow around her.

She's still beautiful, volpone! (And that does look like the far left corner of my back yard. I keep hoping that one day I'll look out there and see this Old Girl sitting there, with you standing in the doorway waving at me!)

Dino.

She is lovely in the dappled light, beautifully aged and weathered.

Absolutely!

Volpone, your TARDIS looks awesome in that last photo.
The colour, the weathering, everything is spot on. I hope mine weathers like this as the years roll by.

Your TARDIS is like a fine wine, it just keeps getting better with age!


Russell

The mixed blessing of outdoor TARDISes is that they need paint touch-ups from time to time. This I'd nice for a mixed colors of blue effect (as it is hard to get a perfect paint match--even with the code), but you wind up painting over your faux weathering. That said, while renovating a dresser, I hit on a new weathering technique: dark wood stain in a spray bottle. Effects to come if I ever find the time for her annual maintenance.

The trusty 2002 Canon Elph 2.0MP camera didn't work with Windows 7, so even if I could have got a shot with the one chance I get on its old worn out battery, I couldn't upload it.  And the cell phone doesn't fit on a tripod.  I used this as an excuse to pick up a starter DSLR...and after a year or so, I finally got around to trying it out.  Of course the image it generated was too big to upload here, so I was about to dust off the image editing software when I realized Facebook had already done that for me.  So...

Me, as a non-specific Doctor.  I like to think it is a young First Doctor, long before "An Unearthly Child."  I know the sonic screwdriver isn't right for that, but I don't care.  

Didn't get the lapel grab just right, but after the amount of fuming and fussing to get the shot, I was more worried about being in frame when the 10 second timer went off. 

Wow! What a great shot! (And if you're thinking along the lines of a pre-'An Unearthly Child' Doctor, perhaps even before Susan was born, then why not go all out and let this look the part?)

(Cropped a little to save space, and just a hint of the Hartnell-era blur added, and color removed for that Hartnell B&W feel.)

I hope you'll excuse my taking the liberty, but your idea was one I just couldn't resist! And as for the "lapel grab", I'm sure it took the 1st Doctor a while to perfect it as well.

Dino.

Well, you inspired me to cook it a bit myself.  I upped the blur a bit and I mucked about a bit with contrast.  My paint choice is probably close for a 1946-ish Met Box, but it is just a bit light for a TARDIS.  Monkeying with the settings gave it a bit more depth. 

Whoa! Nice!

Dino.

And if I may go somewhat afield from this forum, I put far more thought into this costume than any sane person would.  I looked at the neckwear the Doctor wears--bowtie to long tie to no tie (and of course 3 wears a bowtie and no tie and 4 wears variations of each (I didn't factor in the long bowtie because I'm not going to be wearing that).  The Doctor overwhelmingly wears patterned trousers--particularly in the old series.  In fact the only one I can think of that didn't wear some kind of plaid or stripes was 3.  Long-ish coats are prevalent.  My first choice would have been something shorter, like a car coat, but finding a nicely tailored coat that is between the length of a contemporary suit coat and a raincoat is difficult--unless you're going to shell out serious money.  So I settled on a decent microfiber raincoat I've had for some time that has a nice grey plaid liner with plenty of pockets for yoyos and Jelly Babies and such.  And more than a few Doctors wear some manner of outerwear--1 has his cape, 2 his fur coat, 3 his Inverness.  4 has the plum greatcoat from the last season and his Sontaran fightin/transmat repairing coat from his first season.  Now that I think about it, 6 has that cape in one story.  9 wears the black leather, 10 has his raincoat, and 11 has a couple overcoats.  So I decided to go with that.  I did wind up finding a velvet blazer that is as close to a smoking jacket as I'm going to get on my budget that may wind up in a photo at some point, but I opted for the raincoat for this.  

And as much as I went with blacks and greys, the Doctor does have a flashy side, hence the shirt.  Another reason for the shirt is it picks up the blue of the Goodwill polyester vest.  And it has French cuffs.  I indulged myself and picked up "?" cufflinks that aren't as intrusive as some of JNT's costuming choices.  And I managed to break one, which works out OK because I managed to lose one of the cufflinks I originally wore with that shirt--neat silver jobs with blue accents.  So I'm wearing a mismatched pair of cufflinks.  And of course there's the Timex digital watch.  If I really go nuts, one day I may pick up one of those Casio calculator watches for this costume.  

Something that may not show up in this photo (and doesn't actually come from studying the costumes in the show) is that I think the Doctor would tend to have slightly beat up clothes.  We all have that favorite shirt of ours, that we want to keep wearing even after it has started to wear out.  Along with the mismatched cufflinks, the coat is patched in the back.  It has ripped about a foot up the seam, above the vent from the way it catches as I get in and out of a car.  The shirt, I've had to stop wearing except with the costume.  I had to take the collar stays out because the points of the collar are coming apart and there's a small hole in one of the elbows.  I suppose the TARDIS might be able to generate clothes.  Or the Doctor might have a supply of gold and diamonds to trade for tailoring, but I'm thinking when he finds a look he likes, he wears it until it falls apart.  

What else?  Oh, I actually have a fairly decent 1st Doctor silver and blue ring that I accidentally picked up in the cheap jewelery section of Wal*Mart a few years back for a pirate costume, but it is just too flashy for me to pull off, so I'm wearing a stainless steel ring that doubles as a bottle opener and just happens to have a hexagonal opening that engages the bottlecaps.  

Quote from: volpone on May 30, 2015, 06:02 am

Something that may not show up in this photo (and doesn't actually come from studying the costumes in the show) is that I think the Doctor would tend to have slightly beat up clothes.  We all have that favorite shirt of ours, that we want to keep wearing even after it has started to wear out.    

I don't think you look 'beaten up' at all. Quite the contrary, you look very dapper indeed! (As does your Tardis!)

OK. It's been around 2 decades that I've had clipper-short hair, so this year I've been having a go at growing it out.  When it looks good it looks good, but it is so much more work and it can look very odd too, so there's a very good chance it is getting buzzed down this weekend, but I decided to do one Young Doctor shoot that has a costume closer to Hartnell's.  I've actually got a fairly decent ring on, but the angle sadly hides my right hand.  (If I put the camera on the other side, I'd have a bunch of toddler toys behind the TARDIS instead of a rustic wooden fence.)  Also, I couldn't quite get the pose and the Hartnell scowl quite right as I scrambled into frame, trying not to upset my makeshift tripod, as the 10 second timer beeped at me.  Still, it turned out OK.  I actually quite like the antiqued version I did.