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Tele-snaps (often known as telesnaps) were off-screen photographs of British television broadcasts, taken and sold commercially by John Cura (born Alberto Giovanni Cura in
Clapham Clapham () is a suburb in south west London, England, lying mostly within the London Borough of Lambeth, but with some areas (most notably Clapham Common) extending into the neighbouring London Borough of Wandsworth. History Early history ...
, South London, England; 9 April 1902 – 21 April 1969). From 1947 until 1968, Cura ran a business selling the 250,000-plus tele-snaps he took. The photographs were snapped in half of a normal frame of 35mm film, at an exposure of 1/25th of a second. Generally around 70–80 tele-snaps were taken of each programme. They were mostly purchased by actors and directors to use as records and examples of their work before the prevalence of
videocassette recorder A videocassette recorder (VCR) or video recorder is an electromechanical device that records analog audio and analog video from broadcast television or other source on a removable, magnetic tape videocassette, and can play back the reco ...
s. For many early programmes tele-snaps are the only surviving record of their appearance. From the 1990s onwards, tele-snaps have often been used by groups of fans to recreate lost ''Doctor Who'' episodes, creating "reconstructions" by marrying the images to fan-recorded off-air soundtracks of the episodes.


History

From a young age, Cura had been interested in electronics and photography, developing a reputation among his family as a "
Heath Robinson William Heath Robinson (31 May 1872 – 13 September 1944) was an English cartoonist, illustrator and artist, best known for drawings of whimsically elaborate machines to achieve simple objectives. In the UK, the term "Heath Robinson cont ...
inventor".Lewisohn, ''John Cura: Snapshots of History'' In June 1946, the
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...
resumed its television service following the hiatus imposed by the
Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...
. Cura, recently
demobilised Demobilization or demobilisation (see spelling differences) is the process of standing down a nation's armed forces from combat-ready status. This may be as a result of victory in war, or because a crisis has been peacefully resolved and milita ...
from the
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, combined his twin passions of photography and electronics and began to experiment with developing a camera that could take pictures from a television screen. He eventually came up with a mechanism that took half-frame 18×24 mm images on 35 mm film (i.e. the same format as in 35 mm motion picture cameras), at a speed of 1/25th of a second. Once satisfied with his process, Cura wrote to the BBC on 11 September 1947 enclosing samples of his work and requesting permission to exploit the images commercially. Cura's request caused considerable consternation in the BBC's legal department who were concerned about
copyright A copyright is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the exclusive right to copy, distribute, adapt, display, and perform a creative work, usually for a limited time. The creative work may be in a literary, artistic, educatio ...
. Ultimately, the BBC concluded that a television image was not covered by existing copyright law and replied to Cura giving him permission to proceed but to "only photograph the television image of individual artists who have instructed you to do so prior to their television appearance, and that you do not give or sell the photographs to anyone other than the artist in question". Cura often ignored this restriction, however, frequently sending tele-snaps to artists on spec in the hope of attracting business from them. Many of his clients were BBC programme makers who found his photographs useful records of their work. In 1951, Cura came once again to the attention of the BBC's lawyers when he requested that he be allowed to photograph entire BBC productions, writing that his service "enables you to have a permanent pictorial record for valuable reference in years to come, of series which have a brief life of an hour or so and are then lost forever". The BBC had also been contacted by several newspapers at this time, looking for permission to use Cura's tele-snaps—especially after it transpired that Cura had taken the only image of
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's boat sinking during that year's Boat Race between Oxford and
Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a College town, university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cam ...
. The BBC made petitions to the
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to have the Copyright Acts overhauled to give them
legal certainty Legal certainty is a principle in national and international law which holds that the law must provide those subject to it with the ability to regulate their conduct. The legal system needs to permit those subject to the law to regulate their condu ...
regarding the issue. Although a revised Copyright Bill was enacted in 1956, it did little to curtail Cura's activities. Cura's business was at its peak in the mid-fifties, his business having doubled overnight following the launch of ITV in 1955. A second television set was purchased and a second camera constructed to enable Cura to photograph both channels. Cura also enjoyed success with two best-selling books on improving television reception and correcting picture faults, which were illustrated with his tele-snaps. He also appeared on the BBC's television panel game show ''
What's My Line? ''What's My Line?'' is a panel game show that originally ran in the United States on the CBS Television Network from 1950 to 1967, originally in black and white and later in color, with subsequent U.S. revivals. The game uses celebrity panelis ...
''. Celebrity clients of the tele-snaps service included
Benny Hill Alfred Hawthorne "Benny" Hill (21 January 1924 – 20 April 1992) was an English comedian, actor, singer and writer. He is remembered for his television programme ''The Benny Hill Show'', an amalgam of slapstick, burlesque and double ente ...
and the
Beverley Sisters The Beverley Sisters ( MBE) were an English female close harmony pop vocal and light entertainment trio, consisting of three siblings from London. They were most popular during the 1950s and 1960s, and became well-known through their radio and ...
. By 1959, Cura claimed to have taken over 250,000 tele-snaps and that sets of his tele-snaps had been "presented to and graciously accepted by the Royal Family; Their Majesties the King of Denmark; the late
King of Norway The Norwegian monarch is the head of state of Norway, which is a constitutional and hereditary monarchy with a parliamentary system. The Norwegian monarchy can trace its line back to the reign of Harald Fairhair and the previous petty kingd ...
;
Queen Juliana of the Netherlands Juliana (; Juliana Louise Emma Marie Wilhelmina; 30 April 1909 – 20 March 2004) was Queen of the Netherlands from 1948 until her abdication in 1980. Juliana was the only child of Queen Wilhelmina and Prince Henry of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. S ...
; Ex-president Auriol of France; Earl Attlee; Sir
Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 during the Second World War, and again from ...
; Mr
Charles Chaplin Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin Jr. (16 April 188925 December 1977) was an English comic actor, filmmaker, and composer who rose to fame in the era of silent film. He became a worldwide icon through his screen persona, the Tramp, and is consid ...
; Mrs
Eleanor Roosevelt Anna Eleanor Roosevelt () (October 11, 1884November 7, 1962) was an American political figure, diplomat, and activist. She was the first lady of the United States from 1933 to 1945, during her husband President Franklin D. Roosevelt's four ...
" as well as a wide range of newspapers and periodicals. However, when Cura raised the prices for his service in 1964, the BBC ordered a review of the tele-snap service, which at this stage was costing them £1,300 per annum, and, with many programmes now routinely recorded on film or video, the business began to decline. John Cura continued to take tele-snaps right up within a few months of his death in 1969 from colon cancer. His widow offered her late husband's collection of tele-snaps to the BBC but was turned down. It is believed that they were subsequently destroyed. However, many copies of tele-snaps survive on broadcasters' production files and in the private collections of many of the artists and technicians whose work Cura photographed.


Cultural significance

In the early days of television, the means of making recordings of television programmes were limited and programmes were, in the main, transmitted live. This began to change as techniques for recording programmes onto film ( telerecording) and, later,
videotape Videotape is magnetic tape used for storing video and usually sound in addition. Information stored can be in the form of either an analog or digital signal. Videotape is used in both video tape recorders (VTRs) and, more commonly, videocasse ...
were developed in the 1950s. Even after the technology for recording programmes had become the norm, it was a common practice, due to a combination of the costs of storage and restrictions on broadcasting repeats, for UK broadcasters to wipe programmes after transmission. As a result, John Cura's tele-snaps are often the only surviving record of many lost programmes from the early years of television. Tele-snaps have been used to reconstruct lost television shows by marrying up the tele-snaps with audio recordings of missing shows to create a slide-show backed by the programme's soundtrack. Most notably, this technique has been employed, on an amateur, not-for-profit basis, by some enthusiasts of the British science fiction series '' Doctor Who'', which has nearly a hundred missing episodes. Some professional reconstructions using tele-snaps have also been created, including: * A brief (15-minute) reconstruction of episodes two and three of the ''Doctor Who'' serial ''
The Ice Warriors ''The Ice Warriors'' is the partly missing third serial of the fifth season of the British science fiction television series '' Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 11 November to 16 December 1967. In this serial, th ...
'' for its VHS videotape release in 1998. * A full reconstruction of the final episode of the ''Doctor Who'' serial ''
The Tenth Planet ''The Tenth Planet'' is the partly missing second serial of the fourth season in the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 8 to 29 October 1966. It was William Hartnell ...
'' for its VHS videotape release in 2000. * A full reconstruction of the ''Doctor Who'' serial ''
The Power of the Daleks ''The Power of the Daleks'' is the completely missing third serial of the fourth season of British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', and which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 5 November to 10 December 1966. It is ...
'' for the MP3 CD release of that story in 2005. This reconstruction was later included in the DVD release of an animated version of the serial in 2016. *Similar full reconstructions of all four episodes of ''
The Macra Terror ''The Macra Terror'' is the completely missing seventh serial of the fourth season in the British science fiction television series '' Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast in four weekly parts from 11 March to 1 April 1967. In this serial, ...
'', episodes 2,4,5 and 6 of ''
The Faceless Ones ''The Faceless Ones'' is the mostly missing eighth serial of the fourth season in the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 8 April to 13 May 1967. In this serial, the Sec ...
'', all six episodes of ''
Fury from the Deep ''Fury from the Deep'' is the completely missing sixth serial of the fifth season in the British science fiction television series '' Doctor Who'', which originally aired in six weekly parts from 16 March to 20 April 1968. In this serial, the D ...
'', episode 3 of ''
The Web of Fear ''The Web of Fear'' is the partly missing fifth serial of the fifth season of the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 3 February to 9 March 1968. The serial is set on the ...
'', all six episodes of ''
The Power of the Daleks ''The Power of the Daleks'' is the completely missing third serial of the fourth season of British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', and which was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 5 November to 10 December 1966. It is ...
'' and episodes 1 & 3-7 of ''
The Evil of the Daleks ''The Evil of the Daleks'' is the mostly-missing ninth and final serial of the fourth season in the British science fiction television series ''Doctor Who'', which originally aired in seven weekly parts from 20 May to 1 July 1967. In this seri ...
'' (with the surviving parts represented by the original episodes and surviving footage) have also been included in the subsequent DVD releases of the animated versions. * A condensed (30-minute) reconstruction of the seven-part ''Doctor Who'' serial '' Marco Polo'' for the DVD release, "The Beginning", in 2006. * A condensed reconstruction of the missing episodes of the 1961 science fiction serial '' A for Andromeda'' for its DVD release in 2006. Since at the time of release no soundtrack for the missing episodes of this serial exists, this reconstruction is backed by music used in the serial with on-screen captions employed to narrate the story. (the full soundtrack of the partially-existing episode 7 was subsequently recovered). * Narrated reconstructions of episodes from the first season of '' The Avengers'' have been included as extras on the Region 2 DVDs of the series released by Optimum.


Notes


References

* * {{cite web , url = https://copyrightliteracy.org/2022/06/28/snapshots-of-history-the-story-of-john-curas-tele-snaps-by-mark-lewisohn/ , title = John Cura: Snapshots of History , last = Lewisohn , first = Mark , work = Copyright Literacy Blog , access-date = 21 July 2022


External links


Photonovels of lost ''Doctor Who'' episodes using tele-snaps
at th
BBC
Television in the United Kingdom Photography by genre Television technology Television preservation * British inventions 1947 introductions 1947 establishments in the United Kingdom 1968 disestablishments in the United Kingdom