Color separation overlay. The video equivalent of bluescreen/greenscreen mattes, for superimposing actors onto miniature sets or against matte paintings, that sort of thing.
CSO was the very first thing i learned about on Dr Who from Blue Peter here in the UK back in the day, they knew how to educate us all back in the 70s on the important stuff like the techinical behind the scenes aspects of a TV show, and how to make a 4 bedroom semi detached from some old news papers, empty washing up bottle and a coat hanger. lol
If I remember correctly, Barry Letts was a very early proponent of CSO at the BBC and kind of pushed its usage.
Yes, he loved using new technologies. A particular example is Terror of the Autons, which extensively used CSO even for things like Mrs Farrell's kitchen. They don't always work. One of the cool things when Enemy of the World was recovered was seeing his direction. There's a few scenes that use rear projection in a similar way to how he would later use CSO.
Watched The Pirate Planet. I'm indirectly watching the Key of Time series eps every so often instead of all together. My god, Mary Tamm was beautiful. Baker must have been delighted when she left- she really does steal his air. And she was a great actor too. She could have easily carried her own spinoff series. I thought the use of trailered speedboats as "aircars" was kind of hilarious. The Captain was a bit OTT, but not too much. Liked that he ended up a pawn in a bigger game. The fact the Pirates needed to go to Earth for the material they needed was a bit Small Universe Syndrome. They should have made it Pelodon, or some other friendly world we've seen before. That would have been jeopardy enough. Eps like this demonstrate why K9 needed to go- he's just a bit TOO useful and it looks dumb to keep having him run low on power every time you need the stars to be in danger.
They were using a black-and-white form of CSO from very early on, though. It was used in the Troughton title sequence to do the wipe effect from the Doctor's face to the show title, by rotating a rough block of styrofoam that was crosslit with heavy shadows, so that you had an irregular transition from black to white (or vice-versa) with different images chromakeyed into the black part and the white part. I think they used the same technique for some early matte shots in the Hartnell era.
Inlay. Worked out how to use it at the uni tv station in the late 80s. Basically, you pointed a camera at a b&w board to insert pictures from source two into source one. Best use was done by Andrew, an interviewee swivelled in his chair, leaving a lot of blank wall in the shot. A picture of the place he was talking about was put onto the wall.
Thanks for the answers about CSO, I'm familiar with those kind of effects, I've just never heard that term before.
When I hear "CSO," my first thought is "Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra." Context is everything, to quote my father (who often dealt with the CSO in his work as a Cincinnati classical radio host).
Planet Of Fire. Still have to listen to the commentary, and I suppose I'll have to watch the re-edited version at least once.
The Stones of Blood- A soso Key of Time ep. Very strange in that, during ep 3, it changes into a kind of courtroom drama. As soon as the action moves onto the hyperspace ship, it literally becomes a different story. Pretty clever how a flat made up like a rock being pushed around the set actually DOES seem threatening because of good sound effects.
^^Yeah they did a good job in making those stones look very threatening, the bits were they crash through windows and doors was always good, and like the daemons another occult type episode full of sacrifice and people in robes with werid looking daggers, but thankfully these type of stories never seems to have affected us back in the day, no doubt because our lord and master beelzebub has protected us from it until the day he returns to claim this world and make all the unbelievers pay for their treachery. lol
Mark Of The Rani for our weekly Master story last night. I've got the re-edited movie version of Planet Of Fire on now, never having seen this version. Mostly the changes seem to be a new pre-credit, some new glows, and a smoky filter over everything.
The earliest definite use of inlay I can spot is in The Dead Planet, compositing the TARDIS crew on one side and the model shot of the Dalek city on the other.