Material from the cutting room floor?

[JesterFace]

I wonder, might it somehow be possible to get our hands on material that was filmed back in the day but for some reason didn't end up in the final episode.

For example 'Night Terrors', it ran nearly 10 minutes too long, where's the material that got cut?

With 'The Measure of a Man' there's a longer version available these days, might this happen with other episodes too in the future?

It would be nice to watch episodes many of us know inside out but with a new scene or something.

 

[Tosk]

There's some deleted scenes on the Blu-rays.

 

[somebuddyX]

I don't think we'll ever see it. I don't think anyone's going to outlay cost and I don't think any of the creatives are going to go for new extended cuts. If I'm not mistaken the only reason "The Measure of a Man" got one is that it existed back when it finished production and Melinda Snodgrass had a copy so the Okudas used it as reference. I would love to see someone take the audio from "A Final Unity" and animate it.

 

[JesterFace]

Cutting room floor scraps go in the bin, right? They're gone.

With cutting room floor I meant deleted scenes. If those scenes are filmed, why throw them away.

 

[Pikirk_Janesisko]

With cutting room floor I meant deleted scenes. If those scenes are filmed, why throw them away.

It was quite common in the old days to destroy remaining material to gain more space on the shelves, simply because they didn't think that there was any use for it or they didn't want the public to watch. You'll be suprised at how many movies or TV shows don't have any material left available other than the master, sometimes not even that.

Considering the bonus material on Blu-Ray, I'm pretty sure TNG is archived.

 

[Takeru]

Considering the bonus material on Blu-Ray, I'm pretty sure TNG is archived.

We know for a fact it was archived, there's be no HD episodes in the first place of it wasn't.

 

[JesterFace]

It was quite common in the old days to destroy remaining material to gain more space on the shelves, simply because they didn't think that there was any use for it or they didn't want the public to watch. You'll be suprised at how many movies or TV shows don't have any material left available other than the master, sometimes not even that.

First one that came to mind; Doctor Who, apparently many older original episodes are gone.
Shelves, those must be quite rare in the world on television....

 

[Richard S. Ta]

First one that came to mind; Doctor Who, apparently many older original episodes are gone.
Shelves, those must be quite rare in the world on television....

I know you jest and I am a Doctor Who fan who laments the missing 97, but it’s less a case of having a shelf and more a case of having vast, temperature controlled buildings. Film needs to be stored in highly specific conditions or it can disintegrate entirely in what’s known as vinegar syndrome.

 

[Tosk]

Although simply taping over the only copy you have is very short-sighted.

 

[Therin of Andor]

TNG's "Shades of Gray" was the episode where unused trims from earlier TNG episodes could have been used to great effect. They were stimulating positive and negative memories in Riker's brain. There was a scene of Wesley's birthday party in an episode, but cut for time. Everyone is wearing party hats. Worf asks Beverly how old she is and she is unimpressed. She hands him a plate and says, "Have some cake, Worf." That would have been fun amongst the memories we had already seen.

First one that came to mind; Doctor Who, apparently many older original episodes are gone.
Shelves, those must be quite rare in the world on television....

Early videotape was hugely expensive, so b/w material that had been repeated several times already was suddenly considered reusable, especially when colour TV started arriving in UK and (in 1975) Australia, etc.

 

[Maurice]

Videotape was indeed expensive, and many shows were overwritten by newer programs. I was told that one reason Laugh-In still exists is because they actually cut the videotape so extensively it was effectively useless for re-recording.

 

[Qonundrum]

Although simply taping over the only copy you have is very short-sighted.

And the tapes were reused so often that original airings of edited material often had videotape artifacting (lines going across the screen, if not frame dropouts) - "The Tomb of the Cybermen" being one example of many where the film wasn't too bad, but the videotape it captured had problems.

But that was 1992. Fast forward to 2013 when "The Web of Fear" was recovered, the amount of restoration work was far more extensive due to the sheer amount of damage from the film negs (or were those print copies?) stored poorly. There's a detailed Radio Times article that shocked even me... I spent 15 Earth minutes trying to find it, to no avail and links to other articles from RT of the time redirect to the main site, so chances are the article won't be found in a decaying building 4.5 decades later, but here's what I did trip over:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/blog/2017-12-morecambe-wise-video-film-archive-restoration
https://doctorwhomagazine.com/news/the-enemy-of-the-world-the-web-of-fear-found/