Jack Kine

Last updated 09 January 2020

Jack Kine

Born: Tuesday 20th September 1921
Died: Friday 14th January 2005 (age: 83)



Jack Kine was a visual effects designer for the 1968 Doctor Who television story The Mind Robber. He was also seen, uncredited, as "the Leader" in the second episode of Inferno.

Kline was the co-founder in 1954 of the BBC Visual Effects Department along with Bernard Wilkie, he worked on many landmark productions, inventing techniques that stood the burgeoning industry in good stead for decades to come. 

Their baptism of fire was 'Running Wild' with Morecambe and Wise in 1954, quickly followed by Rudolph Cartier's epic production '1984'. They learnt fast and quickly: on 'Quatermass II' (1955) the amorphous monster was hurriedly put together after Cartier finished one morning session with the announcement that "after lunch we shoot the creature". 

Although shows were predominantly live, some pre-filming was allowed for 'Quatermass and the Pit' (1958/59), for which Kine designed the hideously plausible Martian creatures. 

Their remit covered every genre including comedy (Dad's Army, Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em), drama (Z-Cars, Maigret) and education (Blue Peter and Tomorrow's World). They weren't backroom boffins, but an integral part of the studio team, establishing a rapport with cast and crew alike. 

The television Visual Effects Department became the biggest of its kind in the world, with a bevy of talented designers blowing things up with aplomb. BBC bureaucracy would not allow joint heads of department, so Kine became the titular chief, assuming a more administrative role, whilst Wilkie continued on the workshop floor. 

Kine worked on the realisation of the original TARDIS as well as the Daleks.