THIS SITE is dedicated to my late grandfather, William Creighton, who worked for many years in the movie industry as a carpenter and model-maker. Initially working on the Clyde shipyards, he was involved in the construction of some of the great ocean liners like the Empress of Britain. During the Second World War, he worked for the Crown Film Unit, and subsequently at Pinewood Studios for many years.

The photographs on this page were rediscovered after lying in storage for almost twenty years after my grandfather's death. Many are unique, in that they were not official publicity photographs, but rather a personal record of his work, both at Pinewood itself and on location all over the world. The original version of this site went online in 1997, with a limited number of pictures available. In 2009, with access to much better equipment, every original picture has been rescanned along with the remaining archive.

CAN YOU HELP? Please have a look at our unidentified photos page, and contact us if you have any information about any of these pictures - thank you! Identification of much of the material is quite difficult, as it relies mainly on what my father can remember! Most of the photographs are not annotated in any way, and identification of some of the locations has proved tricky. Thank you to everyone who has helped us so far!

The site is now organised into themed pages, based around studios and also on major works such as Battle of Britain and James Bond. Please use the links at the top of each page to navigate.

My grandfather at work, possibly on a
Battle of Britain cockpit mockup
Click for larger image

• contact AT shipofdreams DOT me DOT uk
• Usage policy

• Crown Film Unit - Target for Tonight, Journey Together, Western Approaches
• Pinewood Studios - Green for Danger, Appointment with Venus, The Beachcomber, All for Mary & more
• James Bond - Thunderball and Goldfinger, plus possible From Russia With Love
• Battle of Britain - construction photos of the various model aircraft
• Malta Story - production photos & more
• Unidentified photos - from miscellaneous productions potentially 1940s to 1960s - maybe you can help!

Usage policy: All original photos on this site (those marked with a copyright symbol of shipofdreams.me.uk) are part of a private collection previously belonging to William Creighton. Please do not use the photos elsewhere unless you have obtained prior explicit permission from the site owner, thank you. Other photos belonging to individuals who have consented to their use on this site are also marked as such, please do not use these elsewhere without their prior explicit permission. Please note we do NOT accept requests for commercial for-profit usage of photos from this site. Requests for charitable fundraising usage will be considered and may be granted at the site owner's discretion. We continue to welcome usage requests from fan-run not-for-profit websites, thank you.

All original photos, graphics & code © shipofdreams 1997 - 2018 no unauthorised reproduction.
All copyrights and trademarks are implied and acknowledged.
This site uses CSS and should degrade legibly for non-CSS compliant browsers.
Last update April 2nd 2018.