At the ashram, Ringo Starr gave his 16mm camera to Saltzman, along with 100ft (30m) of film, so he could shoot some footage of the band and keep it for himself, telling him it "could be worth some money". The three minutes of footage which Saltzman shot and took home was lost and never found.
"I actually never thought I would do much with the pictures and footage then. I tried to get The Beatles interested in a project for 12 years, but they never responded and I gave up," Saltzman says.
At the ashram, surrounded by woods full of monkeys and birdsong, much of the White Album , the band's only double album, and one which divided the critics, was born.
Saltzman reckons the band wrote between 30 and 48 songs, many of which made their way to the new record: Back in the USSR, Happiness is a Warm Gun, Dear Prudence, Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da, Sexy Sadie, Helter Skelter and Revolution, among others.
Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da was born on the steps of one of the low slung cottages where the entourage lived.
One day, remembers Saltzman, he was passing by the cottage when he saw Lennon and McCartney sitting on the front steps and strumming the tune on their acoustic guitars.
He ran back, picked up the camera and took pictures of the two with a pensive-looking Starr sitting on the side, from outside a wicket gate.
Saltzman remembers the two were singing the first two lines of the song "over and over again, going fast and slow, having fun". "That's the riff we have," McCartney told Saltzman, "but no words yet".
