Bafta award-winning actor Chris Langham has said that he thought he would be "admired" after downloading child porn images as research for a television role.

Chris Langham was sent to prison for 10-months in 2007 after being found guilty of 15 accounts of downloading child pornography, but insisted he downloaded and viewed the videos as research for his role as a paedophile character he was developing for the BBC Two drama "Help."

He told a newspaper that the trial had left him "quite unhinged" but also insisted that "nothing in my life has ever gone wrong."

The actor, who won a Bafta for his role in the BBC drama The Thick Of It, said: "I knew it was illegal. It was just hubristic and arrogant of me to think I'm above the law because I'm an artist.

"I thought after (I'd played the character) I'll reveal I'd researched it and people would say 'Gosh, you've taken this really difficult subject and done something amazing.' I'll do this thing and everyone will think I'm wonderful.

"I thought if I pulled it off, everyone would admire me. And I'm a slut for approval."

The actor is due to appear in a new low-budget British film Black Pond, which premieres at the London Raindance film festival on 2/3 October, and is released at selected cinemas on 11 November.

London