Turpin began his career in 1945 at Ealing Studios as a camera assistant to Douglas Slocombe and Stanley Pavey.
For his first collaboration with Bryan Forbes, Seance on a Wet Afternoon (1964), he received a nomination at the British Academy Film Awards in 1965.
What a Lovely War (1969), Richard Attenborough's directorial debut, he received the 1969 BSC Best Cinematography Award[1] and his second BAFTA.
On Attenborough's, Young Winston (1972), Turpin used a camera lens mounted device he had developed called ColorFlex which represented an alternative to conventional pre-exposure (flashing) of negative film in the lab.
From 1973, Turpin developed his ColorFlex system into a comprehensive system called Lightflex which was used by cameramen such as Oswald Morris (The Wiz, 1978), Freddie Francis (Dune, 1984), Sven Nykvist (Swann in Love, 1984), Adam Greenberg (La Bamba, 1987) and Jost Vacano (Total Recall, 1990).