Visual Proof a Resdesign is a good thing

[M'Sharak]

Cary L. Brown wrote:

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M'Sharak... shall we do a count... of every insulting or hostile post ST-One has made in this thread, and then one of mine?

No, we shall not. The thread has been disrupted enough as it is. Anything further you feel needs to be covered can be done via PM.

Cary L. Brown wrote:

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(One thing I liked about the old BBS software was the fact that there was a way to "ignore" people who you didn't want to read. I'm not aware of any way of doing that in software. Shame, that... )

3D Master has provided instructions, though you could just as easily have worked it out yourself by consulting the appropriate section in the FAQ.

Again, discuss the topic, or don't discuss it -- that I leave up to you -- but the squabbling stops here.

[Vektor]

My attempt at visual proof that [radical] redesign is not always necessary:









Your milage may vary.

[Gep Malakai]

^That looks A. very cool, and B. still very 1960s. I doubt modern studio execs would go for it, even if such a design were presented to them.

[JuanBolio]

Gep Malakai wrote:

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^That looks A. very cool, and B. still very 1960s. I doubt modern studio execs would go for it, even if such a design were presented to them.

Looks like a beautiful and functional starship, to me. Does it have to transform into a giant robot to look "modern", or what?

[Herkimer Jitty]

No, it needs neons everywhere, everything graceful has to be made to be made compeltely of straight lines, break up the hull with random patterns, the gaps of which you could fit an SUV into, kitbash some battleship parts, cut out parts of the hull and stick em in, then paint random triangle patterns all over it. And don't forget the random antenna clusters.

Giant robot transformation is for the sequel.

It would be... so... beautiful.

[Jimmy_C]

Cary L. Brown wrote:

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Well, that could apply to the basic "deck plating," sure. You'd be defining "deck plating" as a form of wave-guide that would channel gravity and cause it to flow as desired. Sort of like how the deflector "grid" on the hull isn't what creates the shielding (that's the "shield generators") but it IS what causes the shielding to be distributed evenly over the hull.

However, there's on-screen evidence that's worth considering regarding the lifts. We know how big the ship is, and we see, several times, the lifts moving from inside, yet the passengers aren't being jarred and jolted when the lift starts, stops, changes directions, etc, etc. The explanation, in-universe, is that the lift cars each have their own internal gravitation and acceleration-compensation fields.

If this weren't the case, the people in the cars would have to lean from side to side when the car shifted direction, have to "lift up" or "scrunch down" or whatever... they'd have to react to acceleration forces. They don't... so there is none as far as they're concerned, inside... right? You've been in elevators which move MUCH more slowly... or been in airport shuttle-buses where you'd have to stand. You know what I'm talking about, don't you?

SO... if there was gravity in the shafts... you'd then need to have antigravity on each car to move the car... and then another internal gravity system inside. THREE systems present, with two serving no purpose but to cancel each other out, and only one serving any useful purpose.

We all know why the stuff was presented as it was in TNG and in ST-V. It was being written about by people who were thoroughly grounded in "earthborne" mindsets... and HERE, elevator shafts are dangerous things you can fall down. They just didn't think things through on a practical level for a spaceship.

FYI... another thing I'd do if I were going back to 1964/65... I'd make the little ladderways also be "zero-g." You wouldn't have to do anything with them very often, but just a few "wire" sequences in those little zero-G ladder alcoves would've sold the "they're in space" idea very effectively, I think.

Also note that each deck is literally right beside the walls of the turboshaft. I wouldn't be surprised if gravity could "leak" out of them, accelerating the turbolift as well as Jean-luc and the kids near the walls. The vector wouldn't be constant, but its magnitude would be about constant as well as a general "down" direction (as well as a slight nonlinear component towards the floor of each deck).

Ya I'm rationalizing.... but it's just based on evidence from the show. I know the writers didn't consider this model, but I think it fits the observations better. :-D

[Gep Malakai]

JuanBolio wrote:

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Looks like a beautiful and functional starship, to me. Does it have to transform into a giant robot to look "modern", or what?

Hey, I said it looks cool. What more do you want?

[RedSpar]

Simply stunning Vecktor! Great lighting!

Some designs are simply timeless...Designs you simply can't make any better...

-Ferrari GTB 275

-Supermarine Spitfire/P51 Mustang

-Eiffel Tower

-Ford GT40

etc, etc...

The original Starship Enterprise is one of them. Iconic classic in every sense.

[Patrickivan]

I love how you've taked that beautiful ship and added all that detail. For a-far, it's clean and elegant, but when we get in super close, that's when all the detail shines! I love it! That is how it is supposed to be, and that's the kind of detail that makes her look so huge!

[Admiral Buzzkill]

I like it a lot, but of course it's not what we're getting.

[Cary L. Brown]

Herkimer Jitty wrote:

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No, it needs neons everywhere, everything graceful has to be made to be made compeltely of straight lines, break up the hull with random patterns, the gaps of which you could fit an SUV into, kitbash some battleship parts, cut out parts of the hull and stick em in, then paint random triangle patterns all over it. And don't forget the random antenna clusters.

Giant robot transformation is for the sequel.

It would be... so... beautiful.

What more can anyone add to that... it's sooo PERFECT.

But don't forget the flapping wings! Those are CRUCIAL!

[Cary L. Brown]

Patrickivan wrote:

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I love how you've taked that beautiful ship and added all that detail. For a-far, it's clean and elegant, but when we get in super close, that's when all the detail shines! I love it! That is how it is supposed to be, and that's the kind of detail that makes her look so huge!

Absolutely... and that's what I've always meant when I've said that the DESIGN works fine, but it could be presented with an additional level of "polish" which we could just assume never showed upon on our 1960's TV screens. Sort of like you were always watching the show without glasses and now you're wearing your proper prescription for the first time.

The design works fine. The problem is that there are people who've got a mental association of that as being related to an earlier time (even though, as far as I can see, there are no actual physical features that do so, just the "recognition factor" and the psychological connection)

These same people tend to have the same emotional/psychological connection to the styles used in more recent (not I'm not necessarily saying "more modern," just "more RECENT") shows. Lots of primary-color glowing, lots of "graphic arts" detailing without any evident logic behind it, lots of mechanically-impractical (or even mechanically harmful) "notches" and so forth... lots of exposed external hardware... etc, etc.

Now, it's interesting that (as much as I prefer the design style of the original), the new BSG series is actually much closer to TOS trek style than to more recent style in at least one MAJOR area. In the new series, everything on the ship is behind hull panels... in "shirt-sleeve maintenance" environments, not in a vacuum. The detail you see on the main ship is all based upon heavy armor plating, or upon structural "ribbing" which would, ordinarily, have been beneath that armor. Which is very much in line with MJ's original design intent for the 1701. But is NOT the "modern" look which so many people seem to want to see, with lots of exposed plumbing and so forth (which, for the record, is no more "modern" than the MJ approach... after all, that style mainly dates back to "2001," doesn't it?).

We really have five models for spaceship design.

1) The "real space program" model... base things off of existing technology or technological trends.

2) The "naval" model... which is what TOS Trek used.

3) The "space trucker" model... used in Alien, as well as in the Star Wars films, and which is the only way to describe Serenity. Visually cool to look at, and it feels "real" (since it reflects stuff we're all already familiar with) but not necessarily logical or practical.

4) The "freakily cool" model... stuff that has no connection to any sense of logic we're supposed to be able to grasp. This would be stuff like the Shadows or Vorlons on B5, or Moya, or so forth. This works, depending on the situation... but it's only workable in very specific sorts of scenarios.

5) The "graphic arts" model... this is similar to the above #4, in that there's no connection to logic or function which we're supposed to grasp, and the shapes and structures and so forth are there purely because they "look cool." But while #4 works... it's supposed to tell the audience "this is beyond anything you can understand, so don't even try"... for something like Trek that's not really something you want, is it?

I'm a huge proponent of the "naval model" for Trek. But in recent years, Trek has moved away from that and moved into the final category from above.

It's the "naval model" which is getting described as "old-style" and the "graphic arts model" which is getting described as "modern." But neither is more or less "modern" than the other, and both have been in use for ages.

It's worth pointing out that the ancient "Flash Gordon" serial ship designs (Buster Crabbe, not the more "modern" takes) have more in common with the "graphic arts" approach which is currently being billed as "modern" than with the supposedly "old fashioned" naval model.

[Vektor]

Starship Polaris wrote:

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I like it a lot, but of course it's not what we're getting.

No, it’s not what we’re getting, but I hold out hope that what we’re getting may be a lot closer to the original than most people think.

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Vektor wrote:

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No, it’s not what we’re getting, but I hold out hope that what we’re getting may be a lot closer to the original than most people think.

That would be nice. I think the only way that it might be possible, though, is if there's more than one version of the ship in the film.

[Cary L. Brown]

Starship Polaris wrote:

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That would be nice. I think the only way that it might be possible, though, is if there's more than one version of the ship in the film.

Well, we DO know that the film will, at the very least, be set in multiple timeframes. And if it really is about "altering the timeline" (blech, IMHO), well... we could have dramatically different versions of "the" Enterprise in the same movie.

It's not unreasonable to assume that the ship we saw in the trailer might be the ship as it's intended to be seen in the film... but it's also not unreasonable to assume that it might have been put together specifically for the trailer.

Do we know, for a fact, that the same people doing the FX for the movie did the trailer? Or could this trailer have been "subcontracted?" Happens all the time in other fields... and we see plenty of FX houses doing work even on a single film. So is it possible that what we saw there is "studio A's" take on a sequence which will never even appear on-film, while "studio B" is doing the stuff which we'll see on-screen?