FX/editing wishlist/technical/related discussion for STNG-R

[YARN]

Squiggy wrote:

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Then don't buy it.

Do we have confirmation that TNG-R is even happening?

From what I've heard this will be a real mess compared to TOS-R.

The finished eps are on video which lacks the resolution of film. Who knows where are the original bits of film are housed. Suppose you are missing 10 minutes of film from an episode. What do you do?

[CaptainStoner]

YARN wrote:

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Do we have confirmation that TNG-R is even happening?

From what I've heard this will be a real mess compared to TOS-R.

The finished eps are on video which lacks the resolution of film. Who knows where are the original bits of film are housed. Suppose you are missing 10 minutes of film from an episode. What do you do?

Legend has it that the original film elements were stored properly, but then again that might mean Rick Berman's attic.
In my fantasy, we get to go back, clean up the film, and completely re-edit and post-process everything in 16:9 1080p, even if it's just a collection of episodes rather than the whole series. BoBW turned into a full theatrical film essentially.

[Harvey]

I'm sure Paramount stored the original film elements properly. They knew the cash-cow possibilities of Star Trek by 1987, and they'd want to preserve that material for future use.

[Mark 2000]

Becareful what you wish for, guys. TOS-R is a disaster in my book. None of the CG show have any weight. The ships move in really bizarre ways. The lighting is horrendous. For some reason nobody wanted any highlights or contrast in the whole show - its all mid tones and shadows - very muddy. I'll give them the on set stuff like matte paintings. Those were very well done. But anything is space was crap.

That being said, my biggest wish for TNG-R would be scaling the BOP back down to its original size all the way through. Seeing that model as the same size as the E-D always made me groan.

[BillJ]

Poopday Machine wrote:

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Becareful what you wish for, guys. TOS-R is a disaster in my book.

I don't think it was a disaster. But there was a lot of it that was very underwhelming.

[Harvey]

I was never blown away by the ship shots in TOS-R, but it's been a few years since the project was done, so hopefully a TNG-R project would show improvement in that area. In any event, TOS-R had a great eye for fixing minor details and matte paintings, changes that will improve TNG immensely.

And, hopefully, just like with TOS, a new Blu-Ray set will include both versions of the episodes.

[Mark 2000]

@Harvey, I don't think a TNG-R would fare better than the TOS one with time. TOS-R was done quickly, on the cheap, and was led by someone who had never directed SFX shots before. Bless Mike Okuda for bringing so much to Trek, but he's not a director and TOS-R proves it. If you look at Elaan of Troyius, which was done toward the end, you see that there was no growth in technique. It was possibly even worse than previously done episodes.

[YARN]

Harvey wrote:

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I'm sure Paramount stored the original film elements properly. They knew the cash-cow possibilities of Star Trek by 1987, and they'd want to preserve that material for future use.

Dare to dream...

[Harvey]

I doubt it's a dream. You don't let the future profits of one of your studio's most lucrative properties degrade due to negligence.

Poopday Machine wrote:

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@Harvey, I don't think a TNG-R would fare better than the TOS one with time. TOS-R was done quickly, on the cheap, and was led by someone who had never directed SFX shots before. Bless Mike Okuda for bringing so much to Trek, but he's not a director and TOS-R proves it. If you look at Elaan of Troyius, which was done toward the end, you see that there was no growth in technique. It was possibly even worse than previously done episodes.

On the contrary, I think that, especially in terms of lighting and the improved 3D model of the Enterprise, the effects did improve over time.

[Mark 2000]

Harvey wrote:

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On the contrary, I think that, especially in terms of lighting and the improved 3D model of the Enterprise, the effects did improve over time.

You're thinking about when they went to the lower rez model near the very beginning. Things like the engine tips improved, but the lighting got darker and the ship still moved really badly.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NdKGl...C907184AFC37C9

Everything is too dark. Highlights are midtones. There's some really odd camera moves, like when the E passes by and then the camera pans over to see the klingon pass by behind her. The Klingon ship looks like a video game render. There's a lot of strange shots of it off center, cutting off the top of the ship against the top of the screen. And, of course, there is the really unbelievable last second maneuver of the Klingon ship behind the E where it suddenly turns off abruptly and not even on its center of gravity.

It's as if they aren't even trying. And, unless the animators were first year trade school graduates, I doubt they would allow things to look this terrible without a bad director breathing down their necks and insisting it look this way.

[Warped9]

^^ Man, does that look shitty! And the Klingon disrupters look like a video game. The whole thing looks like a video cheesy game.

[CoveTom]

CaptainStoner wrote:

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In my fantasy, we get to go back, clean up the film, and completely re-edit and post-process everything in 16:9 1080p...

No. No, no, no. Do not re-format TNG to 16:9.

The directors and cinematographers working on TNG constructed their shots for a 4:3 aspect ratio. If you want to take it to 16:9, you can only do that in one of two ways -- either you chop off some of the top and bottom of each scene or you include things outside the original border of the frame that were never meant to be included in the shot. Either way, you totally change the director's construction of the scene.

To me, doing TNG in 16:9 would be no different than taking a feature film and doing it pan-and-scan. Both destroy the original image and both are unacceptable.

[Harvey]

Yeah, there's no way I'd buy TNG Blu-Rays that were cropped to widescreen. That's a dealbreaker.

[Skywalker]

Agreed. 16:9 is not always automatically better. Whatever aspect ratio in which the film (or show) was shot is always the correct one.

[YARN]

Harvey wrote:

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I doubt it's a dream. You don't let the future profits of one of your studio's most lucrative properties degrade due to negligence.

First of all, respectfully, LOL.

Second, your supporting statement in your original post is only half right. Yes, "They knew the cash-cow possibilities of Star Trek by 1987." Then again, they also knew apparent cash cows sometimes turn into money pits. As for, "they'd want to preserve that material for future use" you are ascribing predictive powers to these people which goes well beyond what they could have been expected to anticipate at the time. When TNG was on the air the post-series game plan was syndication, spin-off series, merchandising, video sales, and movies. At the time, 480p was the standard and these episodes were created for televisions of the time. From their point of view, the final episodes (which were edited on video) were the finished product - and they were right; they were and still are the finished product. Their main concern would have been to preserve the video, which they did.

It is ridiculous to assume that they did or should have known that they would need to preserve ALL of the original film elements of the show so that twenty years later they could be reprocessed, reedited, and given new FX shots to meet a standard which did not exist at the time.