Starship Farragut: The Animated Episodes Questions

[USS Intrepid]

Loving this. Really, nice job guys!

[Kail]

USS Intrepid wrote:

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Loving this. Really, nice job guys!

Masao wrote:

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I just D/L and watched part 1. I enjoyed it very much. Hats off to all the cast and crew on a job well done.

Thanks guys, and to everyone else with kind words.

[TigerOfDarkness]

It is a superb recreation of the TAS style ( even if there aren't loads of wrong color uniforms and other glitches ) - I really liked seeing the cartoon Faragut - especially the shot of it orbiting Saturn. The characters look great. The story is interesting and I look forward to downloading the next act. Congratulations!

[Admiral Buzzkill]

ProwlAlpha wrote:

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No, that line makes no sense. Of course they knew exactly where to hit them. Its another Starfleet vessel that fired on them, not some unknown vessel.

It makes all the sense it has to. It's simply a character's reaction to the precision with which the other ship fired on them; it's scarcely an expression of surprised astonishment either here or in TWOK.

As directed by Meyer and delivered by Nimoy, it's a great and effective line: terse, efficient but with an edge of alarm at the unexpected in the middle of a tactical disaster. Part of the ratcheting-up of the tension in that scene.

[NEO f/x]

Been getting a lot of e-mail about 'what's next'....Well, this week we will have a 'quiet period' until we release Act II. That act will be released NEXT WEEK. Not necessarily on Monday...but sometime next week. I have one more small animation I need from the artists.

Also, I would like to thank everyone that posted positive comments on TrekMovie. However, I wasn't just looking for postitives; I also appreciate the constructive criticisms we were given. I think everyone will see an improvement in Act 2 and 3 of this episode. Also, I have gone through the next episode, and feel the voice work is even better than this episode. We are going to spend a bit more time concentrating on that as we go forward.

[jamesmc]

Micheal,
Congrats to you and the gang on a job well done. Don't listen to the rants, keep doing what you do, because you love it. That is the only real reason to keep on doing these things.
Best,
James Cawley

[Kail]

jamesmc wrote:

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Micheal,
Congrats to you and the gang on a job well done. Don't listen to the rants, keep doing what you do, because you love it. That is the only real reason to keep on doing these things.
Best,
James Cawley

Thanks James Cawley! I admire what you do too.

[NEO f/x]

Ditto what Kail said...The ONLY reason I am doing this is because of what you started with the New Voyages. When I first stepped on your bridge a few years ago, I knew that I wanted to be a part of this in some way.

Thanks for the kind words!

[kitsune]

When the Azreal fires on the Farragut and escapes on heading 360 mark 0...isn't that the same as 0 mark 0

[Maurice]

kitsune wrote:

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When the Azreal fires on the Farragut and escapes on heading 360 mark 0...isn't that the same as 0 mark 0

Yep!

[NEO f/x]

I will have to ask the author why he chose that, but if it is indeed a mistake I can certainly have it rerecorded.

Update:

I spoke with the writer and it is indeed correct as he understands the 'heading system'. He points out two resources that go into detail of what the numbers mean. Suprisingly, 360 is not a complete circle in the Trek Universe.

Anyway, here are the resources:
http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Heading
http://www.fastcopyinc.com/orionpres..._in_star_t.htm

[Maurice]

NEO f/x wrote:

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I will have to ask the author why he chose that, but if it is indeed a mistake I can certainly have it rerecorded.

Update:

I spoke with the writer and it is indeed correct as he understands the 'heading system'. He points out two resources that go into detail of what the numbers mean. Suprisingly, 360 is not a complete circle in the Trek Universe.

Anyway, here are the resources:
http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Heading
http://www.fastcopyinc.com/orionpres..._in_star_t.htm

Actually, going by that memory alpha entry, there would only be 360 degrees, as they're using 180 as heading for the edge of the galaxy, so if the middle is 0, that's pretty much admitting it's a 360 degree system.

I just ignore the over 360 numbers as boo-boos on the level of Kirk's "one to the tenth power" gaffe.

And I know it's after TOS/TAS, but there's a very clear 360 degree system used in TWOK on the tactical display...

And I have photos of the astrogator from the TOS bridge at it's got 360 degree markings as well.

[Noname Given]

NEO f/x wrote:

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I will have to ask the author why he chose that, but if it is indeed a mistake I can certainly have it rerecorded.

Update:

I spoke with the writer and it is indeed correct as he understands the 'heading system'. He points out two resources that go into detail of what the numbers mean. Suprisingly, 360 is not a complete circle in the Trek Universe.

Anyway, here are the resources:
http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Heading
http://www.fastcopyinc.com/orionpres..._in_star_t.htm

In the third season of TOS many writers seemed to forget the 360 degrees is equivalen to a full circle. I KNOW what the author was probably going for, but I do wish you guys would not try to adhere so closely to the original TAS as there WAS a lot that could have and should have been done better; and I for one would love it if you guys kept the good and discarded the bad.

At least you guys haven't done the 'random background at wierd angles behind the character as he speaks' yet; and I honestly hope you never do.

Also, as someone who;s done and directed voice over, I would hope the VO director does a little more work with the Captain as sometmes he lacks energy and very occassionally sounded more lie he was reading a line then speaking it. VO acting is a bit different then 'regular' acting; but overall, I was impressed with a majority of the cast's work.

(And I hope you don't take any of the above as a 'swipe'; the work that's been done to date has been good, but I think there's always room for improvement if people are willing).

Looking forward to part II.

[Maurice]

Not a comment on the voice acting in this show per se, but some observations on voice acting in general.

In many ways voice work is harder than regular acting because everything has to be communicated through the voice, and that isn't just inflection. What a lot of people forget is that when you are moving around you get out of breath, and you talk differently. Moving also effects the way your voice sounds.

Orson Welles understood this. When he was rerecording dialog for the sleigh ride scenes in The Magnificent Ambersons he sat the actors on the end of a board and he sat on the other end and bounced them to get the correct shake in their voices.

I had the rare privilege of directing a bunch of name voice actors for a video game around xmas 2000, including Jim Cummings, Billy West, and Janet Waldo, and it was interesting to see how often they would stand and ACT as opposed to just sitting on a stool and read their lines.

In fact, and a worthwhile story to tell, initially Janet Waldo was having problems getting the voice of Penelope Pitstop right (a role she originated). The line was simply "Bye, y'all!" but it didn't sound right. At first we worried she couldn't do the voice any more after 30 years, but, finally, I told her from the booth, "Janet, you're not saying, 'bye bye', you're actually saying 'eat my dust' as you blast by them." Well, on the very next take she swung her arm in a dismissive wave and called out, "Bye, y'all!" in exactly the right way. The voice was there! The voice came back precisely because she was ACTING and not READING.

[NEO f/x]

Noname Given wrote:

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In the third season of TOS many writers seemed to forget the 360 degrees is equivalen to a full circle. I KNOW what the author was probably going for, but I do wish you guys would not try to adhere so closely to the original TAS as there WAS a lot that could have and should have been done better; and I for one would love it if you guys kept the good and discarded the bad.

At least you guys haven't done the 'random background at wierd angles behind the character as he speaks' yet; and I honestly hope you never do.

Also, as someone who;s done and directed voice over, I would hope the VO director does a little more work with the Captain as sometmes he lacks energy and very occassionally sounded more lie he was reading a line then speaking it. VO acting is a bit different then 'regular' acting; but overall, I was impressed with a majority of the cast's work.

(And I hope you don't take any of the above as a 'swipe'; the work that's been done to date has been good, but I think there's always room for improvement if people are willing).

Looking forward to part II.

The author wasn't actually attempting to put a 'mistake' into the production...the references he had and which he believed were 'correct' justified the line. I think in this case since there is documentation to go either way on this I will stay out of it...

As for 'visually' putting in mistakes, I won't do that either (for the most part). The one thing that was apparent from the original Filmation stuff was that people were not working on this in a linear fashion. For example, if someone was working on Kirk in the conference room with a blue wall, someone else might be working on a different angle with a green wall. Since we have a smaller team putting this together (and that it is digital), any 'errors' that pop up can be corrected without wasting 'film'. There are 'little' things I have done to make sure we are consistent within a certain realm. To do this right would mean starting from scratch and having a defined color scheme for not only the characters (which we have), but for the backgrounds (not so much...we reprovision many TAS backgrounds). The 'scope' of this is like finding a cave in 2009 of the original Filmation artists and cels and saying 'let's make a spinoff of Star Trek...similar ship, different crew". With this being the digital age, we have a lot of advanatages, but still want to maintain that same look.

And yeah...we have had a few comments about the voice work. I think my choice of releasing only the first act compounded that issue; since people couldn't really concentrate on the whole story they instead focused on the captain's voice. This is not to say he is doing a fantastic job...he admits there is always room for improvement. I think the standing recommendation and simply 'acting' the lines instead of just reading them will go a long way to improving this. Will it be perfect...no. He is a VP of some government contractor...not a voice actor. But I would expect as the full episode is released and the next one, we will see people looking at this as a whole and finding a bit of 'charm' in it.