Good news for the Enterprise!

[Warped9]

Good news for the Enterprise: http://blog.nasm.si.edu/behind-the-.../?hootPostID=d1dfd381df15a7db0385691899406988

Gary Kerr, Doug Drexler, Andrew Probert and Rick Sternbach.

I'm happy.

 

[Maurice]

Some good sources ther, but not all of those people are experts on the original ship.

 

[Melakon]

Gary Kerr, Doug Drexler, Andrew Probert and Rick Sternbach.

Mike and Denise Okuda also on the panel.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

I'm surprised Greg Jein isn't a panel member. He built the 5.5-foot Enterprise seen in DS9 "Trials and Tibble-ations." He had to develop considerable expertise to do that. The Okudas are better known as authors of the Star Trek Encyclopedia and Chronology, two excellent books but not relevant to model restoration.

 

[BeatleJWOL]

Some good sources ther, but not all of those people are experts on the original ship.

Who's still left that is?

 

[Warped9]

I don't think there is anyone left around who was there and involved when the model was built. Oh, sure there are the remaining main cast and some others, but they would have no expertise regarding the model. So the most essential ones to have on hand would be those well versed in researching TOS and more particularly those most knowledgeable regarding the model.

I think Gary Kerr is at the top of that list because I don't think anyone has researched the 11 footer more than he has. Andrew Probert was involved in redesigning the ship for TMP (and Rick Sternbach as well but I'm not sure.) So he might have had access to original construction drawings and the 11 footer before undertaking the redesign. Yes, Greg Jein did recreate the miniature for DS9, but I believe there were differences between his model and the original although I don't know if those differences were intentional or production compromises.

Doug Drexler has certainly been involved in recreating the model onscreen and his most recent work creating a model of the ship for Star Trek Continues shows he's well aware what the model originally looked like.

 

[Christopher]

The Okudas are better known as authors of the Star Trek Encyclopedia and Chronology, two excellent books but not relevant to model restoration.

They were also consultants on TOS Remastered, which did involve recreating the appearance of the original miniature, both the pilot and production versions.

I don't think there is anyone left around who was there and involved when the model was built. Oh, sure there are the remaining main cast and some others, but they would have no expertise regarding the model. So the most essential ones to have on hand would be those well versed in researching TOS and more particularly those most knowledgeable regarding the model.

Well, Howard A. Anderson, Jr. and Darrell Anderson are still alive, though they're 94 and 81 respectively. They might be worth consulting, but there's no telling how much they remember.

Andrew Probert was involved in redesigning the ship for TMP (and Rick Sternbach as well but I'm not sure.)

IIRC, Rick only worked on interiors and equipment for TMP, not the ship miniature.

Doug Drexler has certainly been involved in recreating the model onscreen and his most recent work creating a model of the ship for Star Trek Continues shows he's well aware what the model originally looked like.

Doug has also worked on a number of restoration projects of his own, including a recent restoration of Uncle Martin's ship from My Favorite Martian.

 

[Warped9]

Doug Drexler has certainly been involved in recreating the model onscreen and his most recent work creating a model of the ship for Star Trek Continues shows he's well aware what the model originally looked like.

Doug has also worked on a number of restoration projects of his own, including a recent restoration of Uncle Martin's ship from My Favorite Martian.

Something much more obscure than the 11 ft. TOS E.

 

[Christopher]

I've been reading Memory Alpha's article on the studio models for NCC-1701, and it says that Gary Kerr was present for part of the previous (Miarecki) restoration and took extensive photos and measurements of the miniature during its initial disassembly. So he may be the best-qualified expert on the state of the miniature before that restoration (its third). Kerr later used his measurements to create the blueprints for Jein's "Tribble-ations" model, and the measurements were also the basis for the digital models used in TOS-R and "In a Mirror, Darkly."

 

[Richard Baker]

Gary Kerr was also instrumental in the creation of the 1/350 scale model kit from Round 2- the most accurate kit ever made of this subject.

 

[Warped9]

Gary Kerr was also instrumental in the creation of the 1/350 scale model kit from Round 2- the most accurate kit ever made of this subject.

And the engraved gridlines on the model were not Gary Kerr's call, but Round2's Jamie Hood (I believe).

 

[Ryan Thomas Riddle]

Speaking of the restoration, Trekcore has a new, exclusive interview Dr. Margaret Weitekamp, the lead conservator on the project:

http://trekcore.com/blog/2014/12/smithsonian-enterprise-update/

 

[Christopher]

Those new x-rays they took sound really interesting. It sounds like they expect to release them in a few months.

 

[Ronald Held]

With no one, or almost no one who originally worked on it still available for consulting, how do you weight the advice of those available?

 

[ALF]

Some good news for a change - I'll take it.
The Brady Bunch photo is great. Lots of Star Trek All-Stars. Loved the close up photo of the traction cracking too, such detail of a legendary artifact.

 

[Maurice]

FWIW I just pinged Rick Sternbach to mention Shaw's studies and analysis of the models and the plans and how the 11 footer deviates from those plans, as I think that's possibly valuable information.

As to the TOS ship, I believe Richard Taylor and Andy Probert worked primarily from Jefferies' Star Trek (Phase) II model design, not any materials from the original construction.

 

[Christopher]

With no one, or almost no one who originally worked on it still available for consulting, how do you weight the advice of those available?

The same way they weigh expert advice in the restoration of art and antiquities from centuries ago. This is what museums do. If anything, they're better off because these experts are closer to the source than an expert on, say, the Sistine Chapel or the Liberty Bell would be.

 

[Jeyl]

The charm of the Enterprise design is that it instantly looks like it wouldn't do well in gravity. It looks like something that needs to float in a weightless environment.

If there are any reservations or concerns about this project, know that the people who are actually controlling the Star Trek franchise right now would probably put the Enterprise in a tank full of fish and water.

 

[plynch]

From the interview with the curator:
"We really are thinking of this as conservation of – as of this week – a fifty-year old object."

This does not say to me, restoration to someone's (preferably mine ) version of what it looked like in 1966. This is what I would like, though I am aware in person looked different from onscreen on an RCA 1966 console TV.

"Conservation" to me means, well, conserving/preserving what we have been left with (i.e. greenish gridlines ) and not letting it decay.

Experts in museum semantics, feel free to weigh in here.

 

[Christopher]

From the interview with the curator:
"We really are thinking of this as conservation of – as of this week – a fifty-year old object."

This does not say to me, restoration to someone's (preferably mine ) version of what it looked like in 1966. This is what I would like, though I am aware in person looked different from onscreen on an RCA 1966 console TV.

"Conservation" to me means, well, conserving/preserving what we have been left with (i.e. greenish gridlines ) and not letting it decay.

Experts in museum semantics, feel free to weigh in here.

Overall, I'd say you're right. They've said that the priority is preservation, not achieving a specific look. Given a choice, say, between keeping an original piece that looks worn and replacing it with a new piece that duplicates the original look, they'd choose the former. But that means that more recent additions, such as the Miarecki paint job, could be removed. When the Sistine Chapel ceiling was restored some years back, one of the things that was done was the removal of a number of earlier restorations painted over the original art -- although small sections of the added paint were left in place to preserve the historical record of their existence.