Someone at Roddenberry.com customer service is trying to make me believe that the TOS uniform insignias were always gold for every branch, even science and engineering. The reason I bring this up is I just ordered the uniform insignia patches for the 3rd season out of long-ago memories from doing the same back in my youth from the original Lincoln Enterprises. The ones I received today were all gold, and it struck me how "off" the science and engineering patches looked. It's always been a fact that command is the only insignia with gold background, correct? Spock and McCoy and Scotty have silver, always have, always should. I'm not that blind for this many years, am I?
Insignia Colors
- Thread starter tosapanic
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They catch the stage lights, so lighting matters. I'm genuinely curious myself, not ever having seen any of the genuine articles in person.
I always thought they were silver.
So did I.
They were always gold. the science insignias often looked silver because of reflected light off the blue material.No. CBS digital changed them to all be gold in the remastered edition
In the 70s and 80s, Lincoln Enterprises sold embroidered "leatherette" insignias from the same manufacturer as TOS. Always gold. Tie-in toys have sometimes gotten it wrong. The Spock and McCoy bases of the Hamilton Gifts figurines had silver science insignias, IIRC.
I have seen an original set of screenused patches and they, too, were gold.
Gold. No question. Gold.
I have seen production-article costumes exhibited at museums and ST conventions, and the braid and "Warp Delta" insigniae were all gold.
Yup, I've seen 'em too. And yet somehow they often do look silver.
The other thing to remember is that such things, especially where film or stage costuming is involved, are rarely made out of real brass or real bronze, much less real gold, and are probably made out of materials that fade with time.
Just found this video from a Spock tunic auction :
When they show the full shot of braid and insignia, damned if it doesn't look silver! Then when they do a close-up on the insignia, you can almost see traces of gold in it. All I know is Kirk's insignia is always showing as gold, no matter what it's set against.
When they show the full shot of braid and insignia, damned if it doesn't look silver! Then when they do a close-up on the insignia, you can almost see traces of gold in it. All I know is Kirk's insignia is always showing as gold, no matter what it's set against.
I thought they were silver too!
JB
JB
Always gold.
No almost about it.
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