DS9 looked "cheaper" than Voyager

Post source.

 

Dunno if I ever gave the look between the two that much thought but, thinking about it now I don't believe, that there is a difference.

 

"I hate the carpet. I do."

 

They had comparable budgets, DS9 being slightly higher(depending on the episode)

Taken from IMDB(by and big thanks to @Ghislaine H. B. BRAEME)

-TNG's budget:
$1,300,000 per episode (Season 1)
$1,400,000 per episode (Season 3)
$2,000,000 per episode (Season 6)

-DS9's budget:
($12,000,000 pilot)
$1,500,000 per episode (Season 2)
$4,000,000 per episode (Season 4-7)

-Voyage budget:
($23,000,000 pilot)
$2,000,000 per episode (Season 5)
$3,500,000 per episode (Season 6-7)

 

How likely was it that DS9 was getting twice the money as Voyager in its last season?

 

I dunno. I'll look again.

This must have been the page where these numbers were pulled.
http://www.imdb.com/list/ls056710448/

Info on this is so scant on IMDB, Memory Alpha, and WP. All I found was that Voyager's deck one set started on fire in season 5, and destroyed everyone's lunch.

 

That might be what the page says, but I don't buy that Voyager was spending $2 million at the same time that DS9 was spending $4. I don't think those numbers represent the same things (like maybe the Voyager numbers don't include salaries).

 

The way the page is laid out is a little confusing, with the season 5 budget and pilot budget on the same line. It would make much more sense to me if that number was the season 1 budget, since the pilot's cost doesn't have anything to do with the season 5 per episode cost. That would put them neck and neck with Voyager slightly under DS9 for its entire run, but who the heck knows?

If we just take season 7 DS9 and season 7 Voyager (and there's only 2 years separating the two so inflation should be negligible), DS9 does come out slightly on top of the budget war.

All in all, I'd say Voyager probably had a slightly lower budget than DS9.

 

Actually, the costs would come down, at least for special effects. Certainly Ron Moore says that thing that were impossible during the TNG days were routine by the time he quit Voyager. DS9, coming two years earlier, would have been more expensive to produce the same level of quality as Voyager.

 

As I looked on, I saw numbers for Enterprise stated to be $3.3m per episode, or $5m per episode, until season 4, with $800,000 per episode, or $900,000 per episode, depending on the source.

I can believe 3.3 - 5m for that show.

I guess the fact of the matter is every episode costs a different amount. It would be interesting to see what the total cost of a season (of DS9 or VOY) was to produce. I bet it's not all that far off from what Disc. is spending(90-130m for season 1)

Making TV shows is ridiculously expensive.

 

It is expensive, but genre shows are typically higher, for obvious reasons.

 

Well DSN started two years ahead of VOY so it is possible that in the main cast members there was an X% increase in salary each year. Which could account for some of the difference.

 

Not to mention crew salaries increasing, too.

 

DS9 also had a much larger secondary cast than Voyager, especially by the final two seasons, so that likely ate up some extra money as well.

 

Voyager's season 5 was the same year as DS9's season 7. Why would DS9's budget be 100% higher?

 

I feel the opposite. I think the show looked it's best during it's season 2. It was kind of darkly lit which made the place feel even more gritty and real. The dark grey and brown sets look better in the dark than with bright lights IMO.

I think the only reason why people might think the sets look worst is because they were on a alien space station. You have nothing else to really compare it to in Trek. "Voyager" on the other hand you can compare to the TNG sets and see how the starship look has been updated and improved.

As for special effects you do have a 3 year gap between when each show got started, which means "Voyager" is clearly going to have more years of better CGI to work with.

Jason

 

I'm surprised how good the cgi is on Star Trek sometimes. I can rarely tell the difference between the Voyager model and cg model.

Only when it does a barrel roll.

 

You made my point for me... a vast majority of DS9's cast and crew were there for 7 years, meaning even higher and higher salaries due to lengrh of time on a show. Especially when you count all the recurring cast... Garak, Nog, Martok, Dukat, Weyoun, Damar, Female Changeling, Winn, and more. And some of them were more established actors than the main cast before the series started, like Andrew Robinson or Louise Fletcher. (Well known because of movies like HELLRAISER and DIRTY HARRY, and ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST.)

 

So Berman and Behr paid the recurring cast $100,000+ per episode each? That would explain why Farrell left in a huff.