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Strange New Worlds Intro

Scruffy old battleship? [squints eyes really hard, then back up to the other side of the room, tripping over an ottoman in the process]
Oh, yeah! Now I see it. :D

Teasing aside, I can see your side of it. But it doesn't register like that for me. I would expect to see discernable hull plates on a ship of this era, with the almost clinical close-ups they use. The old girl looks mighty fine to my eyes.

The plate texture is overdone and rather motley (literally), as is often the case with spaceships on TV. The rendering techniques used in feature films are (usually) more subtle, as well as a great deal more time consuming and expensive. The reflections and lighting work are pretty good here, but the colors on the hull detract from that.

The Orville spaceships have a great look. I can't think of many others. Notably, they make use of modeled plating rather than color and shading maps to break up smooth surfaces. Really, only The Orville is comparable to Trek because they share the super-sleek-and-beautiful aesthetic. Ships on The Expanse look terrible because they're meant to look shitty.
 
The plate texture is overdone and rather motley (literally), as is often the case with spaceships on TV. The rendering techniques used in feature films are (usually) more subtle, as well as a great deal more time consuming and expensive. The reflections and lighting work are pretty good here, but the colors on the hull detract from that.

The Orville spaceships have a great look. I can't think of many others. Notably, they make use of modeled plating rather than color and shading maps to break up smooth surfaces. Really, only The Orville is comparable to Trek because they share the super-sleek-and-beautiful aesthetic. Ships on The Expanse look terrible because they're meant to look shitty.
Yeah, I don't think the rendering of the hull is bad, but it makes the ship look more primitive that I'd expect. I suppose I've been spoiled by the more subtle look of the movie Enterprises.
 
Yeah, I don't think the rendering of the hull is bad, but it makes the ship look more primitive that I'd expect. I suppose I've been spoiled by the more subtle look of the movie Enterprises.

Yeah, and the Abrams movies carefully aped and improved upon the paint scheme of the ST:TMP Enterprise.

Of course, the TOS Enterprise was never presented as pristine or primarily an object of sculptural beauty, nice as it was. If you've seen the completely restored model at NASM, there was quite a bit of "weathering" and staining applied to the paint job, over time (though not as much as was used in the 1992 restoration). Plus, the almost-neutral-running-to-slightly-green paint used on the production version of the model is virtually matte finish, which means little specular highlighting of the surface.

To replicate that treatment now would not work. large unbroken areas of essentially neutral color/low reflectivity in CG look like what they are: artificially-rendered polygons.

They even had to add some of that to the TOS Remastered CG, much to the nattering dismay of some of the TOS-onlies.
 
The plate texture is overdone and rather motley (literally), as is often the case with spaceships on TV. The rendering techniques used in feature films are (usually) more subtle, as well as a great deal more time consuming and expensive. The reflections and lighting work are pretty good here, but the colors on the hull detract from that.

The Orville spaceships have a great look. I can't think of many others. Notably, they make use of modeled plating rather than color and shading maps to break up smooth surfaces. Really, only The Orville is comparable to Trek because they share the super-sleek-and-beautiful aesthetic. Ships on The Expanse look terrible because they're meant to look shitty.

Yeah, I don't think the rendering of the hull is bad, but it makes the ship look more primitive that I'd expect. I suppose I've been spoiled by the more subtle look of the movie Enterprises.
All good points, and well taken. And it's evident in the 4K clip that they could have toned down the textures. I'm just dead chuffed to have the Big E back for new adventures. So there it is. I've been caught out in a fanboy moment. :beer:
 
All good points, and well taken. And it's evident in the 4K clip that they could have toned down the textures. I'm just dead chuffed to have the Big E back for new adventures. So there it is. I've been caught out in a fanboy moment. :beer:
Yeah, I mean watching the ship move onscreen and seeing what they're doing with it, dynamically, minimizes my complaints about the model in some of the stills and beauty shots. I started to fall a little in love with it, at last, after a few of the thirty-second promos were released.

And, to be honest, that's often the case with skiffy design work - especially costuming and makeup design.
 
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Yeah, I mean watching the ship move onscreen and seeing what they're doing with it, dynamically, minimizes my complaints about the model in some of the stills and beauty shots. I started to fall a little in love with it, at last, after a few of the thirty-second promos were released.

And, to be honest, that's often the case with spiffy design work - especially costuming and makeup design.
What? You mean they didn't design the models with an eye toward having every single image freeze-framed an looked at and scrutinized with a loop? :eek::wtf:;)
 
Well that was just lovely! I can't wait to see it with the actual credits to bring the sequence together. I'm not wild on the montage of close ups of different parts of the Enterprise, and Pike's reading of the speech is bit too subdued for me, but the overall product is definitely a winner. It's nice to see a starship flying through space again! And that one shot with the spinning asteroid will the E zips by in the background (1:08) in particular really harkens back to the VOY sequence. I love it! I feel for sure that the artists behind this were Voyager fans in their youth.
 
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ETA : Oh, wait, am I supposed to add a comment of my own?

Okay, then:

Holy Fuck.

It looks like "the live-action version of the 'Lower Decks'-intro! ":guffaw:

But yeah, I like it.
This is very much what I wanted a new Star Trek show to look like. Not necessarily the Enterprise itself (not a big fan of this CGI model - it's way too dark, and somewhat awkwardly shaped). But goddamn do I love the adventurous feeling of this intro.

(btw not too thrilled about the instrumental version of the intro music - I would have wished for something more bold or unexpected - but it's very solid & safe).

Lower Decks intro gets more points for being actually funny. This one catches up by being freakin' amazing live action!
 
I think it's by a mile the best of the modern live action intros.
I do like the classic ones more. But that might just be my stupid nostalgia speaking. This one feels just right. That's a huge step.
 
The only Trek themes that have stuck in my mind are TOS, TMP/TNG and for some reason TAS. The others are forgotten until I hear them again.

VOY & DS9 are also very easy hummable (though both a bit slow). But I love the opening of VOY. (And TOS: And TNG. And also ENT somewhat. :guffaw:). And I guess soon this one too.
 
The only Trek themes that have stuck in my mind are TOS, TMP/TNG and for some reason TAS. The others are forgotten until I hear them again.
Except for TAS it's the same for me.

VOY or DS9 are distant memories. Even my friend played it via the trumpet for a talent show and I still could not recall it unless you played it for me.
 
I love 95% of everything about the new title sequence and main theme. The 5% I don't care for stems from Jeff Russo's recurring crutch of ending his Trek themes with a reprise of the fanfare or theme from Alexander Courage's TOS main titles. While it actually makes sense here, it's a bit worn out for me after he did that with Discovery and Picard. He's a good composer; there's no reason for him to keep going back to that well time after time.
 
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