Sternbach blueprints question

[graffy]

Hello,

I am interested in finding a little more info on the Sternbach blueprints for Enterprise D. As a hobby project, I'm playing around with building Enterpise D using blender. After reviewing both the Sternbach and Whitefire blueprints, I've opted to do a build on the Whitefire set as it's less complicated and seems a great way to prep for building the more complex Sternbach layout. Thus far, the Whitefire set has been a pleasure to use. Took very little correction in Gimp to get the ortho's to line up *perfectly*.

Anyway, after reviewing the Sternbach blueprints, I deduced the paper copies were printed at 75 scale, but I believe they were originally drawn at 50 scale on mylar. I don't suppose any other version of the Sternbach prints were ever sold (preferably something in the more common 50 scale?)

Also, I noticed that Rick Sternbach was involved in a project that was scrubbed in late 2011 to produce a cut-away type of model of Enterprise D. In producing the model, he indicated he took the time to reconcile the problems with the original blueprints he drew up. I'm going to guess the project has not been resurrected and whatever blueprints or drawings that may have been produced are unavailable. If not, I'd like to know. Otherwise, is there any comprehensive collection of "erratta" for the Sternbach blueprints? Like text descriptions of what's missing / incorrect?

 

[Albertese]

You may be in luck, graffy, at least in one area... Rick Sternbach himself is not a stranger to this board, so, it's entirely possible that you may get a pretty definitive answer to your question here if you're patient...

--Alex

 

[Mytran]

I would usually start here, but as the plans are still commercially available the site has limited the images to thumbnails only.

The Sternbach project has come up on these boards before, but there is no recent news so it seems that it is currently in hiatus.

 

[graffy]

Thanks for the response! I have hardcopy of the published blueprints of Enterprise D, but they were reduced scale. I could scan them to 600 dpi tifs or something and rescale, but that's a hassle to do, and I'm not really helping myself that much to do it...

In any case, knowing that Rick resolved a lot of the complications in the blueprints which arose from changes made during the series, I'd be awfully curious to know what those changes were. I get that NDA's are NDA's, but I'm more interested in identifying the original blueprints inconsistencies and what the best resolution of them would be rather than a set of official or unofficial corrected blueprints, per se. If you ask me, the fun will be in the rearranging, anyway. (I think it'd be neat, for example, to see what a layout would look like to put the bridge in the saucer's mid-section - an early idea for the show that was scrapped)...

If nothing else, I figured someone else must have taken pains at some point to identify plan inconsistencies and suggest good solutions.

Anyway, it's no great loss if I don't get any leads. I've sorted through havoc92's ongoing TOS 1701 build (98 pages on 3DBuzz... yikes) and noted much of his wrangling with the FJ plan inconsistencies. Rick's original set isn't fraught with nearly the degree of problems as the FJ plans were, so I'm not greatly worried.

Besides, I'm an engineer - figuring this stuff out on my own is (almost) as much fun, anyway.

 

[Tosk]

I'm not even into the blueprint side of things very much and I'd still love to see those revised ones. Hopefully there will be a project in the future that uses them.

 

[Rick Sternbach]

You may be in luck, graffy, at least in one area... Rick Sternbach himself is not a stranger to this board, so, it's entirely possible that you may get a pretty definitive answer to your question here if you're patient...

--Alex

*Huff puff* Ah, made it. Yeah, I was heavily involved with a "part work" project for DeAgostini Japan, wherein subscribers would get, for plunking down something like $1500, 100 issues of tech data, crew facts, empty binders, blueprints, and ship model parts including a lighting kit. Hugely ambitious, but failed to take off, so to speak. Seven test issues were produced, and they look gorgeous. Their initial efforts on the model parts needed a lot of help, and by the end, they really had clean parts with a nice two-tone paint job.

I reworked all of the exterior ortho drawings to match up geometrically with the 6-foot Ent-D built by ILM and later modded for GENERATIONS. All new accurate shield grid lines, adjusted phaser strip locations, new markings, the works. Finally had some extra miniature castings to work from. Got about 65% of the new hyper-detailed cutaway done (you can see Guinan in Ten Forward with her hat). Got about 23 or so of the 42 deck plans completely redone. CBS and I will be talking about reissuing the set; no idea exactly where it might fit in their plans yet. The Trek publishing machine grinds exceedingly slowly these days, sorry to say.

Rick

 

[Tosk]

Dang, that sounds awesome.

 

[Rick Sternbach]

Anyway, after reviewing the Sternbach blueprints, I deduced the paper copies were printed at 75 scale, but I believe they were originally drawn at 50 scale on mylar. I don't suppose any other version of the Sternbach prints were ever sold (preferably something in the more common 50 scale?)

I don't recall exactly all of the details about the scales, but I mention in the blueprints booklet that the original art was 0.02"=1', starting with pencil art done by Todd Guenther (saucer decks) and me for most of the rest of the ship. The scale factor for the Pocket Books kodalith negs was 66.66%. I'd have to take out my published set and some of the mylar inks and really go through it all again. Or not.

For the DeAgostini Japan project, I settled on a printed ship length of ~28.5", which is about what it was for the Pocket Books printed sheets (printed, incidentally, on the presses at Rand McNally).

Rick

 

[Icarus68954]

Incidentally, Rick, should you ever get a chance to reissue them, do try to remember the Arboretum this time.

In all honesty, I love my D-blueprints, but it's always bothered me that you labelled the windows for the Arboretum, but forgot to actually put it inside the ship. Also, I have been on a Where's Waldo-like hunt for years trying to find Troi's office; it's shown on the key on the last sheet, but I've never been able to find it inside the ship. Has anyone had any luck there?

 

[Mysterion]

Incidentally, Rick, should you ever get a chance to reissue them, do try to remember the Arboretum this time.

In all honesty, I love my D-blueprints, but it's always bothered me that you labelled the windows for the Arboretum, but forgot to actually put it inside the ship. Also, I have been on a Where's Waldo-like hunt for years trying to find Troi's office; it's shown on the key on the last sheet, but I've never been able to find it inside the ship. Has anyone had any luck there?

I've never been able to locate Troi's office either. Or the Brig. Or a personnel transporter room in the secondary hull. The arboretum, I believe, is that recangular blank space on about Deck 6 or 7 (IIRC) toward the rear of the saucer section. Not labled, but it does seem to correspond with the windows' location on the hull.

All that said, I'd love to see a re-issue also.

 

[Rick Sternbach]

Incidentally, Rick, should you ever get a chance to reissue them, do try to remember the Arboretum this time.

In all honesty, I love my D-blueprints, but it's always bothered me that you labelled the windows for the Arboretum, but forgot to actually put it inside the ship. Also, I have been on a Where's Waldo-like hunt for years trying to find Troi's office; it's shown on the key on the last sheet, but I've never been able to find it inside the ship. Has anyone had any luck there?

I've never been able to locate Troi's office either. Or the Brig. Or a personnel transporter room in the secondary hull. The arboretum, I believe, is that recangular blank space on about Deck 6 or 7 (IIRC) toward the rear of the saucer section. Not labled, but it does seem to correspond with the windows' location on the hull.

All that said, I'd love to see a re-issue also.

Don't worry, the Arboretum is definitely in the new plans, with lots of little ins and outs of bushes and hedges and such. All the other stuff has been added and will be findable.

Rick

 

[DEWLine]

Looking forward to adding those revisions to my collection!

 

[Mysterion]

Don't worry, the Arboretum is definitely in the new plans, with lots of little ins and outs of bushes and hedges and such. All the other stuff has been added and will be findable.

Rick

spiff! Looking forward to this!

 

[Rick Sternbach]

And just to show you I'm not just blowing smoke, here's a grab of the back of Deck 7.

 

[Mytran]

Looks nice! I've always wondered, was a particular reason for the design of the "[] []" arrangement of windows around this section of the ship?

 

[Rick Sternbach]

Looks nice! I've always wondered, was a particular reason for the design of the "[] []" arrangement of windows around this section of the ship?

Sorry, not sure what your double brackets are meant to show; I didn't design the ship, so you'd need to ask Andy Probert about the window groupings. I don't recall anything that stands out as unusual or requiring clarification; perhaps a screengrab or diagram would help me see what you're looking at.

Rick

 

[Mytran]

Sorry, I meant these windows, below the shuttlebay:



The reason they struck me as odd is that there are three tiers of windows in the space of a single deck. No biggy, but still...

 

[publiusr]

Working on anything new Rick?

 

[Rick Sternbach]

Sorry, I meant these windows, below the shuttlebay:



The reason they struck me as odd is that there are three tiers of windows in the space of a single deck. No biggy, but still...

Those are the windows for the Arboretum, which folks have been grilling me about.

Rick

 

[Rick Sternbach]

Working on anything new Rick?

Not at the moment; been trying to scare up some publication projects, but the approvals process is glacial at best. One TV production seemed to be interested and then blew me off after 3-4 meetings, so screw 'em. If anyone hears of an SF gig, you know where to find me.

Rick