Starship Size Argument™ thread

[F. King Daniel]

Re: New IMAX Star Trek Into Darkness Poster

King: why do you always compare 2009 Enterprise pics with 1966 Enterprise pics? You immediately handicap the latter by its limited budget, special effects, and the fact the production crew could care less whether the model matched the sets. Why not take pics from the movies where the viewscreen is bigger, the shuttle bay / cargo section is bigger, engineering is bigger, etc...?

Browsing through the archives, I found the following thread:

http://www.trekbbs.com/showthread.php?t=119751&page=13

Didn't read through the whole thing, but based on those images, I could fit a big fucking "brewery" in that space -- particularly if the entire secondary hull is devoted to engineering + shuttle bay.

HERE is the TMP Enterprise.
As you can see, the cargo/shuttle bay takes up most of the interior of the secondary hull - and it's still only 4 decks tall (although never all at once). The new Enterprise'a shuttle bay is four decks tall all at once, and that's just the smallest end of the engineering hull.

HERE is the new Enterprise for comparison. HERE is a look at that brewery/engineering section that's behind the enourmous shuttlebay.

The Enterprise model was shrunk to fit over the power plant/shipyard location. In that shot, the ship still has all it's large-scale details, including the five-deck saucer rim. They simply shrunk the model. There is a mishmash of walkways, some scaled for a 366m Enterprise, others for a 725m+ ship.

And HERE is the USS Kelvin, just because.

Whether or not you agree with their choices or reasoning, the people who made the film designed and detailed them to be these sizes, as you can see. It's ridiculous and arrogant that a fan thinks they somehow know better. There is no way to reconcile the details shown on-screen with a ship the size of the classic TV series or movie Enterprises.

 

[anh165]

Re: New IMAX Star Trek Into Darkness Poster

Whether or not you agree with their choices or reasoning, the people who made the film designed and detailed them to be these sizes, as you can see. It's ridiculous and arrogant that a fan thinks they somehow know better. There is no way to reconcile the details shown on-screen with a ship the size of the classic TV series or movie Enterprises.

I think the only reasoning is that the TOS/JJ verse era ships are not allowed to be larger than their more advanced 24th century hero ships.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Well, there's no 24th century in the JJVerse yet. We've no idea what things will be like a century hence.

I think it would be fun if they eventually entirely abandoned trying to parallel the oldTrek continuity if they ever move beyond TOS-era stories. The more versions, the merrier - why even consider retreading Picard et al. when continuity now gives you liberty to make up anything you like?

 

[F. King Daniel]

I don't suppose anyone knows if they actually say how big the Enterprise is in the new film?


KEENSER: This is the Enterprise. She's 8175 blurrts long.

SCOTTY: Quit usin' yer goofy alien measurements!

 

[Kemaiku]

Fuckin' big.

 

[horatio83]

Is it just me or is it always just guys debating the size?

 

[Kemaiku]

Is it just me or is it always just guys debating the size?

*Resisting...urge to make...shuttlebays and landing strip remarks...*

 

[Kruezerman]

Is it just me or is it always just guys debating the size?

Ample nacelles...

 

[BillJ]

Fuckin' big.

That is really all that matters.

 

[Tiberius Jim]

Since I didn't see the need for a totally new thread for this, I'll put this here since the only new clip is a shot of

Spoiler: the new shot in this video...

the Vengeance hurtling toward San Francisco.

Might help with some of the size discussion...and it looks badass.

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M3O0GifJyW8[/yt]

 

[WarpFactorZ]

Neat clip, but you really can't tell anything about the scale of the ship from the aerial shot.

 

[Mad Jack Wolfe]

I'd say larger than a breadbox and slightly smaller than Michael Bay's ego.

 

[WarpFactorZ]

I'm sure this has been stated before (it pretty much echoes arguments I've seen on the web), but I'm bored and wanted to check for myself. Using this schematic:

http://www.cygnus-x1.net/links/lcars/blueprints/sexton/Enterprise1701-new_schematic.jpg

I get the following measurements. Assume the hatches in the neck and secondary hull at 2.5m wide (reasonable, based on what we've seen, incl. in the new trailers where they spacewalk), you find:

- Primary hull diameter = 238 m
- Secondary hull length = 189 m
- Total length (excluding nacelles) = 343 m
- Height = 97.5 m
- Max. width of secondary hull = 45 m
- Max. height of secondary hull = 39 m (measured from base of neck)
- Width of hanger deck (at doors) = 26 m
- height of hanger doors = 8.5 m
- Bridge viewscreen / window = 8.5 m
- Round porthole window diameter = 0.6m
- Diameter of "bridge" dome = 9 m
- Bridge diameter = 18m (assuming it fills the space between the two "side" windows)

Every one of these dimensions seem quite reasonable to me, and obviously the exterior form of the ship was designed to basically match that of the TMP refit.

There are TWO problems. If shuttles are 40ft long (12m), as someone stated, then you can only park them sideways if you have 2m between them. If shuttles are 30ft long (9m), then you can basically park 3 end to end across the shuttle bay -- kind of what we see in the movie.

The second problem is with the viewscreen height. According to that diagram, it would be 1.25m high (a little over 4ft). Obviously we see Kirk standing tall with room to spare, suggesting that it is about 2m high. Of course, it could be a resolution issue on the above diagram.

But if you scale the ship based only on these two artistic elements (because they "look cool"), portholes become unreasonably large, the hatches become a ludicrous 4m across, etc...

 

[Franklin]

Over on Memory Alpha, it says the finalized length of the Enteprise is 2397.75 feet (725.35 meters). That's reported in the "Starship" Blu-ray feature. It also says this size was specified by the licensor of the model kit, who got it from ILM.

As many others have said, the article notes that the initial 1200 foot size was considered too small as production continued, so they scaled things up. By fall 2007, the size was wavering at anywhere between 3000 and 5000 feet.

Full link here. Scroll down to "Size" near the bottom of the page. It is quite well documented.

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/USS_Enterprise_(alternate_reality)

 

[F. King Daniel]

I'm sure this has been stated before (it pretty much echoes arguments I've seen on the web), but I'm bored and wanted to check for myself. Using this schematic:

http://www.cygnus-x1.net/links/lcars/blueprints/sexton/Enterprise1701-new_schematic.jpg

That's Tobias Richter's first attempt at the 2009 Enterprise, made prior to the film's release. Here is his revised and more screen-accurate model.

I get the following measurements. Assume the hatches in the neck and secondary hull at 2.5m wide (reasonable, based on what we've seen, incl. in the new trailers where they spacewalk), you find:

- Primary hull diameter = 238 m
- Secondary hull length = 189 m
- Total length (excluding nacelles) = 343 m
- Height = 97.5 m
- Max. width of secondary hull = 45 m
- Max. height of secondary hull = 39 m (measured from base of neck)
- Width of hanger deck (at doors) = 26 m
- height of hanger doors = 8.5 m
- Bridge viewscreen / window = 8.5 m
- Round porthole window diameter = 0.6m
- Diameter of "bridge" dome = 9 m
- Bridge diameter = 18m (assuming it fills the space between the two "side" windows)

Every one of these dimensions seem quite reasonable to me, and obviously the exterior form of the ship was designed to basically match that of the TMP refit.

They may match what you wish the ship size was and what the old movies depicted, but it completely fails to match what we saw in the 2009 movie and what we've already seen in the 2013 sequel previews.

There are TWO problems. If shuttles are 40ft long (12m), as someone stated, then you can only park them sideways if you have 2m between them. If shuttles are 30ft long (9m), then you can basically park 3 end to end across the shuttle bay -- kind of what we see in the movie.

Why this need to fudge the sizes? That's not how you get accurate measurements.

The second problem is with the viewscreen height. According to that diagram, it would be 1.25m high (a little over 4ft). Obviously we see Kirk standing tall with room to spare, suggesting that it is about 2m high. Of course, it could be a resolution issue on the above diagram.

But if you scale the ship based only on these two artistic elements (because they "look cool"), portholes become unreasonably large, the hatches become a ludicrous 4m across, etc...

They are not "artistic elements" that "look cool" they are EVIDENCE. I'm working from what the films show us, and the people who made the damn thing tell us. You are working from obsolete assumptions and nothing else. It's the Trekkie equivalent of saying the Earth is 4000 years old.

 

[WarpFactorZ]

That's Tobias Richter's first attempt at the 2009 Enterprise, made prior to the film's release. Here is his revised and more screen-accurate model.

OK, thanks. Same size.

They are not "artistic elements" that "look cool" they are EVIDENCE. I'm working from what the films show us, and the people who made the damn thing tell us. You are working from obsolete assumptions and nothing else. It's the Trekkie equivalent of saying the Earth is 4000 years old.

First, that's a ridiculous analogy. Second, your "evidence" doesn't even provide a consistent scale size. The ship grows and shrinks depending on how they decide to match interior to exterior. How is that reliable? It was an image superposition where one image (ship) was arbitrarily scaled up so the second image (people / shuttles) would fit in and the composite would "look cool."

Anyway, Kirk's personal escape pod is seen being ejected from one of these hatches. No way that thing was 5m in diameter. Does that "evidence" get thrown out?

I really don't care what artists think the size is, based on their need to make something "look cool." That's why there's a term "artistic license", which means to stretch the truth because you can.

I match the form with the function. The Enterprise shouldn't have 5m diameter hatches. Who thought of that? Can you explain what they're for? It makes no sense for the ship to be over 200m tall (as high as a 70 storey building). etc... etc... etc... Shall I repeat: THOSE DIMENSIONS MAKE NO SENSE.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

They are not "artistic elements" that "look cool" they are EVIDENCE. I'm working from what the films show us, and the people who made the damn thing tell us. You are working from obsolete assumptions and nothing else. It's the Trekkie equivalent of saying the Earth is 4000 years old.

You're absolutely right, of course, but then you do research and apply logic. The "young Earth trekkies" just know what they know 'cause, uh, they're pretty sure they know it somehow.

 

[WarpFactorZ]

You're absolutely right, of course, but then you do research and apply logic.

If your "research" reveals inconsistencies with your assumptions, then "logic" dictates you should throw out your assumptions. A starship that is different sizes depending on which window or door you look through suggests the problem is looking in from the outside.

 

[137th Gebirg]

Y'know, I'm wondering if this size weirdness is why no deckplans or cutaways have been produced yet, official or otherwise. I'm not sure the producers even know at this point...

 

[WarpFactorZ]

Y'know, I'm wondering if this size weirdness is why no deckplans or cutaways have been produced yet, official or otherwise. I'm not sure the producers even know at this point...

It wouldn't surprise me. They painted themselves into a corner on this issue.