I wonder if the back of the model was damaged between TMP & TVH, so they just added that to cover it up, knowing that it wouldn't be seen anyway? Whatever the reason, it does look bloody ugly, so best to pretend it didn't happen!
Since the model was built to allow for rear-projection the back endcap must've been detachable. It's possible it was mislaid, I will try to remember to ask Bill George about it and see if he has any idea what the thinking was. The weird thing about that back end is in the film there is a tug in front of the travel pod, as if it's pulling it along.
IIRC, Image-G was ILM's miniatures branch (opened in 1984) that specialized in motion control filming for all their projects at the time. As TVH was a movie released in 1986, all miniature effects for that project would have gone to them. They did all miniatures work for TNG, DS9 and VOY as well. Modeling luminaries such as Greg Hutzel (RIP), Greg Jein and Robert Legato all came out of this shop.
No, Image G is not a division of ILM; as stated at the link you provided, it was the company that replaced ILM as TNG's miniatures unit after "Encounter at Farpoint." ILM got a credit in every TNG episode because their footage was used in the titles and as stock library material, but they didn't work on TNG after the pilot. Image G's founder, Tom Barron, didn't work for ILM; indeed, he'd worked with Robert Abel and then Douglas Trumbull on TMP, and he founded Image G using equipment he'd bought from Abel. https://sites.google.com/site/imagegwebsite/about
Ah - that's why I got them confused. But Image-G did work on TVH's motion control VFX, which was the original question.
They did? They aren't credited in the film, nor is Voyage Home mentioned in the Memory Alpha article (which puts Image G's association with Trek starting with "The Naked Now").
I would say the change didn't didnt really start to occur until TSFS, due to the fact that TMP and TWOK had the same core design team made up of Mike Minor, Lee Cole and Joe Jennings, with ILM then taking over for TSFS.
Crap... quite right. My brain was already processing Greg Jein by that point and it got cross-threaded.
EAS has a new article up on the graphics and icons made for TMP and how they were used in later movies. Could be useful, definitely interesting. I also found out about the Star Trek Design Project for the first time, which, wowza. That's my kind of website. Honestly, I was always afraid I'd have to track down a copy of the sticker book and do this myself (though my version would've mostly been a love letter to the turbolift-with-four-arrows and the little transporter guy).
Yeah, I ordered a copy of the sticker book a few years back, but carefully cut every page out so I could get a flat scan of each. It’s been invaluable when creating clean vectors of the labels inside in photoshop.
I loved that book SOOO much. https://startrekdesignproject.com/ This is insane! Truly the internet was created for Star Trek.
I still have a never-used copy of the sticker book. I kept meaning to buy a second one so I could actually put some of the stickers on things, but I guess I never felt sufficiently flush with funds to afford the indulgence.
I have a copy of this book because my dad, when I was a kid, set out to build us a working helm console. It didn't go further than a few buttons and the tactical sticker being used, but, the book remains one of my prized possessions.
What's the source for that assertion? ILM had it's own mocon systems, and the models for TVH were made/refurbished at ILM, so why would it use Image-G?
I think they're referring to that specific Klingon logo from the sticker book with the yellow background, green circle, and round corners of the trident, which wasn't seen until on the wall of the BoP bridge in TSFS, albeit slightly recolored. The logo on the actual K't'inga model had far crisper, sharper edges:
As an aside, I'm soooo grateful these reference photos exist to show us the standard K't'inga. The poor model is never going back to this, probably forever sitting in it's Kronos One / Kang's Battlecruiser configuration.