Damage to the Enterprise D 6 foot model
- Thread starter treknician1701
- Start date
I think it was Maxwell Everett who posted some first week sales data from the season sets where season one sold 95,000 units and the later seasons were only moving 15-20,000. Which is quite a drop.
But I can't find anything to compare the TNG sets to TOS.
I had hoped to make it clear that it shouldn't be a GL S.E. but one in a "positive sense", i.e. "Artist's Edition" where many many ideas of the artists - which couldn't be visualized because of budget and/or time and/or technical restrictions - could now be realized by means of CGI.
The Making of DS9 says brutally honest, that the VFX guys envied the CGI capabilities used on "Babylon 5" to visualize an uninterrupted zoom from far away to the command center of B5.
In the opening scene of "Farpoint" the camera zooms in onto the 6-footer and in particular the "real" observation lounge with Picard in it. There is an inevitable break between VFX and live action footage but CGI could enable a seamless transition.
Recently here, Andrew Probert talked about some of the unrealized ideas for TNG that could now be visualized by means of CGI.
And I have a couple of TNG magazines where the VFX artists talked about some really cool ideas, they were unable to visualize.
IMHO, there is plenty of potential and in contrast to GL's claims (if he had really wanted Greedo to shoot first, he could have visualized that already back in 1977) we'd really have the original artists' intentions (besides, I'd love to see a TNG re-release where all these artists are invited and get appropriate coverage for the great work they did on TNG ).
But that’s the issue: money! I think it’s safe to assume that transferring and fixing the information from the camera negatives into digital storage was the biggest cost factor. CBS made an investment and I’m certain they’ll explore future opportunities to generate additional income from the restoration project investment, it’s somewhat inevitable and logical. It could be an “Artist’s Edition”, it could be a “Widescreen Edition” or even a combination of both. Not now, but probably something happening within the next seven years or so.
With the re-imagined VFX of TOS (regardless whether good or bad) CBS showcased its own “Special Edition” ambitions and I see no reason whatsoever why we shouldn’t look forward to something like that for TNG. It’s less a question of “if” but “when”, IMHO.
Bob
But there's more to consider than just cost. The incremental cost of returning to the completed footage and inserting new CGI is one thing, but unless there's a market for it, it'd be a fool's errand for CBS. Plus it would create a scenario where CBS would have two products competing against each other, which is always a bad idea. It would result in practically ZERO added revenue for CBS. It'd be like 'splitting the vote'.
I remember when The Dark Knight was coming to theaters. The old Burton/Schumacher films went briefly out of print and weren't available anywhere for a few months. They withheld them as to not have their existing product compete against the new product in theaters. It happens all the time.
TNG-HD exists because CBS identified a healthy enough demand from the fanbase to justify dumping money into the project. It's a niche product though, unlike a smash hit like a Game of Thrones or a Breaking Bad, so they can't go hog-wild. That's why we get shrewd things like separate episode releases, to maximize the budget to produce more. That's the same reason shows would create two-part episodes in the first place. To increase the budget for an episode.
Those wanting a second version of TNG with new CGI is a niche group within a niche group. I doubt there's enough demand to even make a blip to CBS.
I remember when The Dark Knight was coming to theaters. The old Burton/Schumacher films went briefly out of print and weren't available anywhere for a few months. They withheld them as to not have their existing product compete against the new product in theaters. It happens all the time.
TNG-HD exists because CBS identified a healthy enough demand from the fanbase to justify dumping money into the project. It's a niche product though, unlike a smash hit like a Game of Thrones or a Breaking Bad, so they can't go hog-wild. That's why we get shrewd things like separate episode releases, to maximize the budget to produce more. That's the same reason shows would create two-part episodes in the first place. To increase the budget for an episode.
Those wanting a second version of TNG with new CGI is a niche group within a niche group. I doubt there's enough demand to even make a blip to CBS.
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I agree but I don't see CBS revisiting TNG any time soon. They will watch how the individual season sets are selling. Should there be a complete TNG Blu-ray edition they will watch how this one is selling. But there will come a point in time where sales of either two will be neglectable and that will be the moment they'll consider something new to do with TNG.
But it's difficult to predict. I don't even know how the TOS-R sales were doing. Did people mostly buy because they wanted to see TOS in HD or did they mostly buy to see the re-imagined effects?
Bob
I could see perhaps CBS taking an epic two parter like 'The Best of Both Worlds' or 'All Good Things' and making a special edition with enhanced SFX. Treat them like a movie release you did not have to do principle photography on.
I could even imagine some added scenes along the lines that had Riker at Farpoint in AGT- have the conversation with Admiral Hanson take place as before, but cut to an over the should shot of him talking with Picard from his bridge during the battle and show some of combat with the Borg at Wolf359 until his ship was destroyed...
I could even imagine some added scenes along the lines that had Riker at Farpoint in AGT- have the conversation with Admiral Hanson take place as before, but cut to an over the should shot of him talking with Picard from his bridge during the battle and show some of combat with the Borg at Wolf359 until his ship was destroyed...
Maybe not where you are, but DS9 and VOY do air a lot. International markets are just as much a legit source of revenue for CBS as the US market is.
Depends on how much the carriers are willing to pay for the rights.
