Folks--what's this?! (mislabeled Trek image?)

[Tosk]

Look at the glare on the rim of the TV from what's on the screen.

That's actually one of the things that looks kind of faked to me. And the blown-out highlights in general look artificial to me, they bloom greatly but without obscuring. Again, I could very well be wrong (and probably am!) It's all too easy to see "errors" even in totally real photos. I don't know nuthin' 'bout nuthin', so the fact that I think they're faked probably means they're definitely real, just mislabeled.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

@Metryq got back to me, but he was inconclusive. The bottom line is that they could very well be faked, but are not certainly fakes.

Myself, I would bet minor money that they are real, because this is not how fakes would be done. If the pictures were made up digitally:

• You wouldn't pick Channel 3 to be showing, making people think about VCRs and DVRs that don't fit with a b&w TV set. You just couldn't rely on your targets to suss out the NBC affiliate that was on Ch. 3.

• You wouldn't make fakes with those black parts showing at the edges of the screen, like poorly cut matte lines. You'd make it fit so it looked "right." But a real TV, a crappy b&w TV that was already old in 1966, is right where you'd see artifacts like that: the out-of-adjustment CRT along the bottom, and the bezel-frame shadows at left and top-right. The very things, in other words, that make the pictures "look fake" are what make them look real upon deeper reflection, because the mooks you want to dupe cannot be relied on to think it through. So those real-world-imperfections, those unfortunate artifacts, say real to me.

• The choice of trying to capture the Transporter in action also sells it for me. A modern viewer faking images on a computer probably wouldn't think of it. We're so accustomed to that fx shot as to take it for granted, meaning a digital faker would be nose blind to the allure in 1966 of freezing that fleeting moment, in an age before freeze frame.

 

[Noname Given]

It's a FAAAAAAAAAAAAKE!!!

So William Shatner was returning to the Enterprise on his Blue Origin rocket ride.

 

[Maurice]

I maintain it wasn't Tricon because the episode on the screen wasn't filmed yet. They are likely genuine photos but taken at a much later date.

 

[Qonundrum]

So William Shatner was returning to the Enterprise on his Blue Origin rocket ride.

That's Blue Somethin', that's for sure!

 

[Neopeius]

I maintain it wasn't Tricon because the episode on the screen wasn't filmed yet. They are likely genuine photos but taken at a much later date.

Quite.

 

[Mres_was_framed!]

The screenshots are so similar to the frames shown on Trekcore that it almost seems as if those are the frames that were edited into the shot of the TV.

 

[Kor]

Yep, somebody mislabeled those photos. But taking photos of your TV at home was a fun thing to do back then. I did it myself, and the images posted above look real to me (as opposed to recent forgeries).
...

If I recall correctly, such photos were used for the "reconstructed" Doctor Who episodes that used still photos over the audio for parts where the video footage was missing. But I could be mis-remembering.

Kor

 

[Maurice]

The screenshots are so similar to the frames shown on Trekcore that it almost seems as if those are the frames that were edited into the shot of the TV.

A typical show of the time will have a few hundred cuts, and Trekcore does more than that, so it's liable to get most camera angles, so that there's a "close" match is unsurprising. If it were the exact frame, that would be a tipoff.