Great alternate movie shots

[Metryq]

Forget the freefall of building in orbit. If the vaunted 23rd century technology includes gravity control, then why is the ship surrounded by scaffolding and external support structures? For that matter, why all the lights? The ship would probably be built by robots who "see" more efficiently in different lighting, or none at all. Then there's the matter of weather. Okay, so the 23rd century also has force fields...

Etc. Etc. and around it goes. Let's come up with a few more rationalizations why the other guys are wrong. The truth of the matter is that all versions of TREK are concessions to the period when they were produced. That's why TOS had blinky consoles that looked like a binary display, or NASA's Mission Control stations, while later versions had workstations that looked progressively like contemporary computers.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Supposedly, it was this piece of fan art which inspired the Enterprise-built-on-land idea from Star Trek '09.

Also, one of the Lost Years novels featured the Enterprise saucer being rebuilt in San Francisco, then taking off and docking with the engineering hull in drydock.

But on-topic, these pics look great

 

[Warped9]

Don't I remember reading somewhere that the Enterprise modular components were built on Earth but then assembled in space? This always made a heckofalotta sense to me, since you get the best of both worlds (especially with those potentially fragile hull joins - a gravity free environment would be definite plus until they're complete)

The Making Of Star Trek in the section describing the ship, its layout and capabilities. This is bolstered by seeing the ship in drydock in TMP.

 

[BillJ]

Hey, the OT was the shot, not another JJ bash session. Sheesh.

The shot? It is awesome. Honestly surprised it took someone this long to do it.

 

[Marsden]

There must have been some kind of "shift of concept" somewhere along the line, because it was my understanding that starships did not and could not land on planets and when Voyager could it was really something of note.

Enterprise didn't land on any planets until TSFS. Enterprise D landed on Veridan III. Both not good situations.

I only pointed out a change of thinking, I didn't make any judgements about how stupid or intelligent it is, and my only examples were how unique it was for Voyager to do it as the other ships were indeed crashing, becasue they couldn't normally land.

I don't think it was ever "canon" but the "saucers" of at least the first Enterprise if not the D could land on planets and were even supposed to have legs. But that was an emergency operation for the first Enterprise and the saucer was acting as a lifeboat, one of the reasons no escape pods are mentioned back then, and the ship was in need of rescuing if this had been done. Something about having the warp drive operating in an atmosphere was bad, like crossing the streams bad, but I don't have any more details.

I'm not sure what to make of the picture because it seems wrong to me. I don't think gravity was ever the problem, it wasn't built to operate inside an atmosphere. BOP from TSFS was the first ship that landed on planets but it had wings. But the shuttles did land on planets and didn't have wings and were not aerodynamic.

Just for full disclosure, I just pretend that the Abramsverse just doesn't exist, but I know it does exist and if anyone likes it I have no problem with that or them having enjoyment.
People that need to be insulting, well that's not logical. And if I caused this argument from my post, I apologize.

 

[BillJ]

People that need to be insulting, well that's not logical. And if I caused this argument from my post, I apologize.

I wouldn't apologize. You brought up an interesting talking point about technology within the universe itself. Sometimes it is fun when a discussion takes an unexpected detour.

 

[Marsden]

Well, Bill, that's why you're a knight and I'm just the piss boy.

 

[Albertese]

Don't I remember reading somewhere that the Enterprise modular components were built on Earth but then assembled in space? This always made a heckofalotta sense to me, since you get the best of both worlds (especially with those potentially fragile hull joins - a gravity free environment would be definite plus until they're complete)

Yeah, The Making of Star Trek (page 171) describes that the components were built in a shipyard on the ground and towed up for final assembly in space. This is actually backed up by a quick little shot in an episode of TNG (I forget which... I wanna say "Parallels" but I may well be mistaken) where we see a long-range picture taken of Utpoia Planitia where we see Galaxy-class modular components lying in a yard on the surface of Mars. It makes a lot of sense to me.

And the construction of a starship on the ground is not too far removed from that. Though, I still feel final assembly in space makes more sense, and achieving orbit via tractor rigs rather than under its own power.

I guess all I'm saying is that seeing the Enterprise on the surface of Iowa (what? Why not San Francisco?) is one of the lesser sins of Star Trek (2009).

--Alex

 

[BK613]

Opinions about ST09 not withstanding, those are some good photoshops.

 

[drt]

I like the shots of the original Enterprise in the new movie settings (saying that as someone who likes the nuEnterprise design) but the ones in the old movie settings aren't working for me.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

It's a reasonable belief that all of the in-universe legend about the Enterprise being built in space was a direct result of being unable to land the ship in the first place. Take away the budget limitation that precluded landing the entire ship, and thereby any need in-universe to account for why the ship can't land, and the assumption that the ship was built in space is no longer necessary.

The built in space idea makes the Connies (original and refit) seem like massive projects too big (appropriate) for the confines of earth. They were born to exist in space, so it is fitting that their construction haapened there, too.

 

[Richard Baker]

I remember reading somewhere that the image of those Galaxy class ship components on the ground in 'Parallels' were in storage, if one was needed most of the work was already done.

 

[Mudd]

It was never canon that starships can't land on planets. It was mentioned in stuff written by people involved with the shows, probably because it just seemed sensible, but not established on screen - nor was the "fact" that the Enterprise was constructed in orbit.

 

[BillJ]

I remember reading somewhere that the image of those Galaxy class ship components on the ground in 'Parallels' were in storage, if one was needed most of the work was already done.

But they still obviously had the power to move them to and from orbit when necessary. Whose to say most of the heavy lifting of the Abrams Enterprise was done in orbit then the framework was moved to the surface when they had to start involving a group of actual humanoid workers.

 

[Kemaiku]

There must have been some kind of "shift of concept" somewhere along the line, because it was my understanding that starships did not and could not land on planets and when Voyager could it was really something of note.

Just an artificial limitation put in because the effects cost would've been too high. In universe, a society that has the technology to manipulate matter and gravity shouldn't have too big an issue landing and putting starships into orbit from the ground.

Yup, Roddenberry wanted the Enterprise to land each week, and had to invent the concept of the transporter when told that it would be too expensive, we just get to see some of the stuff he wanted, granted a few decades later.

 

[Kemaiku]

Captain April just accumulated too many parking tickets, Pike went melancholic paying them off and Kirk was just having fun the way people do when they get a nice vintage model.

But strictly no landing after they squashed that poor diplomats...whatever the hell that pet was.

 

[BillJ]

I really don't get the uproar about the Enterprise being built on the ground or in space. It's science fiction, aren't we suppose to let our imaginations run free in a way that isn't possible in other stories? I think the biggest disgrace that could happen to Trek is for it to become so inflexible that it no longer embraces new ideas.

It doesn't mean everyone has to think every change is a good idea, but we shouldn't treat Trek like some inviolable religious text.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

I think the biggest disgrace that could happen to Trek is for it to become so inflexible that it no longer embraces new ideas.

You mean new ideas like Data's emotion chips and 24th century dune buggys?

 

[Maurice]

Roddenberry liked to tell the story of inventing the transporter because he couldn't land a multi-story spaceship every week, but that's a different than saying "I wanted to land the ship every week", which I never recall reading/hearing.

 

[Kemaiku]

Even so, why can't it? I mean nearly 50 years later really, why not?

I loved the opening of Into Darkness and the beauty shot of the 1701 in '09, all I see from the complainers is that it didn't happen 50 years ago...well...so?