Is the bridge at a funny angle?

[Mike Doyle]

Found on twitter.

“My favourite Star Trek fact is that because the Enterprise bridge has its turbolift to the SIDE, but that turbolift is directly BEHIND the bridge on exterior of the ship, the bridge crew are canonically sitting at a 36 degree angle from the direction they're actually heading.”

https://twitter.com/ryanqnorth/status/1339324053803319296?s=21

 

[NCC-73515]

That was the funniest part of the Franz Joseph manual! XD

 

[C.E. Evans]

In a very real sense, the positioning doesn't matter because the bridge's main viewscreen isn't an actual window, just the biggest monitor screen there. Setting the viewscreen at a 36-degree angle from the ship's centerline may have been a matter of efficiency with the original Constitution-class design--maybe it provided better circuit alignment with some internal system or something like that. Maybe the TMP refit corrected that.

 

[BK613]

@Mike Doyle
Real world reason: Camera shots like this:

http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/1x16/The_Galileo_Seven_006.JPG
http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/1x16/The_Galileo_Seven_007.JPG​

In-universe reason: who knows? You can make a case from screenshots that the lower section rotates:
In "Where No Man has Gone Before" the center-line of the helm/nav console doesn't line up like it does in the 1st pilot and the series. Instead of being trued to the centers of the screen and comm officer station, it lines up with the edges of the lift alcove and screen alcove:

http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/1x03/wherenomanhasgone035.jpg
http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/1x03/wherenomanhasgone045.jpg​

And then there is this shot from "By Any Other Name":

http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/2x22/byanyothername0215.jpg​

 

[ZapBrannigan]

I take a different view. I was a teenager when the Franz Joseph material was published, the perfect age to eat it up, and I love it.

But today I would scale up the size of the ship about 10 or 15 percent, so the bridge and its turbolift fit entirely inside the Deck 1 housing. And what seems to be the turbolift housing on the ship's exterior is not that. It's something else. Thus the captain's chair and helm console face forward.

 

[Tosk]

An easy fix for me. I simply don't accept that "the bump" on the back of the bridge module is the turbolift at all. The exterior of the module is a fat, round shape. The interior turbolift is set right next to a flat wall. Making the bump the turbolift makes little sense to me, despite intent.

Edit. ^Wot he said, more or less.

 

[Mike Doyle]

I didn’t really need it “fixing” for me. Just thought it was funny.

 

[Forbin]

FJ's plans and the tech manual aren't "canonical" so, nope.
Here's a simple solution that also explains how there can be a fresh car in place seconds after another one leaves:

 

[Kor]

Funny angle? As in "haha" funny, or "heehee" funny?

Kor

 

[BK613]

@ZapBrannigan @Tosk @Forbin I'm not adhering to any particular side: I was just going straight to the screenshots that that demonstrate that "It's a TV show therefore what's best for the shot" as the reason*. Holds true for some of those bridge rails too:
http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/1x04/thenakedtime369.jpg

*(and perhaps avoid yet another forward/offset argument altogether)

 

[Tosk]

*(and perhaps avoid yet another forward/offset argument altogether)

Discussion, not argument.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

FJ's plans and the tech manual aren't "canonical" so, nope.
Here's a simple solution that also explains how there can be a fresh car in place seconds after another one leaves:

That is precisely what I want it to be. Did you make this image, Forbin?

 

[Maurice]

The ship has artificial gravity and anti-inertia tech or the crew would be wet smears on the wall the instant they accelerated or decelerated. And most of the stations on the bridge don't face the front, so the Captain and helm being rotated slightly to 11 o'clock makes as much functional difference as a having a basement that's not aligned to true north. It. Doesn't. Matter. It just annoys Trekkies for some inexplicible reason.

 

[FormerLurker]

Funny angle? As in "haha" funny, or "heehee" funny?

Kor

As in "Yeah. You're funny."(turns away)"Jerk."

Edited to add: I apologize profusely. That was mean.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

The ship has artificial gravity and anti-inertia tech or the crew would be wet smears on the wall the instant they accelerated or decelerated. And most of the stations on the bridge don't face the front, so the Captain and helm being rotated slightly to 11 o'clock makes as much functional difference as a having a basement that's not aligned to true north. It. Doesn't. Matter. It just annoys Trekkies for some inexplicible reason.

It annoys us because there is no evident, in-universe reason for the 36° offset. Real shipbuilders would naturally at least start with the intuitive, face forward idea, and have to be forced to twist the bridge around by some exigency.

So yes, the Command stations could be offset. But that makes the bridge seem like a staid control room, insulated from the adventure. It's more fun to see it as the in-motion cockpit of a flying machine, living out the ship's trajectory. "Hang on!"

And since when is Star Trek supposed to be annoying?

 

[Tosk]

I'm certainly not angry about it, and I don't remember anyone else being so. It's like if the bridge were rear-facing and located at the ass-end of the ship...there's no reason it couldn't be, it just tickles the human brain a tad.

 

[Henoch]

FJ's plans and the tech manual aren't "canonical" so, nope.
Here's a simple solution that also explains how there can be a fresh car in place seconds after another one leaves:

Does this work in a side, cross-sectional view? The curvature of the bridge blister might cut off the back ceiling of the turbo car. I guess it comes down to the scale of the ship and the depth of the bridge into the structure.

 

[ZapBrannigan]

Does this work in a side, cross-sectional view? The curvature of the bridge blister might cut off the back ceiling of the turbo car. I guess it comes down to the scale of the ship and the depth of the bridge into the structure.

Yeah, that's why I say the ship might have to be scaled up a bit from the standard 288.6 m length. This also gives more room for everything else.

 

[Henoch]

This concept is supported by the remastered (retconned) opening bridge scene of the Pike Enterprise in The Cage and The Menagerie Part 1, though the bridge still needed to be sunk deeper into the blister. Maybe it was an optical magnification effect from the semitransparent curved dome.

 

[F. King Daniel]

FJ's plans and the tech manual aren't "canonical" so, nope.
Here's a simple solution that also explains how there can be a fresh car in place seconds after another one leaves:

It appears on screen in TMP close up as V'Ger hacks the Enterprise computer, along with a shot of the offset bridge, so it's as canon as any other on-screen graphic.

I used to wonder if with the segmented bridge set, the turbo was originally intended to be directly behind Kirk's chair but perhaps they changed it for a more visually interesting bank of computer screens.