Is there an official class for the Kelvin yet?

[Timo]

And why couldn't "Regula One" be the same station from STII?

Sure it could. But there shouldn't be any cadets or other personnel being shipped to this station at that time, because the only ships available were being sent to Vulcan. So probably Regula One is a starship, just like Armstrong isn't a lunar lake...

I'll try to spot the Odyssey thing at some point, too. But not tonight, alas.

(Actually, there appear to be nine ships at that Earth space station: the seven that launch in time, the Enterprise, and a ninth ship that is seen floating next to the station when the Enterprise belatedly warps away. In theory, that ninth ship could have been a connecting flight to the Regula system...)

Timo Saloniemi

 

[ST-One]

^You forget the exterior close-up of the bridge windows during the second or third attack (they're tiny on the outside)

This?

http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/xihd/trekxihd0138.jpg

Just goes to confirm the top part of the superstructure is the bridge, i.e., represents the height of one deck. And the saucer is the same thickness as the bridge height, as it should be for a 250 m ship.

the corridor network behind the bridge

No real problem there: the ship has a spine that extends back from the bridge, and can accommodate those corridors even if/when the bridge is represented by the circular part visible to the outside.

I think you should look at this screencap:



The bridge-windows are small and the bridge isn't nearly big enough to fill out that whole deck.
The corridor could be in the spine, but it's probably still in the circular structure of the bridge deck.

 

[Sparky]

I just think of the Kelvin as "The Wormhole" class of ship. I(n honor of our resident 0 hater

 

[Timo]

The bridge-windows are small and the bridge isn't nearly big enough to fill out that whole deck.

Why wouldn't it be?

http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/xihd/trekxihd0012.jpg

The windows inside represent only perhaps half the diameter of the bridge. The windows outside represent perhaps half the diameter of the uppermost deck. It seems like a perfect match.

http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/xihd/trekxihd0004.jpg

This look at the spine supports the idea that the topmost level of the superstructure would comprise the bridge, its outer walls being defined by the trench around the top dome, and the conical part outside that trench being assorted corridor spaces (possibly enough to explain what we see during Robau and Kirk's short walk to the turbolift). The bridge would also represent a typical deck in height. The window rows in the spine, as well as the docking port there, suggest the lower level of the superstructure represents a second deck while the saucer slopes to reveal a third deck in the spine before we reach the saucer rim that is a bit more than one deck high.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[F. King Daniel]

We see a Kelvin-type saucer cut in half when the Enterprise arrives over Vulcan. No need to estimate decks when they're right there for you to count - and it's roughly the same deck count as the TOS Enterprise, in a saucer more than twice the diameter.

We see gigantic, CG-extended interiors (disused power plant) that dwarf the TMP cargo deck matte painting. We know the ship had 800 survivors and dozens of shuttles. The bluray disc gives the size of the ship at 1500', with relative comparison to the Enterprise - which matches the shots of the Enterprise and the Kelvin kitbash fleet at spacedock.

The Vulcans had ships 600+ meters long a hundred years earlier in Enterprise. Starfleet built insane superstructures like the spacedocks in STIII/TNG and STXI. A 457m Starfleet ship in 2233 is nothing. It's a change, sure - but why fight it? They squeezed in a whole new, previous Enterprise in 2151 a few years ago - that broke the whole Star Trek Chronology book.

 

[Herkimer Jitty]

Not necessarily disagreeing with you, but the crew count proves nothing. Trek ships give their crewmembers an appaling amount of space. The Galaxy-class, for example, could easily fit 10,000 people or so, and they'd still have pretty much the amount of quarters space we see onscreen. If you pack people in, and even hotbunk, you can fit a lot of people into these ships.

I'm inclined to go with the larger scale, because it fits a wee bit better based on what I can see. However, I do personally like the ST:XI ships better at a scale closer to the Prime verse.

 

[ST-One]

The bridge-windows are small and the bridge isn't nearly big enough to fill out that whole deck.

Why wouldn't it be?

http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/xihd/trekxihd0012.jpg

The windows inside represent only perhaps half the diameter of the bridge. The windows outside represent perhaps half the diameter of the uppermost deck. It seems like a perfect match.

I think you are overlooking the fact that only the middle of the three squares on the front of that dome represents the three bridge-windows. And that makes the bridge itself much smaller than the whole of the dome; placing it in the front of the dome, with much room in the back of it.

 

[Timo]

I think you are overlooking the fact that only the middle of the three squares on the front of that dome represents the three bridge-windows.

So they do. And these three windows represent about half the diameter of the top deck ceiling (The panels outboard of the three aren't windows, since if whey were they would open to the bridge as well. We see from the inside that they don't.)

The inside and outside still match up pretty well if the inside is centered below the yellowish dome. And a symmetric structure is clearly implied here, as is a definite height of decks in the superstructure.

Sure, the ship may be 450 m long - but in that case, it's built for 4 meter tall people...

Timo Saloniemi

 

[ST-One]

I think you are overlooking the fact that only the middle of the three squares on the front of that dome represents the three bridge-windows.

So they do. And these three windows represent about half the diameter of the top deck ceiling

Not even close, I'm afraid.

(The panels outboard of the three aren't windows, since if whey were they would open to the bridge as well. We see from the inside that they don't.)

... indeed...

The inside and outside still match up pretty well if the inside is centered below the yellowish dome. And a symmetric structure is clearly implied here, as is a definite height of decks in the superstructure.

The bridge itself is symmetrical, but it isn't large enough to fill out the dome.

http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/xi/behindthescenes/sta10.jpg

Like the Enterprise's bridge, the Kelvin's too is in the front of the circular dome with room to the sides and the back.

Sure, the ship may be 450 m long - but in that case, it's built for 4 meter tall people...

Timo Saloniemi

Or, and here is a shocking thought, you might be wrong, and the ship's layout doesn't follow your ideas (or mine).

 

[Vance]

As for the 'official' length of any ship in NuTrek...

I tend not to take too seriously any technical details from people who literally do not know the difference between 'feet' and 'meters' (from the Art book, which used the terms interchangeably).

 

[Dukhat]

So probably Regula One is a starship, just like Armstrong isn't a lunar lake...

The problem with that theory is that all the starship names were given a "U.S.S." prefix, while Regula One didn't have one.

Actually, there appear to be nine ships at that Earth space station: the seven that launch in time, the Enterprise, and a ninth ship that is seen floating next to the station when the Enterprise belatedly warps away. In theory, that ninth ship could have been a connecting flight to the Regula system...)

Actually, there's at least three smaller ships docked or hovering about the station besides the eight primary ones. It's quite possible that these are transports headed for Regula One.

Anyway, I finally got around to rewatching the cadet scene. With both my ears and the closed-captioning, here's my results:

Male voice:

1. (unintelligible cadet name) - U.S.S. Newton
2. (unintelligible cadet name) - U.S.S. Odyssey
3. Fugeman - Regula One
4. Gerace - U.S.S. Farragut
5. McCoy - U.S.S. Enterprise
6. McGrath - U.S.S. Wolcott
7. Rader - U.S.S. Hood

Female officer:

1. (unintelligible cadet name) - U.S.S. Odyssey
2. (unintelligible cadet name) - U.S.S. Newton
3. Uhura - U.S.S. Farragut
4. Petrovsky - U.S.S. Antares (sounds like "Centarus" because of the actress's lousy pronunciation)

Add the U.S.S. Truman we hear later in the movie, and that accounts for all seven ships besides the Enterprise.

 

[Timo]

...Which is actually good for the story, because then we have at least one extra ship near or at Vulcan (the Mayflower), meaning Starfleet didn't completely abandon its core regions when going to Laurentius.

I mean, yeah, usually starships in TOS, TNG or DS9 were spread out quite thinly, so that just a single hero ship would typically arrive at the eleventh hour, and sometimes only after the twelvth. But if by STXI story logic Vulcan lies close to the Romulan Neutral Zone, some sort of a Starfleet presence there would probably be warranted at a time when there's known unrest at said Zone.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Timo]

Not even close, I'm afraid.

Hmh?



The bridge set ought to nicely cover all of the space beneath the dark ring on top of the superstructure. There would be a space surrounding the bridge, yes, just like in TOS - but only a narrow walkway, not an expansive maze like on the new NCC-1701. And the space would be symmetrical around the circular bridge in the circular dome, by all indications from the movie.

The Kelvin was clearly designed to be of a certain size, with windows, airlocks and hangar spaces to match. Not much bigger than a TOS-style Saladin. She was also photographed to that effect, both inside and out. Even the powerplant-interior location used for Robau's journey to the underworld and the last flight to hell is something you could easily fit inside a TOS-sized starship: we see five to six decks, and the dorsal hull could hold about seven.

The creators of the ship are free to say it's close to 500 meters long. But they are then at odds with what they put on screen.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[F. King Daniel]

Since you're utterly fixated and refusing to consider anyone else's evidence on the subject, I'll only ask this: Why would the makers of the film lie about the sizes of the spaceships, Timo? What do they have to gain from this deception?

 

[Timo]

What an odd thought.

"Lie"? "Deception"? It's as if these people publishing "official" figures actually cared. They have no reason to do so. What possible reason could they have?

As for "anyone else's evidence", I dismiss that which is wrong. The claim that the bridge windows as seen from the outside would indicate a tiny bridge shoved to the front of the symmetric superstructure is hollow, as the argument that the window row wouldn't represent half the width of that superstructure's top is demonstrably false. These are obvious errors, by people who apparently do care. So I consider this evidence, find it false, and dismiss it because it is false.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[F. King Daniel]

So you consider the scene with the fleet at spacedock an error? I'm afraid that it's worth more than specs a technical manual from 1970.

The cutaway of a Kelvin-type saucer we see when the Enterprise drops out of warp? The Kelvin innards vs. the TMP cargo deck? The branching corridor Kirk and Robau pass while walking around to the turbolift? The phaser turret compared to the ones on the NX-01 (which has the same size saucer as the TOS Enterprise)? The two rows of windows on the saucer rim (which matches the cutaway saucer)?

The makers of the movie aren't picking random numbers out of thin air. They're telling you how big the spaceship they designed and made is.

 

[Timo]

So you consider the scene with the fleet at spacedock an error?

Nope, no error there. No Kelvin there, either.

The Kelvin was designed with a specific size in mind, and was seen in detailed close view that established this size.

The fleet at spacedock was kitbashed from Kelvin components, both to save time and to create a common "look". However, if was not seen in close view, and probably would not have withstood such scrutiny. Whether the ships there were intended to be of rougly the same size as the Kelvin is rather immaterial, because no such connection can be made on screen. The thing establishing the scale of the fleet is the new NCC-1701, a ship herself plagued by contradictory scaling.

If one wants to believe in a large NCC-1701, one gets large ships in the fleet. If one wants to believe in a smaller NCC-1701, one gets smaller fleet vessels. That issue is less clear-cut than Kelvin size because NCC-1701 gets more screen time, enough for contradictions to pop up (as they inevitably will when people with contradictory aims throw their contributions together).

The cutaway of a Kelvin-type saucer we see when the Enterprise drops out of warp?

Inconsistent with how the Kelvin herself was portrayed, and also unrelated to the Kelvin herself. Other kitbashed components were liberally re-dimensioned for use in the kitbashes, so there's no particular reason to believe in a single standard of saucers, either.

The Kelvin innards vs. the TMP cargo deck?

Just take a look at the relevant shot.

http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/xihd/trekxihd0074.jpg

One can see catwalks amounting to at most six decks here. Such a facility would easily fit inside the dorsal hull of the Kelvin. Remember also that the TMP cargo bay represents barely one half of the height of the Enterprise secondary hull.

The branching corridor Kirk and Robau pass while walking around to the turbolift?

That calls for a bigger ship, yes. But the branching could take place within the spine. No reason to think that the TMP ship was two kilometers long merely so that an ill-placed corridor in front of Main Engineering would fit within her confines, either.

Since you so helpfully listed these various arguments, it's easy to see that this one represents a minority of one in the collection of evidence...

The phaser turret compared to the ones on the NX-01 (which has the same size saucer as the TOS Enterprise)?

Huh? There's no set requirement for phaser turret size.

The two rows of windows on the saucer rim (which matches the cutaway saucer)?

Consistent with a Saladin-sized ship, and with the window rows in the spine of the Kelvin, as well as with the shuttle.

The makers of the movie aren't picking random numbers out of thin air.

Clearly, they are. And why wouldn't they be?

As said, it's perfectly possible to say the Kelvin was closer to 500 meters long - but only if she is to accommodate people 4 meters tall. That's the whole argument here: the ship has a design size, and it has an "official" size, and the official size is inconsistent with the design size.

I simply advocate the design size because I don't want to believe in a 4 m tall Captain Robau or Commander Kirk.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Timo]

Addendum: this is how it really looks like.

...Okay, there may be inaccuracies to this side view of the ship. But it's at least as "official" as the quoted length.



Diameter of docking port: 1 square
Height of bridge deck: 1.5 squares
Height of saucer rim: 3 squares
Height of saucer total: 10.5 squares
Height of dorsal hull: 10 squares
Diameter of saucer: 80 squares
Length overall: 140 squares

If the docking port is two meters across, we get a deck height of about three meters, and an overall length of 280 meters. The saucer rim will be six meters tall, just like the rims of TOS/TMP style ships.

To get the 457 m overall length, the square would have to be 3.26 meters per side. That means a big docking port, bigger even than in the Voyager (which spat out teeny weeny Borg drones in "Scorpion", to match the scaling). Moreover, it means a bridge deck five meters tall, and a deck spacing (from spine window rows) of five meters as well. Not what we see during Robau's march to the shuttle.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[F. King Daniel]

So you consider the scene with the fleet at spacedock an error?

Nope, no error there. No Kelvin there, either.

The Kelvin was designed with a specific size in mind, and was seen in detailed close view that established this size.

The USS Iowa was the size of FJ's Saladin class. Like the Enterprise, which was designed about the size of the TMP version, the ships were made bigger before they reached the screen.

Your earlier pic with the pink lines doesn't make sense - if the corridor goes all the way around, how is the window in front? There's no chance that little tiny frame is the width of the corridor, or that the bridge is even as large as the circle on top of the dome. The bridge itself probably extends as far back as the centre of the dome.


Compare to ST-One's pic...
http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/a...enes/sta10.jpg

The fleet at spacedock was kitbashed from Kelvin components, both to save time and to create a common "look". However, if was not seen in close view, and probably would not have withstood such scrutiny. Whether the ships there were intended to be of rougly the same size as the Kelvin is rather immaterial, because no such connection can be made on screen. The thing establishing the scale of the fleet is the new NCC-1701, a ship herself plagued by contradictory scaling.

I disagree. The Kelvin kitbashes are clearly meant to be made of the same components as the Kelvin - just as the Reliant saucer is the Enterprise saucer, the Nebula saucer is the Galaxy saucer, the Centaur saucer is the Excelsior etc.

If one wants to believe in a large NCC-1701, one gets large ships in the fleet. If one wants to believe in a smaller NCC-1701, one gets smaller fleet vessels. That issue is less clear-cut than Kelvin size because NCC-1701 gets more screen time, enough for contradictions to pop up (as they inevitably will when people with contradictory aims throw their contributions together).

The cutaway of a Kelvin-type saucer we see when the Enterprise drops out of warp?

Inconsistent with how the Kelvin herself was portrayed, and also unrelated to the Kelvin herself. Other kitbashed components were liberally re-dimensioned for use in the kitbashes, so there's no particular reason to believe in a single standard of saucers, either.

How so? Shorter outboard nacelles on the Armstrong?

Just take a look at the relevant shot.

http://movies.trekcore.com/gallery/albums/xihd/trekxihd0074.jpg

One can see catwalks amounting to at most six decks here. Such a facility would easily fit inside the dorsal hull of the Kelvin. Remember also that the TMP cargo bay represents barely one half of the height of the Enterprise secondary hull.

If Robau was on the lowest level of the Kelvin's engineering hull, there wouldn't have been anywhere near as much floorspace as we saw. Dig out FJ's old floorplans and take a look at how much room there is in a TOS engineering hull. And that power plant is in there as well as the shuttle hanger!

The makers of the movie aren't picking random numbers out of thin air.

Clearly, they are. And why wouldn't they be?

So again you're telling me that you know better than Bad Robot and ILM, who made the film. You also tell me to ignore much of what's seen in the film and only look at the bits here and there that agree with your TOS-friendly assumptions.

I don't deny the ship sizes aren't consistant throughout the movie and I don't deny they were designed smaller than they ended up - but I think your assesment of the Kelvin's size is nothing more than wishful thinking, backed up by obselete dogma.

 

[Timo]

Your earlier pic with the pink lines doesn't make sense - if the corridor goes all the way around, how is the window in front?

Probably there isn't a corridor all the way around (what purpose would that serve?); there's merely space for one. The windows simply punch through that space in front, in fairly deep shafts. That's the only way there could be two additional windows to the sides of the triplet, after all: otherwise, there wouldn't be space for any sort of a window-equipped room behind the side windows.

An off-center bridge obviously wasn't the design intent when the modelmakers created this wholly symmetric superstructure, with a dome in the very center, and a corresponding ceiling feature in the middle of the circular set...

I disagree. The Kelvin kitbashes are clearly meant to be made of the same components as the Kelvin - just as the Reliant saucer is the Enterprise saucer, the Nebula saucer is the Galaxy saucer, the Centaur saucer is the Excelsior etc.

The Centaur featured a Miranda bridge module, out of scale with the Excelsior saucer. Another fine example of a size discrepancy that can be solved in three ways:

1) Arbitrary size. Not very satisfactory.
2) Size based on saucer. Leaves the bridge size hanging - and a bridge is a better scale-establishing feature anyway, because it gives us deck height and in this case even docking port size.
3) Size based on bridge. Doesn't do squat to saucer size because the saucer has no size-establishing features. It's just a generic shape, and in this case even equipped with new windows on top (even if the windows on the rim stay the same).

The DS9 story furthermore calls for a small ship to fight against Sisko's small Jem'Hadar ship and then flee from three of that kind. An Excelsior-saucer ship would be a poor choice, then.

IMHO the fleet of seven simply is closer to the Centaur in nature than to the Reliant, being a bunch of background ships.

Shorter outboard nacelles on the Armstrong?

The ones on the Newton don't match those on the two-naceller (Defiant in original art), either. And the Newton ventral hulls aren't the exact match of the Kelvin dorsal one. We don't have detailed views of these ships yet, but the extent of stretching and compacting should be clarified if we ever get those.

If Robau was on the lowest level of the Kelvin's engineering hull, there wouldn't have been anywhere near as much floorspace as we saw. Dig out FJ's old floorplans and take a look at how much room there is in a TOS engineering hull.

So the second-lowest level should suffice...

And that power plant is in there as well as the shuttle hanger!

No problem there if the former is ahead of the latter, rather than side by side. Which I guess we can all agree on.

So again you're telling me that you know better than Bad Robot and ILM, who made the film.

Do you really think that a person named ILM made the film? It was a bunch of artists working with little cross-contact; this sort of thing always happens in such cases.

You also tell me to ignore much of what's seen in the film and only look at the bits here and there that agree with your TOS-friendly assumptions.

The things I ignore aren't "much". They include a connection between the Kelvin and the Mayflower, which couldn't exist even if we trusted official figures because the Mayflower would still have to be twice as large as the 457 m Kelvin; and the branching corridor aft of bridge, which doesn't match the design intent of a symmetric structure anyway, and can be explained by the spine. That's all.

In turn, believing in a bigger ship would require ignoring window row spacings, the layout of the bridge, the two windows to the sides of the bridge, the implied deck height of the two-tier superstructure, the implied deck height of the saucer rim, and even the size of the shuttle vs. the secondary hull. Basically, every exterior feature would have to be contradicted in order to accommodate an interior scene; we don't do that with the TMP ship, so why do it here?

I don't deny the ship sizes aren't consistant throughout the movie and I don't deny they were designed smaller than they ended up - but I think your assesment of the Kelvin's size is nothing more than wishful thinking, backed up by obselete dogma.

Where's the distinction? The Kelvin onscreen is about 300 meters long, not over 450, by her shape and detailing. The official size of the Kelvin isn't mentioned anywhere in the film. There are no onscreen comparisons that would require the Kelvin to be any specific size, least of all one that is at odds with the originally designed small size. And the original design wasn't altered at all, even if ideas about size were: the Kelvin is still the Iowa in that respect.

What possible reason would one have for choosing a figure from a website to define the size of a starship we see onscreen and can judge by that appearance? At the very best, we can examine that website figure and see if it fits - and if it doesn't, disregard it.

Essentially, the Kelvin is still a consistent design with a consistent scale. The NCC-1701 no longer is. And the fleet of seven plus the Mayflower can be judged independently of the Kelvin, although having the seven be approximate NCC-1701 size while the Mayflower is bigger is what we see onscreen.

It's absurd, really: all you have to argue on is "457 m is official", with nothing else to back up that specific figure, and only a single interior scene to suggest it or another large figure would be needed. Every other bit of visual evidence favors a smaller ship. How devoutly should we worship the official stamp? And is that rational behavior?

Timo Saloniemi