Oberth class USS Bonestell NCC-31600

[Dukhat]

This is a photo of the original USS Grissom studio model from STIII, relabled USS Bonestell NCC-31600 for use in the pilot episode of DS9's "Emissary."

(Pic courtesy of Bruce Macrae, who worked in Greg Jein's model shop during TNG & DS9)



This is the only photo which shows the model actually labeled with this particular name and registry. Previously, it was thought that it might have just been made up for the ST Encyclopedia (since we only see the Bonestell for a few seconds in the far distance before it gets blown up.) It's also possible that since it was relabeled for that shot, that it was also unchanged as the ship that ferries Bashir and Dax to DS9.

 

[Tuskin38]

Small correction, the Bonestell was created for Best of Both Worlds, not Emissary. It wasn't visible on screen until Emissary however.

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[Dukhat]

I don't believe the veracity of that spreadsheet. There wasn't an Oberth class model in BoBW. And they wouldn't have damaged an expensive filming model for that anyway.

 

[Tuskin38]

I don't believe the veracity of that spreadsheet.

Well it's a legit spreadsheet.

 

[Dukhat]

Well it's a legit spreadsheet.

I know it’s legit, but I think the date it was created was wrong and there are other errors as well.

 

[Tuskin38]

I know it’s legit, but I think the date it was created was wrong and there are other errors as well.

Or there's just a deleted scene from BOBW that had the Bonestell

 

[Dukhat]

Or there's just a deleted scene from BOBW that had the Bonestell

But they didn’t use actual intact filming models for that scene, because the point of the scene was to show destroyed ships. The closest they came to using a filming model was the destroyed TMP Enterprise from STIII. In order for them to have used the Grissom model, they would have needed to damage it, and they weren’t going to do that to a model they planned on using again in the future as a guest starship.

Now fast forward from September 1990 to before January 1993. Five filming models were shown on screen, with four of them having brand-new names and registries specifically for the episode:

Miranda class Saratoga
Ambassador class Yamaguchi
Excelsior class Melbourne
Nebula class Bellerophon

And until now, we didn’t know that the Oberth class model was actually labeled Bonestell with a new registry, but it makes sense since all the other filming models were relabeled and re-registered for the scene.

Also, in the exhaustive interview Timo had with Micheal Okuda posted at Ex-Astris-Scientia (which I was a part of), Okuda never mentioned reusing the Grissom model for BoBW.

 

[Tuskin38]

But they didn’t use actual intact filming models for that scene, because the point of the scene was to show destroyed ships.

Oh right. I forgot for a moment we didn't see the actual battle in TNG.