Size of the NuEnterprise
- Thread starter EJA
- Start date
Really? Perhaps you'd like to explain exactly why?
I've talked to Bernd about his article before. It's missing several pieces of evidence: The corridor network behind the bridge is physically impossible on a smaller ship, he ignores the people standing in the (huge) windows when Kirk's pod launches and the claim that the shuttlebay changes size is incorrect (the camera is far closer to the hull in the "smaller" shuttlebay shot - just look at the size of the shuttle relative to the numbers in the hull vs when the shuttles arrive)
But it's all moot: The CG of the Enterprise was made huge in all but the shipyard shot, and the sets/locations, CG shuttlebay and windows don't work with a smaller ship.
As I said to Bernd, I don't go "that's wrong because it's not how it was done before", I go, "That's different. How are they doing it now?"
Well that the whole thing. You see supposedly this single giant ship, appears on a single occasion, it destroys a single Starfleet ship, far away from Earth near the Klingon border, is never ever seen again, and because of this single event (which killed at least three people), the Federation, Starfleet, Earth radically changed. To the point people were born in different years.
Makes perfect sense, right?
Looking at possible in-universe reasons for the size of the nuEnterprise, because of the ingress of the Narada the various designers went down different technological roads, the nuEnterprise is the size that it is because it has to be give the knowledge available when her keel was laid down. The compactness of the original engines were never invented, the nuEnterprise had to be so expansive owing to the the size of the machinery and the weapontry she carried. You have to admit the size of the original torpedoes were tiny. Because certain tech was just never discovered, an engineering compartment the size of a (sorry) brewery was required.
The systems aboard the nuEnterprise might also have been more maintenance intensive than the original Enterprise, requiring additional personnel, therefor requiring more living space, therefor requiring more support equipment, which then requires still more personnel. Which can turn into a vicious cycle.
Everything was simply bulkier
In-universe the TNG Galaxy class didn't have to be the size it was, it was someone's choice (Gene Rodenberry's 
) - the Intrepid and Nova classes have all the same abilities but are far smaller. Enterprise had almost all the technology Next Generation had, so why can't the 23rd century have bigger and smaller ships in the fleet? It could simply be that the name "Enterprise" was given to a 23rd century Galaxy-equivelent instead of an Intrepid-equivelent in the alt universe.
We can all make up reasons for it, and even pretend the STXI ship isn't as big as it was presented in (the majority of) the film. JJ Abrams wanted the ship big. According to the "Art of" book the size of the Enterprise went up as high as 1200m at one point in pre-production.
I don't mind if those in charge change things like the size of the ship. I think the epic size of the brewery and the bigger bridge really added to the atmosphere of the film - smaller TV show-sized sets just wouldn't have been the same IMO. YMMV.
) - the Intrepid and Nova classes have all the same abilities but are far smaller. Enterprise had almost all the technology Next Generation had, so why can't the 23rd century have bigger and smaller ships in the fleet? It could simply be that the name "Enterprise" was given to a 23rd century Galaxy-equivelent instead of an Intrepid-equivelent in the alt universe.We can all make up reasons for it, and even pretend the STXI ship isn't as big as it was presented in (the majority of) the film. JJ Abrams wanted the ship big. According to the "Art of" book the size of the Enterprise went up as high as 1200m at one point in pre-production.
I don't mind if those in charge change things like the size of the ship. I think the epic size of the brewery and the bigger bridge really added to the atmosphere of the film - smaller TV show-sized sets just wouldn't have been the same IMO. YMMV.
The USS Enterprise, and Starfleet ships in general, consist of technologies and capabilities that we have no idea how to implement or design.
Anything we come up with here is going to be speculative, until something is shows and/or said on screen to address the differences.
I have a pet theory of sorts, however, that addresses the size issues, as well as a few others.
In 2233, Starships were generally large due to their increased complexity from the time of Captain Archer etc.
During the Prime timeline, several discoveries were made in terms of automation and control that enabled ships to have the same, or better, capabilities, while requiring fewer officers and crew for maintenance and adjustments, leading to far smaller vessels.
In the Alternate Reality, certain key creative people behind these technologies served on the Kelvin, and were killed in that event.
Also, due to telemetry from the shuttles that escaped, some key Starfleet engineers and designers attempted to reverse-engineer some of the materials and technologies seen in the Narada, leading Starfleet to adopt and figure out different capabilities than in the Prime reality, leading to certain advances being made before the TMP timeline, thus certain features of the NuEnterprise being common with the TMP Enterprise.
Anything we come up with here is going to be speculative, until something is shows and/or said on screen to address the differences.
I have a pet theory of sorts, however, that addresses the size issues, as well as a few others.
In 2233, Starships were generally large due to their increased complexity from the time of Captain Archer etc.
During the Prime timeline, several discoveries were made in terms of automation and control that enabled ships to have the same, or better, capabilities, while requiring fewer officers and crew for maintenance and adjustments, leading to far smaller vessels.
In the Alternate Reality, certain key creative people behind these technologies served on the Kelvin, and were killed in that event.
Also, due to telemetry from the shuttles that escaped, some key Starfleet engineers and designers attempted to reverse-engineer some of the materials and technologies seen in the Narada, leading Starfleet to adopt and figure out different capabilities than in the Prime reality, leading to certain advances being made before the TMP timeline, thus certain features of the NuEnterprise being common with the TMP Enterprise.
Another thing regarding the NuEnterprise (not sure if this has been asked before or not): Why is it spoken of in the movie as though it's something totally new and spectacular, so awesome that a lot of people, e.g. Uhura, dream od serving aboard it, when there should be at least one more vessel of its type already in service? It is called a Constitution-class ship in official material, so logically the USS Constitution (and possibly others) must exist at this time. The NuEnterprise can't be as unique as is made out.
Yes in theory but not necessarily: In "Yesterday's Enterprise" Tasha called the alternate Enterprise-D the "first Galaxy-class ship ever built" (or words to that effect). Going back to 80's novels, Final Frontier (from where George and Winona Kirk come from, George ends up XO of the Enterprise) comes up with some claptrap about recent technological breakthoughs leading to the proposed 1700 design being cancelled, and a new "Naval Construction Contract", 1701, being taken out for the prototype that would, by the end of the novel, be named "Enterprise".
But even discounting all that, the Enterprise was slated to be the flagship of the Federation. You can't blame Uhura for wanting in on that.
The prior NX-01 Enterprise was somewhat famous, too. Uhura could have wanted to follow in Hoshi's footsteps.
The Enterprise is brand new and hasn't even been on it's maiden voyage yet when the emergency strikes. In Vulcan's orbit there is the saucer of another Starfleet ship that appears to be larger than the Enterprise (the Mayflower?). Pike refers to the Enterprise as the newest flagship, implying that there are others.
I-Am-Zim
Captain
Nope. He's not "wrong". He has an opinion and he backs his opinions with very compelling evidence and valid points. Just because he doesn't agree with proponents of the Abramsverse doesn't make him wrong.
Of course it makes him wrong, his opinion (just like mine) means nothing and his "evidence" is irrelevant. Things like the size of the Enterprise aren't decided by or with the fans, the producers want it to be 762 metres long? It IS 762 metres long. End of story!
That the ship appears to be smaller in a few scenes just means that the final length wasn't decided when the effect was created. These shots cannot be used as evidence for anything in universe, just like different shots of the Enterprise-D models cannot be used as evidence that the ship changed shapes.
That the ship appears to be smaller in a few scenes just means that the final length wasn't decided when the effect was created. These shots cannot be used as evidence for anything in universe, just like different shots of the Enterprise-D models cannot be used as evidence that the ship changed shapes.
... the ship appears to be smaller in a few scenes ... These shots cannot be used as evidence for anything
And with these two statements it is you who is completely wrong. Canon is based solely upon what is presented on screen, in this case the size of the nuEnterprise has to be determined exclusively based on what we can see. The exact size of the ship is not mentioned in the dialog.
What JJ Abrams, other producers, the designers, intended or wanted is meaningless and irrelevant to canon.
And Trek has fudged up sizes plenty of times in the past. Just look at the Bird of Prey in ST III and IV, which changes its size several times, an obvious physical impossibility. We just have to assume it's an error. The same might go for the super-massive BoPs in TNG "The Defector", and the teeny-weeny, itsy-bitsy little BoPs seen in DS9 "The Way of the Warrior."
... the ship appears to be smaller in a few scenes ... These shots cannot be used as evidence for anything
And with these two statements it is you who is completely wrong. Canon is based solely upon what is presented on screen, in this case the size of the nuEnterprise has to be determined exclusively based on what we can see. The exact size of the ship is not mentioned in the dialog.
What JJ Abrams, other producers, the designers, intended or wanted is meaningless and irrelevant to canon.
So what you are saying is:
In canon the nuEnterprise can change size and become small or large because it was shown on screen.
So now if JJ wants the ship to remain one size throughout the next Trek movie he'll be in canon violation
Because in the first Trek movie his Enterprise could change size
Thank you T'Girl for a new possible canon violation in the next movie.
I think I'll stay with the 762 metres that was stated on the Blu-Ray.
Even if I think it should be no larger than 425 metres
Actually, the USS Enterprise in TOS being a Constitution Class simply points to an experimental/first ship, the USS Constitution theoretically being built.
Since the TOS Enterprise was launched in 2245, and allowing for 2-3 years to build a ship, it is possible that the USS Constitution testbed (in the Prime timeline) was built and tested around 2238-2240, leaving plenty of time after 2233 for the Constitution-class ships to be in the early design phase in 2233 when the split occurred.
Assuming the Narada's arrival and capabilities get the attention of Starfleet's intelligence, and some Engineering expertise brought in to analyze this information went on to work on the Constitution Class project, it is possible that the Constitution Class may have been delayed due to the designers and engineers coming up with (or extrapolating) different ideas that would have been incorporated into the new ship design. Perhaps even at the expense of various ideas those same engineers came up with in the Prime Reality.
Creatively, they went down a different path as a result of what they saw in the Kelvin shuttle telemetry and sensor data.
T'Girl said:
I don't think any Star Trek ship has ever had it's size mentioned in dialogue, ever. The numbers come from the official sources like technical manuals, and in the case of STXI the only two official products released stating the size if the ship are the "Art of the Film" book and the Bluray, both of which say 725m (not 765m, JTK1!
)Gotta point out that according to Memory Alpha one guy at ILM said "whatever looked good in the shot" about the scaling of the ships in the movie. And FWIW I noticed a scene in the first Transformers where Bumblebee was made made way smaller than the rest of the movie
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T'Girl said:
I don't think any Star Trek ship has ever had it's size mentioned in dialogue, ever. The numbers come from the official sources like technical manuals, and in the case of STXI the only two official products released stating the size if the ship are the "Art of the Film" book and the Bluray, both of which say 725m (not 765m, JTK1!
Gotta point out that according to Memory Alpha one guy at ILM said "whatever looked good in the shot" about the scaling of the ships in the movie. And FWIW I noticed a scene in the first Transformers where Bumblebee was made made way smaller than the rest of the movie
LOL, oooops 725m
Then Abrams should show it being a consistent size, in every shot. And ideally have a major character state on screen the size of the ship, if not exactly, then some thing like Picard's words to Lily during FC.
Any time JTK1, glad I could clear that up for you.
