Sound in outer space

[urbandk]

This might already have been addressed.

I understand there's a new "respect" for hard science in the upcoming film. I'll believe it when I hear it. One easy nod to science would be to make outer space silent, as it actually is, rather than the tired sci-fi action trope of explosions, lasers, and other weirdness.

I await this film with bated breath and am sure it will be magnificent, but the kick I get whenever I watch Alien or 2001 would be a welcome addition/subtraction to this new film, especially since it's set in an alternate timeline. Maybe in this one space won't be full of ether.

 

[trevanian]

Odds of nosoundinspace for this film are probably, well, astronomical.

Abrams is a SW guy, and what did GL tell ADF way back when ... this is an expensive movie, and the audiences EXPECT to hear booms and see fireballs in space, so that is what they are going to get (paraphrased)

Science in this movie is probably a matter of making the backgrounds look like JPL imagery, nothing at all that relates to drama or good extrapolation. There's no indication that they did any of the expected research for design, so it'd be strange for them to do anything else along those lines except to placate NASA folk with a genuflection in their direction.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Yep, exactly like Roddenberry.

 

[SalvorHardin]

No, thanks.

I like sound with my space battles no matter how scientifically inaccurate it is.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

Plus last time I check just about every scfi series or movie that features space battles uses sound in space.

 

[trevanian]

Yep, exactly like Roddenberry.

Except for TMP, absolutely right.

But in TMP, mostly very muted sound in space, NO fireballs (till the alleged director's cut), and some acknowledgement of projections and extrapolation of future space progress (building ship in space, y'know, REASONABLE and legitimate extrapolation.)

 

[trevanian]

Plus last time I check just about every scfi series or movie that features space battles uses sound in space.

Firefly (feel free to check again.)

 

[urbandk]

Plus last time I check just about every scfi series or movie that features space battles uses sound in space.

Firefly (feel free to check again.)

Yeah that's cool. I'd never watched Firefly, but I just looked up an episode. I guess they used music for ambiance instead.

 

[indranee]

This might already have been addressed.

I understand there's a new "respect" for hard science in the upcoming film. I'll believe it when I hear it. One easy nod to science would be to make outer space silent, as it actually is, rather than the tired sci-fi action trope of explosions, lasers, and other weirdness.

I await this film with bated breath and am sure it will be magnificent, but the kick I get whenever I watch Alien or 2001 would be a welcome addition/subtraction to this new film, especially since it's set in an alternate timeline. Maybe in this one space won't be full of ether.

no way. space battles and all? gotta have noise.

 

[shapeshifter]

I agree. A talented enough composer could create music/instrument effects to replace the usual space movie sounds which are not supposed to be audible. Probably did not happen here though.

 

[urbandk]

you know, it's funny... there was a sequence in "first contact," in which they're outside the ship. i think that might have been silent.

i know i'm fighting a hopeless battle here, but as long as people are allowed to pull their hair out over the finer points of warp travel (warp 15 anyone?), i thought i might as well toss my two cents in over this obvious science violation.

 

[SalvorHardin]

you know, it's funny... there was a sequence in "first contact," in which they're outside the ship. i think that might have been silent.

Wasn't there phaser fire sound when they were shooting those Borg out there on the deflector dish ?
Can't remember right now

 

[trevanian]

There's a whole different way of doing the nosoundinspace thing that nobody has done in a big feature (outside of 2001, such as the Pool retrieval sequence), which surprises me ... where you use the cutting of interiorsound / exteriornosound to create the dynamic. Lots of folks do the no sound/justmusic to stylize a sequence (QUANTUM OF SOLACE does something like that during their night at the opera), but the intercut thing would be really effective if you had the right blend of sound fx for the interiors and did it right.

 

[trevanian]

you know, it's funny... there was a sequence in "first contact," in which they're outside the ship. i think that might have been silent.

Wasn't there phaser fire sound when they were shooting those Borg out there on the deflector dish ?
Can't remember right now

Yeah, and the sound of steam when the borg gets blown off the dish. Plenty o' sound, plus slow broody music.

 

[urbandk]

There's a whole different way of doing the nosoundinspace thing that nobody has done in a big feature (outside of 2001, such as the Pool retrieval sequence), which surprises me ... where you use the cutting of interiorsound / exteriornosound to create the dynamic. Lots of folks do the no sound/justmusic to stylize a sequence (QUANTUM OF SOLACE does something like that during their night at the opera), but the intercut thing would be really effective if you had the right blend of sound fx for the interiors and did it right.

that's a good point. when it was hard for me to suspend my disbelief i would pretend that the sounds outside were what people in the ships were actually hearing inside the ships, except in like star wars II, obi wan escaping a missle in outer space; there i just didn't give a s---.

 

[JuanBolio]

I'd rather they didn't, and I'd also rather that explosions in space LOOK like the real thing, but I really don't expect HARD sci-fi from Star Trek or Abrams... and especially not from the two combined.

I'm sure it'll be fine anyway.

 

[blockaderunner]

You know, if it serves the plot or has a dramatic resonance, to hell with the implausibility. If I wanted to watch a science oriented show, I'll stick with the Science Channel or Nova. This is Star Trek for goodness sake. When then majority of so called "alien" sentients are bipedal, with limbs with x amount of digits with, at the most, one pair of opposable ones, and all their anatomy almost in all the same places as ours, "hard science" took off long time ago.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

This is Star Trek for goodness sake. When then majority of so called "alien" sentients are bipedal, with limbs with x amount of digits with, at the most, one pair of opposable ones, and all their anatomy almost in all the same places as ours, "hard science" took off long time ago.

Exactly.

Star Trek is built from a handful of pulp space opera tropes that were pretty clearly defined by the end of World War II. For the most part it comes by its scientific rationalizations second-hand, from sources that were outdated at the time that it was first aired.

People make rather a to-do about Roddenberry "consulting" with scientists, NASA, folks at the Rand Corporation and so forth - but go back and read "The Making Of Star Trek" and the various memos reproduced and so on, and what you find time after time is more or less "well, that was what the scientists told us but we found it undramatic so we did something different." It comes up specifically with reference to sound in space, yeah, but also to the hand weapons, clothing design and so forth.

The other common refrain in the book is "we don't know how it works but it looks like it works, we're willing to assume that it can be made to work in the future because we need it and it seems plausible to us and we avoid discussing how it works." That non-researched non-reasoning is invoked in regard to all the most basic technologies that make the Enterprise work in the show - artificial gravity, maintenance of environment and food supplies, faster-than-light travel.

 

[ST-One]

There's a whole different way of doing the nosoundinspace thing that nobody has done in a big feature (outside of 2001, such as the Pool retrieval sequence),...

And what a bore to watch that one is...
I'd prefer an Armageddon-like sound-design of any realism in my sci-fi action-movies.

 

[ST-One]

This is Star Trek for goodness sake. When then majority of so called "alien" sentients are bipedal, with limbs with x amount of digits with, at the most, one pair of opposable ones, and all their anatomy almost in all the same places as ours, "hard science" took off long time ago.

Exactly.

Star Trek is built from a handful of pulp space opera tropes that were pretty clearly defined by the end of World War II. For the most part it comes by its scientific rationalizations second-hand, from sources that were outdated at the time that it was first aired.

People make rather a to-do about Roddenberry "consulting" with scientists, NASA, folks at the Rand Corporation and so forth - but go back and read "The Making Of Star Trek" and the various memos reproduced and so on, and what you find time after time is more or less "well, that was what the scientists told us but we found it undramatic so we did something different." It comes up specifically with reference to sound in space, yeah, but also to the hand weapons, clothing design and so forth.

The other common refrain in the book is "we don't know how it works but it looks like it works, we're willing to assume that it can be made to work in the future because we need it and it seems plausible to us and we avoid discussing how it works." That non-researched non-reasoning is invoked in regard to all the most basic technologies that make the Enterprise work in the show - artificial gravity, maintenance of environment and food supplies, faster-than-light travel.

The single-piece elevator doors (ever noticed that every turbo-lift door-half consists of only one element?)