ST Movie Ere Rank Pins?

[James Wright]

While the Star Trek movies II thru VII were in production was there a correct way to wear the rank pins on the jackets?
In Generations something doesn't look right about the jacket worn by the actor who would later play Tuvok on the ST SERIES VOYAGER!

JDW

 

[CorporalClegg]

It seems to me they were slightly different in all the films. The costume people always seemed to be fussing with them for some odd reason.

 

[137th Gebirg]

Here is the shot in question:

His rank device is that of Lieutenant. It is incorrectly rotated 90 degrees from the way it should sit on the shoulder strap. The long connecting bar should lie vertically, parallel to the strap, not horizontally perpendicular as it is shown there. That's how Bob Fletcher designed it. He is wearing a tan undershirt, which represents the Engineering, Operations and Communications branches, similar to both Sulus, Uhura and Scotty (before he became Captain).

Everything else on the uniform appears correct. The only other gripe I have is that the uniform seems a little too big for Tim Russ. Very baggy around his chest and shoulders. Other than that, it's fine.

Here's a link at Answers.com that has a good breakdown of the rank devices:
http://www.answers.com/topic/starfleet-ranks-and-insignia

 

[cardinal biggles]

^Actually, Uhura's division color was gray, not mustard.

 

[Therin of Andor]

cardinal biggles said:
^Actually, Uhura's division color was gray, not mustard.

Yep, but her jacket lining would have been the pale tan colour, same as Sulu's. Only the command white collars had matching white inner lining on the jackets.

IIRC, Uhura's old TMP patch had the yellow operations colour, when communications was part of that division?

 

[cardinal biggles]

Therin of Andor said:

cardinal biggles said:
^Actually, Uhura's division color was gray, not mustard.

Yep, but her jacket lining would have been the pale tan colour, same as Sulu's. Only the command white collars had matching white inner lining on the jackets.

I'm not quite following you. What does the color of her jacket lining have to do with the color of the shoulder strap and turtleneck (which is what 137th Gebirg was discussing)?

IIRC, Uhura's old TMP patch had the yellow operations colour, when communications was part of that division?

Yes, in TMP helm, navigation, and communication all had the same division color. Meanwhile, engineering had its own division color (red).

I've found the information on this website to be quite helpful, especially since it's based on Bob Fletcher's notes on uniform designs and rank/division schemes, which could (and maybe still can) be purchased from Lincoln Enterprises/Roddenberry.com:

TMP divisions
TWOK divisions

 

[Therin of Andor]

cardinal biggles said:
I'm not quite following you. What does the color of her jacket lining have to do with the color of the shoulder strap and turtleneck (which is what 137th Gebirg was discussing)?

Because when he mentioned "tan" I assumed he was talking only about the lining, or thinking that the undershirt matched the tan lining. I'd have probably called Sulu's and Scotty's undershirts yellow or gold.

 

[cardinal biggles]

Ah, I see what you mean. Since he was talking about the division color on the undershirt, I just sort of mentally changed it to mustard/gold.

 

[James Wright]

If anyone can find a picture of this jacket lining please direct me to a link!

JDW

 

[cardinal biggles]

You see part of the lining whenever one of the cast members has the front flaps open on their uniform. It's not really a lining so much as two facing panels of the same colored fabric; white for command officers (Kirk and Terrell), tan for everyone else.

 

[Jon1701]

I dont like the uniforms in GEN. They look really ill-fitting. You get the impression that they had some new ones made from the same pattern, but the material looks a bit different and the collars are wrong.

Maybe its the way they shot it but it looks too red. The cut of Shatners uniform is all wrong too. I know him and Jimmy Doohan were a little....erm, rotund by this point but compare the belt line between

The Undiscovered Country

&

Generations

Kirk looks like he is wearing a "skant" with pants....

 

[Peach Wookiee]

^That's better than a skant without pants!

 

[Tomalak]

Jesus, The Shat had gotten rather portly even between 1991 and 1994.

 

[cardinal biggles]

jon1701 said:
I dont like the uniforms in GEN. They look really ill-fitting. You get the impression that they had some new ones made from the same pattern, but the material looks a bit different and the collars are wrong.

Maybe its the way they shot it but it looks too red. The cut of Shatners uniform is all wrong too. I know him and Jimmy Doohan were a little....erm, rotund by this point but compare the belt line between

The Undiscovered Country

&

Generations

Kirk looks like he is wearing a "skant" with pants....

I can't find the quote, but I remember an article about Generations -- it might have been in that all-Trek issue of Entertainment Weekly that came out in advance of Generations -- where costume designer Robert Blackman admitted that he made the uniform jackets for Kirk and Scotty a bit longer to compensate for the fact that they were more portly (particularly Shatner).

 

[Tomalak]

I'm not entirely sure he pulled off that minor miracle.

 

[Timo]

Yes, in TMP helm, navigation, and communication all had the same division color. Meanwhile, engineering had its own division color (red).

Since yellow was so rare in TMP, basically not seen outside the bridge, we might also argue that it was the generic color of command there, optionally worn by the department heads regardless of their "native" color. (White would have been the actual department color of Command Division, thus worn by Kirk and Decker.)

That goes pretty well with the later optional use of white for department heads regardless of department (Saavik in ST3, Scotty in ST5/6).

As for which way the pins should be worn, I'd think there could be some "accidents" even "within universe"... Tuvok the Vulcan might never get sloppy, but Lieutenant Russ the apparent regular human could easily have slapped on his insignia the wrong way around on that fateful morning. Especially if they attach with just a single pin through the middle.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Therin of Andor]

Timo said:
Since yellow was so rare in TMP, basically not seen outside the bridge, we might also argue that it was the generic color of command there

Huh?

"The Making of Star Trek: The Motion Picture" memos were very clear on the six division colours of TMP. Yellow was ship's operations, which happened to include communications and helm. At least a sixth of the crew - probably more - would have had yellow insignia patches and shoulder boards.

optionally worn by the department heads regardless of their "native" color.

They had to change their division colours to report to the bridge?

White would have been the actual department color of Command Division, thus worn by Kirk and Decker.

As confirmed by "The Making of ST:TMP"

That goes pretty well with the later optional use of white for department heads regardless of department (Saavik in ST3, Scotty in ST5/6).

It wasn't optional. And we don't know that Saavik was a department head in ST III. She was only recently out of command school. she may have been a guest on a separate mission for Starfleet, and the grissom was responsible for transporting her and David to monitor the Genesis world.

 

[Timo]

Well, Saavik did wear command colors for some reason or another. And she did seem to serve as the science officer of the mission, even if this wasn't quite explicated.

Fletcher's original intentions for the division and position color schemes don't carry far in the aired reality of assorted mix-ups. As long as the original schemes cannot be completely accepted, it might be worth the effort to streamline as much as possible between TOS and TMP, or TMP and the other movies.

And we don't see yellow outside the bridge, mainly because we don't go outside the bridge much. We visit Main Engineering, where people tend to wear red. We visit Sickbay, with people wearing green. And we visit corridors purposefully deserted to allow the Ilia Probe to roam the ship. Basically every yellowbadge we do see could be a department head...

And of course the bridge would be where the department heads would meet.

Timo Saloniemi

 

[Therin of Andor]

Timo said:
Well, Saavik did wear command colors for some reason or another.

In TOS there were three colours. Up to a third of the crew probably wore command gold, not just Kirk. We saw lots of crewmen and women wearing gold uniforms. I assume lots of jobs, such as Records Officer Bates (in TAS) who wore gold, would be a part of the Command division. (I'm surprised yoemen didn't wear gold for their administrative duties, but in TOS red stood for the very general ship's services.)

In TMP there were six colours. Up to a sixth of the crew may have worn command white patches and epaulets, not just Kirk and Decker.

In ST II-ST VI there were at least five colours seen onscreen. Up to a fifth of the crew may have worn command white collars, not just Kirk and Spock.

ST III's Saavik wore white because she was on the Command track, as evidenced by her "Kobayashi Maru" - and white was the colour for Command division in both TMP and the movies II-VI. She also had diagonal grey slash (the inverse of the cadet red w/ command white slash she wore in ST II, where she was a cadet on the command track).

And she did seem to serve as the science officer of the mission, even if this wasn't quite explicated.

I never got the impression she was a permanent member of the Grissom crew.

Fletcher's original intentions for the division and position color schemes don't carry far in the aired reality of assorted mix-ups.

What's mixed up? We have the memos of Fletcher's intentions, and - until they seemed to lose his rule book (by about ST VI) - plenty of on-screen evidence that seems to match.

TMP: Command (white), Science (orange), Ship's operations/Helm (yellow), Medical (green), Security (grey), Engineering (red).

ST II-VI: Command (white), Science/Communications (grey), Engineering/Helm (yellow), Medical (green), Cadet (red).

As long as the original schemes cannot be completely accepted

???

By you only, I'd think.

it might be worth the effort to streamline as much as possible between TOS and TMP, or TMP and the other movies.

Why? Starfleet went from three divisions (TOS) to six and more for the movies and back to three by TNG. And there were only three in ENT. Why add layers of complication where none are needed? You can't force every ST fan to accept your wacky idea that a yellow patch in TMP suddenly means "a department head, especially when on duty on the bridge".

And we don't see yellow outside the bridge, mainly because we don't go outside the bridge much.

So? Bob Fletcher has stated what the six colours meant for TMP. He was in charge. That's good enough for me. We aren't going to get anything closer to canonical, so why not go with his word?

 

[Timo]

The problem with "he intended it this way" lies in the occasions where it didn't happen that way. They aren't many, but they are still there, and some of them are highly prominent. And while no inconsistency directly affects the yellow badges of TMP, once we start down the path of deconflicting the onscreen stuff, the badges are one of the things we could jiggle a bit.

Fletcher's scheme doesn't allow for the uniform of Valeris. It doesn't explain the collar color changes of Scotty. It seems to suggest that Saavik was a cadet when she in fact (and quite explicity, both verbally and visually) was a commissioned officer. Put short, it needs patching. And the degree of patching applied depends on who's doing the patching - it won't become official, it won't become canonical, and it won't become consensus, but it will still be necessary for those wishing to see a self-consistent reality in the inconsistent fiction on the screen.

My take on this is the path of minimum resistance, sort of. Accept everything else but make white an optional color for department heads, and you explain away Scotty and Saavik. Also abandon the narrow view that red would be the color for cadets only, and extend the use of red collars to Academy trainers, postgraduate students and the like, and you explain away ST2 and ST6.

Let the strap tell the division, let the optional mismatched collar tell a different story. There's a functional need for that, really. Department heads should stand out from the crowd. So should instructors and trainees - the former for the convenience of the latter, the latter for the safety of everybody! Yet all these people should also be identified with their division, their field of expertise, and other parts of their clothing can do that.

Alternately, accept Fletcher's intentions and postulate that these people dress up all wrong every now and then, either by mistake or just for fun, and damn the military discipline that makes them don uniforms in the first place. Not my cup of decaf.

Timo Saloniemi