About a week ago, I had a chance to tour Star Trek: The Exhibition as a part of a VIP pre-grandopening tour at the Arizona Science Center. The United Federation of Phoenix (a local Trek and SciFi fan group I'm involved with) had been contacted by the center and asked to function as a reference as the exhibit was being installed. I decided to take advantage of this opportunity to be able to enjoy the exhibit at my own pace and without the crowds. At the time that we were invited to the VIP event, we were told that they were trying to arrange for some special guests who had been involved with Star Trek: The Next Generation while it was in production.
Arrived at the event to discover that the guests were former Trek visual effects supervisor David Stipes as well as Mike and Denise Okuda. I spent a large portion of the day just looking around the exhibit, following and listening to the Okudas explain everything when they went through the exhibit, and getting pictures done on the bridge of the Enterprise.
It was most interesting to just get the Okudas talking Trek. His eyes really light up when you talk Trek with him. I also have to say that it's a very eerily cool feeling of power that you get when you sit in the Captain's chair of the Enterprise.
http://www.trekbbs.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=100&d=1227678033
The United Federation of Phoenix:
This page linked off of the club website has more details about the exhibit. It's packed with both items actually used in the show and replicas of other items from the show. In fact, I'm going to have to go back because I missed seeing quite a number of items (was more focussed on listening to the Okudas speak as we all walked through).
The local Fox affiliate did a couple of brief segments about the exhibit on one of their morning shows. You can watch them from this page. The larger video showing in the center of the page is an interview with another local fan group out of one of the area high schools. The smaller photo in the grey box at the center of the page links to an interview with the Okudas.
Arrived at the event to discover that the guests were former Trek visual effects supervisor David Stipes as well as Mike and Denise Okuda. I spent a large portion of the day just looking around the exhibit, following and listening to the Okudas explain everything when they went through the exhibit, and getting pictures done on the bridge of the Enterprise.
It was most interesting to just get the Okudas talking Trek. His eyes really light up when you talk Trek with him. I also have to say that it's a very eerily cool feeling of power that you get when you sit in the Captain's chair of the Enterprise.
The United Federation of Phoenix:
This page linked off of the club website has more details about the exhibit. It's packed with both items actually used in the show and replicas of other items from the show. In fact, I'm going to have to go back because I missed seeing quite a number of items (was more focussed on listening to the Okudas speak as we all walked through).
The local Fox affiliate did a couple of brief segments about the exhibit on one of their morning shows. You can watch them from this page. The larger video showing in the center of the page is an interview with another local fan group out of one of the area high schools. The smaller photo in the grey box at the center of the page links to an interview with the Okudas.
