The Different Versions of the Enterprise

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Franklin said:
TPTB are going to make their version of NCC-1701. MAYBE they'll keep proportions in mind and make only cosmetic "retro" changes. Or maybe not.

And we'll get our first real clue in fifteen days. I'm really looking forward to that.

 

[Shaw]

Timo said:
The thing that scares me about this is that TPTB must understand that the ship has to be recognizable for the 1960s TV object, and must always have understood this - but they came up with the TMP revamp anyway.

I'm okay with altering basically every aspect of the ship to reflect a "pre-Pike status", as long as I can buy subsequent altering to "Pike status". But that means the saucer shape and size has to remain basically constant; the secondary hull dimensions and curvature, likewise; the neck length can't differ; and so forth. The TMP remake failed on all those accounts. The engineering effort from TOS to TMP would simply have been utterly prohibitive.

I've pointed this out before, but I guess it bares repeating... the effects people of TMP didn't start with the TOS Enterprise, they started with where Matt Jefferies had left off with the Phase II Enterprise (which was only supposed to have had some of it's elements upgraded).

Now, did they know that what Jefferies had drawn was actually quite different from the TOS Enterprise? It is hard to say. Remember that in the 1970s, most of the fans bought the Joseph blue prints and manual and thought that they were accurate... So it shouldn't be hard to believe that when handed Enterprise plans drawn by Matt Jefferies himself, those people believed that they were an accurate starting point.

The fact that the shapes are different doesn't change the story anymore than having different actors play roles that we are already familiar with. As long as Kirk feels like Kirk or Spock feels like Spock, then the story can be communicated to the audience. Same with the Enterprise.

Still, I'm much more of a techie-trekkie, so I spent some time last month playing with the idea of what the ship in TMP would have looked like had they started with the TOS Enterprise, and how the TMP Enterprise might have looked back in the TOS era.

I also show a comparison of earlier drawings of the TMP Enterprise next to the Phase II Enterprise, which illustrates exactly where the major shapes came from. And yes, even though they are quite different from the TOS Enterprise, their origin is still Matt Jefferies.


What If... Study of the Evolution of the
Starship Enterprise (PDF, 2.3 MB)

But the main thing to remember is that this is fiction. And as such, the audience is asked to help the creators of it by suspending their disbelief. It would have been nice if they had gotten the same "actor" to play the Enterprise in TMP as played it in TOS, but that one had retired, so they had to "recast" the part. In the case of Star Trek XI, most of the characters have been recast, but digital effects means that we should get something that looks a lot like the original Enterprise (specially considering the work done with TOS-R). But in the end it is a work of fiction.

I can suspend my disbelief long enough to get the story, and if the story is compelling, then I'll grant them quite a bit of leeway on the other stuff.

 

[USS Mariner]

I love how I'm the TOS-Die Hard, and I'm the one calling for a new 1701 design (for April's ship.) and I know aridas and a few other FRS groupies agree with this.

There's a huge difference between logical extrapolation of a previous 1701, and just fucking about with the design because the CG department needs to get rid of it's budget. The fact that half of the supposed "experts" here have wits too blunt to recognize this shouldn't stop the production from doing something not only interesting, but fitting.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Mariner Class said:
There's a huge difference between logical extrapolation of a previous 1701...

You say this as if that's an important part of the brief of the art department in this case. That's not looking too likely, which is why so much discussion revolves around what the major departures from the old designs are likely to be or ought to be.

It's probably not sticking one's neck out to guess that there will be a saucer up front, a lower hull and two engines behind. Until the 18th, guessing any other detail right is a shot in the dark.

It's not even clear that there is an "April's ship." There seems to be a "Pike's ship," though.

 

[Ezri]

I like this version

 

[Arlo]

Stolen from the trash bins at J.J Central: concept sketch for the Trek XI Enterprise:

(I actually drew this a number of years ago for an art forum contest, Trek as done by Dr. Seuss)

 

[Woulfe]

^ Seuss Trek ! ^

Freakin' briliant !

 

[Ezri]

Woulfe said:
^ Seuss Trek ! ^

Freakin' briliant !

Bones: Captain Captain the red shirt is dead

Kirk: Say not say not the red shirt is dead

Bones: The red shirt I say is dead my Captain

Kirk: My god Bones what shall we do what we shall do

Bones: Nothing my Captain nothing my Captain

Kirk: Why you say that he was a red shit?

Bones: A dead red shirt is a dime a dozen my Captain

 

[Plum]

^^^

Starship Polaris said:
Yeah, but in the documents linked the only specific reference linking the appearance of the ship to the research is to a "negative induction ring" (presumably the solid ring around the ship) in one of the captions. It's otherwise described as "1994 "warp drive" paper of Miguel Alcubierre."

I guess I'm not seeing where either the detailed structure or overall shape of the ship is keyed to parameters or requirements based on research, as opposed to being a conjectural fantasy of the artist based on some general conceptualization.

It's the same problem I have with the notion of what Jefferies did in design terms as representing engineering-oriented thinking. Everything I've read that he said about the process lays it out as very much functional visual design rather than engineering. That is, he decides that because the engines are probably dangerous they ought to be separated from the crew compartment. Okay, that's functionally sensible and he communicates that visually and because the audience can make that connection (maybe subliminally) they buy it - pretty much because they can take good guesses as to how the ship works by looking at it. That functional plausibility sells the design.

But here's what's missing, at the time that Jefferies is sketching away and having his stuff rejected by Roddenberry (as far as can be determined by the statements of Jefferies and Roddenberry):

1) Any definition of what powers the ship or of the technology used to generate the necessary energy;

2) Any concept of how gravity is generated aboard the vessel;

3) Any determination of how food and other consumables, including air, are produced or stored or replenished.

And those three are just for starts.

GR's contribution to the first item was "just make it look like it has power." Matters of gravity generation and food/air were just "we think it's reasonable to assume those problems will be solved."

As Steven Poe (Whitfield) tellingly observes in "The Making Of Star Trek," once you assume those problems solved just about any kind of ship you can imagine can be built.

To have a design actually driven by engineering considerations, though, you need real specific information. Such as: given the thrust expected to be generated by the engines (yeah, I know, I know), just what's the structural and dimensional envelope for the pylons? What are the materials requirements? How far from the crew do the engines need to be? Those answers will dictate what the ship looks like.

The visual/functional answer is: a distance that gives us a good-looking balance. The engineering answer would put that criterion way down the list and quite likely leave it completely off.

Engineering: it's beautiful because it works.
Visually functional design: it appeals to our aesthetic intuition and frame of reference, so we'll believe it works.

There can't be any meaningful engineering logic to a design without defined parameters. If it's decided that gravity is to be simulated, for example, by rotation, that at least suggests some design boundaries.

Those boundaries don't seem to have been laid out by anyone in designing the Enterprise. In 1964 the answers to "where's the power coming from," "how do they feed themselves and what do they breathe" and "what generates gravity" are all the same: magic of some presumably rational kind.

Given the absence of engineering limits, Jefferies develops what he calls a design "envelope" by collecting and ruling out a whole lot of visual material because it's been seen or "looks hokey."

He discards (at GR's bidding, likely) the design for the crew compartment that makes the most sense to him because it makes the ship look slow (Kubrick's designers used it anyway).

Okay, the engines are away from the crew compartment - what's the theoretical or engineering reason for putting them way off the center line? Why is the direction of internal gravitation perpendicular to the axis of acceleration? What's represented by the front of the engines lighting up (when the ship was designed, nothing. Because they later added lights soley for appearence sake, we now have a little "science" of "matter acquisition" or the requirement for bussard collectors as part of "warp" technology).

You have probably collected and read more interview material and documentation by Jefferies than I have, but I haven't seen any contemporary (1964-1965) descriptions of what actual engineering or tech knowledge he used specifically to define those things (as opposed to ideas he may have developed later).

As I said, it looks to me like the main value of all the researching and talking to experts that the producers and designers on Trek did wasn't too much that they got specific or even general ideas that they implemented in the series but that they were guided to acknowledge and think about certain areas so that even if they (as they often did) decided not to pursue answers to them they incorporated evidence that of their awareness. Back to the engines, again: putting them way out there away from the crew acknowledges that you've thought about the dangers involved. It makes sense to the audience. It does not indicate whether you've decided that the power source is antimatter or dynamite or scary monsters, or how exactly that power is utilized.

And in fact the "flexible" and contradictory representations of these things in the first year of Trek demonstrate the big blank spots in the thinking of the designers and producers and writers. For example, they can't settle on what lithium crystals look like because they have no clear idea what they do or what they are. Peeples just needed something to break down that could be replaced by visiting an isolated installation - like a mine or factory planet. After a few weeks they change the names of the things when they realize that "lithium" is not as obscure a word as all that.


Research didn't so much seem to suggest to them what to do as it may have warned them off from doing dumb things. You do enough reading about these things and talking to scientists and science fiction writers and you're less likely to come up with "The Great Vegetable Rebellion" and still be able to look in the mirror to shave. You also acquire some respect and understanding for the scientific and engineering mindsets - how things are thought through, hypotheses formulated, information analyzed - that ultimately make your writing smarter.

Brill! That's how I always saw it. I'm still a Matt Jeffries fan, his designs were great. Just saw 'Metamorphoses' and enjoyed that house design in it, for example.

 

[aridas sofia]

Interersting. I was just reviewing the blueprints of the ringship developed by Jefferies from early Enterprise concepts for GR's aborted 1970s attempt at another space hit -- Starship:

I thought I remembered seeing this. He identifies the ring as a "centriverter" and the propulsion hub as a "centridyne". In other words, a unit devoted to acceleration, and one devoted to some sort of reversal process. This reminds me of how a diametric drive, or Robert Forward's frame-dragging anti-gravity drive might work.

http://www.valdostamuseum.org/hamsmith/ForwardGrav.gif

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_matter

The whole conception reminds me of the sort of clumsy phraseology employed by Franz Joseph when he was describing a spacetime jet at about the same time. As if he had been clued into a very interesting and far out concept, but was unsure just how to precisely depict it in image or words.

Anyhow, I just love dragging this topic so far off focus. Anything that lets me write "antigravity" or "negative energy" just gives me the tingles.

 

[Jackson_Roykirk]

^
^^It looks like this "ringship" concept was resurrected for the vulcan ships in ENT

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Yeah, quite deliberately so by the designers.

If there's any hope or preference I have for the design of the Enterprise in nuTrek, it's simply that it remain conceptually distinct from other franchises or influential properties. That's something that, say, B5 only half-managed; there's a lot of "Star Wars" and "Aliens" in its ship design "DNA" (I wince to use that, but I'm also feeling lazy). Trek has never looked like "2001" or "Star Wars" or "Battlestar Galactica," and to redesign the ships in ways that are too derivative of those properties is just throwing in the towel IMAO.

Oh, and I like round saucers the way aridas likes rings.

 

[Plum]

^^^
I do hope you're right and the designers get this. Well put. Not that I'd dislike a completely new Trek style, just that I agree it would be throwing in the towel if the designs fall back into what came before in another franchise (a franchise in a galaxy far, far, away).

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Here's an interesting paragraph from someone reporting in to AICN, claiming to have seen some footage and/or design work:

I've seen some footage of the new Star Trek flick and I must say I am impressed. I am not a Trekkie and I am not working for the movie industry. It was due to other reasons I got to visit the production faclities and people showed me some scenes that showed what I would call "the Star Trek world". Let me explain. If you watch the TV series and many of the movies than - if you are a Star Wars fan like me - you always have the feeling that there is a discrepancy between the size of the alien worlds / the space ship(s) of the Federation and the locations where most of the scenes have been shot. In other words, the Bridge is more like a living room and does not match the size nor style of gigantic size of the Enterprise at all. It is certainly unbelievable because it's mostly the only place we get to see (and of course three or four other places, but all in all just 1 percent of the ship, I presume).

We'll, this movie is gonna end all that for sure. The "stage play" and Disney like nature of the TV episodes is gone, the "we'll only show you three locations but trust me, this really is a gigantic spaceship we're flying around in"-feeling will also be gone. I would argue that this movie is making use of the Star Wars like decors (as implemented later in the sequels and used immediately in the prequels) therefore expanding our universe more directly (leaves less room for imagination) and making the story a lot more believable, at least to me.

I thought it was very cool. Not sure if the Trekkies will like this move though.

By the way when I saw the new look of the Enterprise, I just wanted to go out and buy a model kit of that or something. I'm quite sure it will get as much positive response as the Milennium Falcon did. Yes, the stuff is that detailed.

 

[Plum]

^^^
Yea, I read that over at Trekmovie.com and, I'm with Orci. Those AICN guys are smarmy twats.

Really, I've NEVER gone to that site. Oh I've tried, but I never last more than a few paragraphs every time. I'm this close to making a website to knock them off the top. It's time.

 

[Holytomato]

I would like to see a more of the Phase II movie design on the ship. Enterprise C & E were the closest we got. Basically, Gabe's design. :thumbsup: Oh heck, the April Fools day design is kEwL as well.

T Minus 15 days, 4 hours, 9 minutes, 10 seconds...

 

[Cary L. Brown]

Holytomato said:
I would like to see a more of the Phase II movie design on the ship. Enterprise C & E were the closest we got. Basically, Gabe's design. :thumbsup: Oh heck, the April Fools day design is kEwL as well.

T Minus 15 days, 4 hours, 9 minutes, 10 seconds...

If they give us a totally different ship, without a satisfactory (if somewhat contrived, I'll admit) explanation like TMP gave us.. ie, if they give us a Lincoln Town Car and tell us it's still "really" a Cadillac... a lot of people will be VERY annoyed. And not just "hardcore fans."

I honestly don't get why everyone is (1) so convinced that this movie is gonna be SET, primarily, on the Enterprise (we haven't been told anything of the sort, so this is PURE SPECULATION), and (2) are so anxious to see the Enterprise thrown aside and have the name put onto a different ship.

Simply stated... if it's not the same ship, it's a new ship. That logic is awfully hard to debate. (Hell, they even said pretty much exactly that in a line of dialog in TMP... "Admiral, this is an almost totally new Enterprise..." which had just basically been torn apart and "rebuilt" from the ground up. Since it clearly WASN'T the same ship... not even with the same internal configuration (otherwise, why would Kirk GET LOST inside???), well... the only real MYSTERY was why Kirk was so excited about "getting the Enterprise back." His ship had been torn down for spare parts already...

Two things are VERY likely in this film.

1) There will be ships in the film besides the Enterprise. It's possible that one of those ships, rather than the Enterprise, could be the primary setting for spaceborn portions of the film.

2) Any new ship can be as creatively designed as is desired without contradicting anything.

Oh, and there's that one other point: Damned near everyone in the world knows what the original Enterprise looks like already.

Yet we continuously get people going on about how the ship is going to be about "CAPTAIN Kirk," commanding the USS Enterprise... but it's gonna look totally different.

When pressed, these people just toss out "well, I'm rubber and you're glue" or some similar nonsense. Whether it's the obnoxious "I'm cooler than you so I'll just put a few symbols in my post after telling you that I'm smarter than you (which, every time I see that, makes me wanna punch the guy doing it!) to the fictitious "I've seen it and it has DRUMSTICKS!" posts... this BBS is just full of people who apparently really really want to see it changed, not because it'll help the story, or because there's something wrong with the original, or because of any other logical reason. It's apparent that they just wanna make other folks unhappy and will take some perverse joy from seeing it.

We're going to see at least one ship in this film that will look little, if anything, like the 1701. Probably quite a few (including background scenes). And we'll see the 1701 at some point in the film. I'll be DEEPLY surprised if the "giggle as I watch the other fans squirm" proposals that the ship will be incompatible with what we already know turn out to be true.

 

[ancient]

Well, I'm sure there will be lots of new stuff for them to design. It's possible that the designers might find it neat to recreate certain elements. That's what happened with the SW prequels. There was a shitload of new stuff, but they recreated several elements, such as the TANTIVE IV corridor. Maybe the main difference between the new model for the ENT and the old one will be more like the differences between CG Yoda and puppet Yoda. Same basic design, just...way better presentation.

 

[Jon1701]

ancient said:
Well, I'm sure there will be lots of new stuff for them to design. It's possible that the designers might find it neat to recreate certain elements. That's what happened with the SW prequels. There was a shitload of new stuff, but they recreated several elements, such as the TANTIVE IV corridor. Maybe the main difference between the new model for the ENT and the old one will be more like the differences between CG Yoda and puppet Yoda. Same basic design, just...way better presentation.

Galaxy Quest. I'm hoping for Galaxy Quest levels of detail.

 

[section9]

Dadgum, but we are looking for the 1701, kids. Problem is, Dr. Boyce can't come walking in with his hip flask of very dry martini. Cabins can't look like a Motel 6.

Look, people don't pop diskettes into the comm board to have a sheaf of paper data pop up out of the printer. Not since, say, 1997, anyway. What will change will be the ship's internals.

Watch for some jokester to put Apple insignias somewhere on the ship. I suspect that the ship remains basically the same.