TOS Control Sound FX - Why the Change?

[Wingsley]

It never ceases to amaze me how fans on a forum like this can pick apart anything having to do with STAR TREK, and yet they can be surprised by something like sound effects. Believe it or not, I noticed the change in the control sounds as far back as when I was a kid in the 1970s.

 

[137th Gebirg]

Well...YAY you!

 

[Warped9]

Believe it or not, I noticed the change in the control sounds as far back as when I was a kid in the 1970s.

Same.

 

[Treadwell]

...a little OT, but in 1986 I was able to see an unfinished version of STIV months before release (my brother-in-law managed an AMC, and the distributor was having them screen it for exhibitors). As far as I've been able to tell the picture was locked, it was simply missing complete credits, had some temp effects (nothing comped into the blue screen, etc), and an early sound mix.

Anyway, all of the buttons on board the Bird of Prey used TOS sound FX. Like Enterprise bridge buttons. I guess someone thought being true to the series was a nice touch, but had overlooked that it was an alien vessel.

(Although since Scotty had worked on it, I guess one could argue he'd installed some Starfleet software....)

 

[Captain Rob]

That sounds like the same work print that I saw early. There was a funny scene where the BoP was doing it's flyby of the Sun for the first time. And on both sides of the model were the special effects crew in cowboy hats. All of which got cut out for the final version.
Back in the 80's there was a Treadwell as Executive VP of the Texas region for United Artists Theatres. I met him a couple of times at my theatre. Really tall guy. He supposedly lived in my neighborhood in Far North Dallas at the time. Any relation?

 

[Ssosmcin]

Believe it or not, I noticed the change in the control sounds as far back as when I was a kid in the 1970s.

Same.

Yeah, it's one of those things that always differentiated the third season from the rest for me. But, as I keep beating into the rotting equestrian carcass, I always noticed the sound mix.

 

[MantaBase]

Hmm....I don't know why this is interesting to me, but it is. And I didn't notice.. likely because I wasn't old enough at the time and after that they were re-runs and not in order.

Question, is it just the "short" sounds or "sound stretches"? Like buttons or clicks or maybe a phaser sound?

I am not familiar with 1960's sound design, but my understanding is that the series began with 100% analog dubbing on effects. Finlay, Grindstaff, and Sorokin actually made an analog library for all of the effects in 66 - different than using a Foley alone. They had to queue up effects on tape to dub them in. This is kinda costly for short or simple sounds. So maybe as part of squeezing them the last season on budget they switched to a Moog or Korg or whatever for the simple sound effects. They don't have to be queued and can be layed in much faster - but you can't really make the same sounds.

But like I said....I don't know what they used/had back then.

EDIT: the reason I asked about which sounds is because ambient sounds like the sound of a room or complex sounds are harder to do with a simple analog synth.

 

[Wingsley]

The sound FX I'm talking about are the control sounds; the musical, or somewhat-musical, noises that are frequently made what a character operates some control panel aboard the Enterprise or a shuttlecraft.

 

[Wingsley]

Here's a direct link to an MP3 sound file off the TrekCore web-site, excerpted from "Where No Man Has Gone Before". This clip plays several of the control sounds common to the first two years of TOS, plus the early part of the third year as well.

The control sounds were replaced partway through the third year, as previously noted, with somewhat less musical sounds that are a little more like touch-tone on a modern telephone.

 

[MantaBase]

The control sounds were replaced partway through the third year, as previously noted, with somewhat less musical sounds that are a little more like touch-tone on a modern telephone.

Yeah - dropping to simple tones sounds like they may have used a syth to save money. It's harder to consistently make "musical" combinations over and over the exact same unless you use tape....then you have the same problem.

Incidentally, the sound at ~ 2 seconds is simply reversed beeps (to me). Likely analog.

A few of the sounds on the clip would be hard to do on a KORG or Moog. But you would be amazed. I was able to do an F1 racer's engine on an analog KORG - gear changes included - just had trouble with hard breaking because the set up only did acceleration - so you would let off and tap the key to make it sound like the driver had the clutch in and was goosing it rather than decelerating with the clutch out. That was the mid/late 70's though.

*I did not do sound design BTW - just had access to the equipment to play with b/c of a good friend.

 

[Treadwell]

Back in the 80's there was a Treadwell as Executive VP of the Texas region for United Artists Theatres. I met him a couple of times at my theatre. Really tall guy. He supposedly lived in my neighborhood in Far North Dallas at the time. Any relation?

No, Treadwell isn't my name, it's just a Star Wars droid name that I've used on multiple forums for years.

 

[Botany Bay]

The sound effects change was pretty early on in the third season. Maybe Freiberger thought it could do with a freshen up along with the change in main titles and the new uniforms?

If it was you Fred, sorry, I preferred the control sounds in the first two seasons...

 

[Nebusj]

The sound effects change was pretty early on in the third season. Maybe Freiberger thought it could do with a freshen up along with the change in main titles and the new uniforms?

If it was you Fred, sorry, I preferred the control sounds in the first two seasons...

``Sigh,'' says Fred Freiberger, ``that's what everyone tells me about everything.''

(Well, I like the new stock shots of the Enterprise they got out for the third season. Also that weird thing they did with Nimoy's voice, that totally worked.)

 

[firstresident]

Does anyone know when Doug Grindstaff left the show to go work on "little house on the prairie"? Perhaps that could have been the reason.

 

[Maurice]

Left what show? Star Trek? Little House didn't start almost 5 years after Trek ended.

 

[firstresident]

I didn't know. I knew that he worked on LHOTP, but I thought that it started in the 60s.

 

[Maurice]

Google is your friend on such matters.