Unseen TOS....

[Warped9]

I love the look of the original TOS hangar miniature. But, now, I see it differently than I did as a young teenager. I still think it looks cool even though I know it couldn’t work that way.

Along comes TAS and right away I know their depiction of the hangar is waay out of whack along with new shuttlecraft that are ridiculously sized.

 

[blssdwlf]

And this is a different but pertinent example of being "realistically accurate". You (and/or Doug) believe that it is accurate that the flight deck was depicted on screen as bigger than one that could fit a 947' ship so for your realism you would alter it to fit the way you envision it.

But some of your other examples are a bit sketchy. The weird railings on the bridge is a safety problem, not a scale issue. And main engineering only had that pipe structure behind the panel that was shown from so many different angles that ideas of it being a forced-perspective object no longer could apply to it. Other than that the set looked big but putting people in it indicated scale.

"Screen accurate" is simply is a reference point I'm using when discussing Warped9's flight deck as it is well known and can be easily compared to.

“compromises that were made to get it to fit a 947' ship”

The compromises were not made to get it to fit a 947’ ship. The compromises were made to make the hangar look bigger. They had every possible chance to make the ship bigger than 947’ and never took them. They wanted the ship to be similar in size to a familiar naval form. The hangar is no different than the bridge, where the railings for the upper level come up to a person’s shins. Or main engineering - wildly distorted to look bigger when using certain lenses made for that purpose. The compromise is the hangar, not the ship. And when dealing with distorted sets, what possible use is “screen accurate”? How do we explain features that are plainly way out of scale with the people who would use them?

And this isn’t just me talking. Doug Drexler told me as much as we stood in the re-creation of the main engineering set in Ticonderoga.

 

[aridas sofia]

^You’d have to walk those sets to understand. The big spaces are purposely distorted. Not just the core in engineering - everything. Tiny ladders. Everything flatter than makes any sense. You were seeing a massively distorted set that was then distorted again through a lens. They knew exactly what they were doing. But the blueprints for the sets are not a guide to the way they appear. You’d have to take screen caps and reverse engineer to achieve some approximation of what was intended. Maybe you could get something sensible from the sets but not likely for the hangar. We know what was intended there. We were told- they wanted it to appear far bigger than it could be. But they also wanted the ship to be a familiar size. They said what size the ship was. They never told us what size the hangar was.

So by all means, you are welcome to hold what was onscreen as “real”. But it won’t make any “real” sense unless you visit the sets to see those blueprints translated into human form, and then reverse engineer what was onscreen to account for the lenses.

 

[blssdwlf]

I've reverse engineered most of the sets virtually using screen caps and I don't really see this massive distortion you speak of. What tiny ladders are you referring to?

You are correct in that the size of the flight deck isn't mentioned on screen although the shuttle size of the Galileo was in dialogue which can be used for recreating the flight deck.

^You’d have to walk those sets to understand. The big spaces are purposely distorted. Not just the core in engineering - everything. Tiny ladders. Everything flatter than makes any sense. You were seeing a massively distorted set that was then distorted again through a lens. They knew exactly what they were doing. But the blueprints for the sets are not a guide to the way they appear. You’d have to take screen caps and reverse engineer to achieve some approximation of what was intended. Maybe you could get something sensible from the sets but not likely for the hangar. We know what was intended there. We were told- they wanted it to appear far bigger than it could be. But they also wanted the ship to be a familiar size. They said what size the ship was. They never told us what size the hangar was.

So by all means, you are welcome to hold what was onscreen as “real”. But it won’t make any “real” sense unless you visit the sets to see those blueprints translated into human form, and then reverse engineer what was onscreen to account for the lenses.

 

[Warped9]

A 24ft. L.O.A. shuttlecraft isn’t much different than a 22ft. exterior mockup. That means the “screen accurate” interior is flat out impossible.

Curiously if I subtract the nacelles and the aft landing strut from my 27ft. model the remaining main hull comes out to about 24-25ft—a curious coincidence given I wasn’t even trying for that.

Somewhere I have more accurate dimensions for my model. I'll try to find them. I know that when I was using my original drawings to make the 3D model I found I was off by just a few inches in length to get the interior to fit properly, so I corrected the size of the 3D model ever so slightly to correct the issue. Consequently my 3D model ended up being just a bit larger than my original drawings. Thats actually not bad considering I was afraid I might have made more drastic errors somewhere in the drawings, but no others were revealed.

 

[blssdwlf]

A 24ft. L.O.A. shuttlecraft isn’t much different than a 22ft. exterior mockup. That means the “screen accurate” interior is flat out impossible.

Curiously if I subtract the nacelles and the aft landing strut from my 27ft. model the remaining main hull comes out to about 24-25ft—a curious coincidence given I wasn’t even trying for that.

In a funny way you have demonstrated the best way to make an interior (like the shuttle) into something that could be screen accurate by scaling up the exterior of the shuttle from 24' to something larger. I wonder if you did the same and scaled the Enterprise up to fit the flight deck and then measure the ship without the nacelles you'd end up with 947'? (I'm joking, btw. )

 

[Warped9]

^^ Some have discussed doing that very thing.

The issue with the hangar isn't really one of width so much as of length. The cutaway drawing seen in The Making Of Star Trek is of the proposed hangar miniature as it could appear onscreen and not the actual hangar as he envisioned it as a "real" facility. But most everyone has long assumed that hangar cutaway is what the real hangar looks like in terms of length. Certainly Franz Joseph took it to be representative of the real thing. But if you scale that cutaway with Jefferies’ cutaway drawing of the Enterprise you see it doesn't fit or match with how he drew the hangar bay in the ship's cutaway.

The interior of my model is not truly screen accurate. It has a lower ceiling than the onscreen version and the cabin is a bit shorter, mostly by tightening the space between the chairs. The onscreen version has more room between the chairs. I compensated for the tightened space by having the chairs sit higher off the deck. The onscreen chairs were originally meant for an interior set with a lower ceiling (thats why the chairs seem to sit unusually low), but by the time the decision was made to have an interior with a higher ceiling so the actors could stand upright the chairs had already been constructed, so they kept them as is.


This is a subject that seems endless and raises its head every so often. There is always a repeat of "What about this?" or "What about that?" The one thing I haven't done yet with my hangar model is play with the focal length of my modelling program's camera. So far I've played only with the field of view. Some tweaking there might give me a different look.

I'm curious to see how Mike Nevitt, the guy who is building a 1/25 scale model of the TOS E, tackles the hangar deck. He has already learned the dorsal of the Franz Joseph blueprints makes things complicated in terms of interior space. I understand the appeal of the FJ blueprints because a lot of the interior layout is apparently done. But he would be better off starting with the 11ft. Enterprise and building inward from there. He has already learned the flat sided dorsal of the TOS E has solved his issues with space in the dorsal.

 

[MGagen]

I think you'll find focal length is the key to the puzzle. I found that I could get pretty close to the "look" of the series hangar miniature by using a shorter focal length virtual lens. You do still have to place your viewpoint outside the forward bulkhead, but how is that any different from any other film set. You are usually looking into a room from somewhere "outside" it.

YMMV, but I think it's possible to get a functional hangar deck into a 947' ship. It is tighter than the miniature set depicted it, but it is "close enough" for me.

M.

 

[Warped9]

^^ Do you recall the focal length you used?

 

[blssdwlf]

Yeah, the debates about the flight deck dimensions go back and forth based on one's source material preferences. As you note it doesn't help that sources aren't very consistent so as I wrote above, you have a good working solution.

FWIW, I used an 18mm virtual lens to screen match and the camera is also forward of where a bulkhead could be.

^^ Some have discussed doing that very thing.

The issue with the hangar isn't really one of width so much as of length. The cutaway drawing seen in The Making Of Star Trek is of the proposed hangar miniature as it could appear onscreen and not the actual hangar as he envisioned it as a "real" facility. But most everyone has long assumed that hangar cutaway is what the real hangar looks like in terms of length. Certainly Franz Joseph took it to be representative of the real thing. But if you scale that cutaway with Jefferies’ cutaway drawing of the Enterprise you see it doesn't fit or match with how he drew the hangar bay in the ship's cutaway.

The interior of my model is not truly screen accurate. It has a lower ceiling than the onscreen version and the cabin is a bit shorter, mostly by tightening the space between the chairs. The onscreen version has more room between the chairs. I compensated for the tightened space by having the chairs sit higher off the deck. The onscreen chairs were originally meant for an interior set with a lower ceiling (thats why the chairs seem to sit unusually low), but by the time the decision was made to have an interior with a higher ceiling so the actors could stand upright the chairs had already been constructed, so they kept them as is.


This is a subject that seems endless and raises its head every so often. There is always a repeat of "What about this?" or "What about that?" The one thing I haven't done yet with my hangar model is play with the focal length of my modelling program's camera. So far I've played only with the field of view. Some tweaking there might give me a different look.

I'm curious to see how Mike Nevitt, the guy who is building a 1/25 scale model of the TOS E, tackles the hangar deck. He has already learned the dorsal of the Franz Joseph blueprints makes things complicated in terms of interior space. I understand the appeal of the FJ blueprints because a lot of the interior layout is apparently done. But he would be better off starting with the 11ft. Enterprise and building inward from there. He has already learned the flat sided dorsal of the TOS E has solved his issues with space in the dorsal.

 

[Warped9]

All right. Here's a recap.

A cross-section of the flight deck and maintenance bay.




A view aftward on the centreline with the forward bulkhead and accompanying observation corridor removed. The pov is well under the nacelle support pylons.




Same shot as above, but cropped to create the illusion of a complete hangar. Pov is still under the support pylons.




Forward bulkead and observation corridor back in place. Standing directly on ship's centreline in the observation corridor looking directly aft onto the flight deck. The reflection in the observation windows is of the lighting panels on the observation deck's ceiling.



Additional views.

 

[aridas sofia]

A possibly crazy question I have been pondering is, does a cgi model account for the lens of the eye itself? You build it, render it, view it on a flat screen… how does that compare to what you would see? This latest render you have done does seem very close to what I would imagine it would look like from the forward gallery.

 

[Warped9]

A possibly crazy question I have been pondering is, does a cgi model account for the lens of the eye itself? You build it, render it, view it on a flat screen… how does that compare to what you would see? This latest render you have done does seem very close to what I would imagine it would look like from the forward gallery.

There is a degree of “eyeballing it” to make it look natural. In trying to make it look more like what we saw onscreen I found it was looking distorted. Part of the problem is I didn’t make my model somewhat elongated like the filming miniature so it’s a challenge to accurately recreate that view. It’s further compounded because I didn’t stretch out my observation galleries on both sides of the flight deck, because like my shuttlecraft I was trying to construct a real hangar within the starship rather than just recreate a filming miniature. My model has something of a double hull with ladders that go up to the control towers and down to the maintenance deck beneath the flight deck (and that does extend farther under the support pylons).

While I can’t say exactly what Jefferies had in mind I did follow his lead in not extending the flight deck much under the support pylons. And, lo and behold, everything manages to fit. All the elements are there just like onscreen, but it won’t be “screen accurate” because I’m not working with a production compromise to fulfill an intended illusion.

As I mentioned upthread there are a couple of tweaks I might try. I have already made the walls of the flight deck a more appropriate colour to approximate what we saw on television. I might try to frost the observation gallery windows so they look more white from the outside, but still clear from the inside. I might also try to address the ceiling lights of the observation gallery to have more indirect lighting than obvious lighting panels.

Another issue that makes my model less screen accurate is that all the lighting in the hangar is in the model itself. Unlike the filming miniature there is no light coming from the opening left by the removed/missing forward bulkhead. Consequently there are more shadows in my model than whats seen in the screen version.

Another subtle difference. Remember that my shuttlecraft model is largely based on the 22ft. exterior mockup and scaled up rather than the 22in. filming miniature. And there are subtle differences between the two, namely the hull markings and the miniature wasn’t as well detailed. There are all these subtle things that will make the mind think something doesn’t look right or “screen accurate.”

But what is really amazing is how well Jefferies’ intended sets fit within the ship he designed. Not many fictional vehicles work out that well when you study them.

Maybe someday I’ll tackle the bridge.

 

[Warped9]

I’m pretty sure if you used the hangar cutaway in The Making Of Star Trek as the template for a 3D model it would look like what we saw on television.

 

[aridas sofia]

I would think you’d need to find a similar lens setup to simulate the camera setup they used.

I also think this image you created might show why they made that distorted model. They couldn’t get this shot without distorting the model or having the galleries cut apart. They could have changed the design, but the options there were somewhat limited by the pylon placement.

https://imgur.com/Xja9mb5

 

[blssdwlf]

Not sure if there is any justification needed for why Warped9's flight deck looks different since it is built and lit differently than the miniature. It is "close enough". The miniature isn't distorted or has any weird perspective trickery applied. Heck, if you removed the alcoves from the miniature and left it scaled for a 22' shuttle it *will* fit in a 947' Enterprise.

 

[Warped9]

The miniature isn't distorted or has any weird perspective trickery applied. Heck, if you removed the alcoves from the miniature and left it scaled for a 22' shuttle it *will* fit in a 947' Enterprise.

The miniature is distorted in the sense it’s elongated to some degree to create the effect of a large space, particularly with the forward bulkhead and observation gallery removed. They likely never planned any other shots other than looking directly aft along the ship’s centreline. For them to do any other kind of shots they would have had to build the miniature significantly larger. That wasn’t going to happen as they were filming a television series on a series television budget rather than a feature film with requisite budget and resources. Factor in a shuttlecraft miniature scaled to reflect the undersized 22ft. mockup and you have successfully created the illusion of a very large space.

aridas has mentioned it often over the years: the clue to Jefferies’ intent for a “real” flight deck is in his Enterprise cutaway drawing. And it wasn’t just a one-off drawing because he maintained that sizing when he drew the Phase II refit. The large cutaway drawing of the flight deck seen in The Making Of Star Trek is not of the “real” flight deck, but of the planned filming miniature. Another clue in the drawing itself are the clamshell doors are shown in cross-section as a perfect quarter sphere—thats not how those doors look on the 11 footer or on the Enterprise cutaway’s Jefferies drew. The actual doors are not a perfect quarter sphere—they’re noticeably taller than they are deep.

The same applies to the shuttlecraft. The drawings in TMoST do not represent the shuttlecraft as depicted onscreen—they simply represent the 22ft. mockup.

The real issue we’re facing is a collection of production compromises to create an idea, an illusion, that wasn’t meant to withstand detailed scrutiny for decades after the fact. But they shot themselves in the foot with a production designer who gave a damn about what he was doing and producing a show that resonated with an audience far beyond anything they could have imagined.

 

[blssdwlf]

Hmmm, you don't think they could've shot the miniature from the other direction?

Just add a flat surface for a forward bulkhead, push the camera closer so you don't need to build the Enterprise exterior and voila, you have the flight deck from the other direction.

It seems to me that the flight deck is only elongated if you strongly believe that it needs to fit that space in MJ's cutaway which is fair as you're trying to emulate his design. But looking at the miniature from both front and back it shows no distortion or perspective trickery, IMHO.

I sympathize with your decisions to get things to fit together however I'd say that TOS has the least number of issues on the Enterprise when compared to the movies and later series, IMHO.

The miniature is distorted in the sense it’s elongated to some degree to create the effect of a large space, particularly with the forward bulkhead and observation gallery removed. They likely never planned any other shots other than looking directly aft along the ship’s centreline. For them to do any other kind of shots they would have had to build the miniature significantly larger. That wasn’t going to happen as they were filming a television series on a series television budget rather than a feature film with requisite budget and resources. Factor in a shuttlecraft miniature scaled to reflect the undersized 22ft. mockup and you have successfully created the illusion of a very large space.

aridas has mentioned it often over the years: the clue to Jefferies’ intent for a “real” flight deck is in his Enterprise cutaway drawing. And it wasn’t just a one-off drawing because he maintained that sizing when he drew the Phase II refit. The large cutaway drawing of the flight deck seen in The Making Of Star Trek is not of the “real” flight deck, but of the planned filming miniature. Another clue in the drawing itself are the clamshell doors are shown in cross-section as a perfect quarter sphere—thats not how those doors look on the 11 footer or on the Enterprise cutaway’s Jefferies drew. The actual doors are not a perfect quarter sphere—they’re noticeably taller than they are deep.

The same applies to the shuttlecraft. The drawings in TMoST do not represent the shuttlecraft as depicted onscreen—they simply represent the 22ft. mockup.

The real issue we’re facing is a collection of production compromises to create an idea, an illusion, that wasn’t meant to withstand detailed scrutiny for decades after the fact. But they shot themselves in the foot with a production designer who gave a damn about what he was doing and producing a show that resonated with an audience far beyond anything they could have imagined.

 

[Warped9]

Well, I defer to Jefferies’ intent given he designed the ship. If the flight deck was meant to go under the support pylons he would have drawn it that way, but he didn’t. And he didn’t do it twice.

 

[aridas sofia]

More than that- he moved the pylons on the Phase II refit ostensibly to accommodate the unaltered hangar deck… which he drew on that Phase II cross section almost exactly the way you have it.

Jefferies also made a plan for the hangar deck model that was wildly distorted. Datin didn’t include some of those distortions but unless we can get a plan for what he DID build, we don’t know whether Datin’s model is a modification of Jefferies distorted plan, or an accurate build of what Jefferies included on the Phase II cross section.