What Happened to Starship Exeter—The Completion of a Fanfilm

[Potemkin_Prod]

We've used a standard since we began our project:

P##L##T##-Character-Comp-Note

Page Number, Line Number, Take Number, Main Character, Composition, Note

P04L07T03-Grigory-Closeup-3/4 View

That way the computer sorts all the footage for us into really easy-to-edit segments. As long as they're properly named, then editing doesn't take near-as-long.

Recently, I volunteered to edit another production, and their footage just was a random series of shot numbers 19472, 19573, 17549, 84032. I had to go through a rename them my convention so that I could edit it. For a twenty-minute video, it added four days' more work. Same with their audio which was just WAV02, WAV03, etc.

 

[MikeH92467]

We reach!

 

[Maurice]

Once I get the footage into my NLE (Non-Linear Editing) software I go and add tags to all the footage, calling out more specifics in different columns, which allows me to sort by things like shot number, character, etc. That really helps me when I'm really deep into the edit and trying to find things like a shot of Nick Cook rolling his eyes at me.

 

[Sir Rhosis]

I, too, read the updates with great interest. Sometimes limited understanding of the technicalities, but great interest. Thank you, and keep posting.

OT: I doubt it would be of interest to a wide audience, but I ponder the viability of someone doing a book detailing the various Trek fan productions. Material of this nature would be far more desirable than the typical "The alien was portrayed by Bobby NoName, who arrived at the studio at 8:37 a.m., and filmed his scenes between 9:28 and 10:47 a.m." nonsense, of interest only to... well, nobody, really.

Sir Rhosis

 

[MikeH92467]

Interesting idea, but it may not be possible in many cases. Take Exeter: as Maurice pointed out, the main shoot was pretty much ad hoc. Everyone scattered and there really wasn't anyone person in charge of the overall production between the first "final" cut and Maurice taking over. I really don't think any one person could tell the whole story and tracking everyone down as Maurice found out would be darn near impossible. In other cases like Aurora where you have a product of one person's vision it would be a different situation.

 

[USS Intrepid]

Once I get the footage into my NLE (Non-Linear Editing) software I go and add tags to all the footage, calling out more specifics in different columns, which allows me to sort by things like shot number, character, etc. That really helps me when I'm really deep into the edit and trying to find things like a shot of Nick Cook rolling his eyes at me.

Yeah I do that a lot. It's my only expression.

 

[Maurice]

Interesting idea, but it may not be possible in many cases. Take Exeter: as Maurice pointed out, the main shoot was pretty much ad hoc. Everyone scattered and there really wasn't anyone person in charge of the overall production between the first "final" cut and Maurice taking over. I really don't think any one person could tell the whole story and tracking everyone down as Maurice found out would be darn near impossible. In other cases like Aurora where you have a product of one person's vision it would be a different situation.

Ummm... what?

Jimm Johnson was still in charge, but by that point he'd become a dad two more times and other stuff was going on. Basically when I picked up the ball no one said "no" so I just ran with in (in spurts, as time allowed).

I never implied that tracking people down was difficult. I was in contact with Jimm, Josh, Scott, Dave Weiberg, Dennis and NEO f/x throughout. If we'd needed to get hold of other people we could have located most of them. The only person I totally lost track of was Ben Jasmine. Also, Joel Sarchet did shoot and has made a documentary about the making of the show, which will be sent out to the backers.

Here's the trailer for the Behind the Scenes film:

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​

 

[HarryM]

Fascinating stuff, and once again, congratulations on finishing TTI in such a fine fashion.

 

[Barbreader]

I have to say that finishing TTI was a revelation to me on the pure power of editing.

 

[Maurice]

I have to say that finishing TTI was a revelation to me on the pure power of editing.

Care to elaborate, Barb? I'm curious what you mean,

 

[Barbreader]

I'm not a filmmaker, so I'm not sure I know what I mean. At the risk of exposing my lack of knowledge, I was thinking that you couldn't go back and do a pick-up shoot for a scene or scenes that was/were inadequate. Somehow, you had to get it together with minor additions and CGI. Word had circulated for years that the reason TTI hadn't been finished was that much of what was supposed to be in Act IV was used to complete Act III, and it just couldn't be finished. The film didn't exist and couldn't be created. And some of the people who told me this have a good track record for telling the truth, although none of it was straight from Exeter principles. Also, watching both Exeter films, the acting in the second one appears to be head-and-shoulders above the first. A very big leap for the learning curve from one film, and done by the whole cast. Seems doubtful everyone could have learned that much that fast. Directing and writing were probably factors, too, but I suspect editing was also important in this matter.

I'm a viewer, not a filmmaker. I really don't know this stuff, and I probably should have kept my thoughts to myself and been content to track releases of completed films... something I can do. Some of what I just posted publicly I regard as gossip, and I would never post it at Star Trek Reviewed for that reason. The final release was wonderful, much better than I expected. That's about all I should have said.

 

[doubleohfive]

I think it's probably important to point out that while editing in the way you suggest/interpret the term is certainly accurate to a degree (i.e. not getting pickups a decade after the thing was originally shot), there's obviously a multitude of other things that "editing" constitutes in the world of filmmaking and as evidenced by Maurice's finely honed talents and skilled efforts since taking over the project, in this case this was likewise obviously not the only interpretation of that aspect of the process.

 

[Maurice]

Ah, now I understand. I wasn't challenging, just questioning. I wanted to make sure I was clear on what you were trying to say.

The only people who really knew the state of Act 4 were Jimm, Scott, Dave and I, as we all had copies of the footage and the project. Anyone outside of that would have been speculating or repeating or paraphrasing things (game of "telephone", anyone?) one of us had said. Anyway, Act 4's "problems" weren't different in kind than those in the previous acts, and only peculiar in that there was nothing subsequent to borrow from.

As to the power of editing... editing is where the rubber meets the road. It's the stage where you have to take all these pieces and put them together and see what you actually have. Typically and invariably it's not what anyone anticipated, and that's because a hundred things can affect how it plays, from body language to line delivery to lighting to camera angles and on and on. The more "defects" there are the harder the work is, but, counterintuitively, sometimes working around those defects can lead to more clever and interesting results than when everything fits neatly together as planned. None of that is to make a case for shooting it badly.

A bad editor can make anything awful, and a good editor can make silk purses out of sow's ears. I'll leave it to others to judge which camp I fall into.

 

[USS Intrepid]

editing is where the rubber meets the road. It's the stage where you have to take all these pieces and put them together and see what you actually have. Typically and invariably it's not what anyone anticipated, and that's because a hundred things can affect how it plays, from body language to line delivery to lighting to camera angles and on and on. The more "defects" there are the harder the work is, but, counterintuitively, sometimes working around those defects can lead to more clever and interesting results than when everything fits neatly together as planned. None of that is to make a case for shooting it badly.

A bad editor can make anything awful, and a good editor can make silk purses out of sow's ears. I'll leave it to others to judge which camp I fall into.

I think this is why I actually enjoy editing. It's incredibly satisfying.

 

[DCR]

A bad editor can make anything awful, and a good editor can make silk purses out of sow's ears. I'll leave it to others to judge which camp I fall into.

From what I've seen, you definitely fall on the good editor side of the fence.

 

[MikeH92467]

I have finally gotten around to writing a long-promised story about TTI.

 

[Maurice]

Geez, I thought I replied to this... thanks Mike!

 

[Maurice]

Part 5: Every Film is Written Three Times​

There’s an old Hollywood axiom, frequently attributed to Hitchcock or Kubrick but its actual provenance is unknown, which goes something like:

Every film is written three times: on the page, on the stage, and in editing.

1. Dennis had written the script, committing the story to written words.
2. Scott Cummins had directed the show, committing it to video, “rewriting” it to work on camera.
3. The editors had then constructed the story from the shot footage, “rewriting” it again to work in "time".

EDIT 2022:
The expression "a film is born three times" appears in English as far back as a 1968 essay, but many attribute director Robert Bresson as the original source—possibly in French—but this is unclear.

So, if you were to compare what had been shot to what the script says, you’d see they are different. And when you compare the edited acts to the raw footage from the shoot, you’d see how different it is, too. Each step is a sort of adaptation of the preceding one. What works on the page doesn’t always work on the stage. What works on the stage doesn’t always work on the screen. So, you “rewrite” the story by changing emphasis, rearranging and repurposing material, and sometimes using material in ways it was never intended to.

Such rewriting had occurred throughout the edited acts up to the point I picked it up. Scenes had been deleted, truncated, and expanded. Shots taken for one scene got used in another. Etc. etc.

So, sitting down with Act 4 my job was to take all the raw material at hand and do a “rewrite” which would satisfactorily resolve the story and be—hopefully—entertaining. I wanted to be true to the story we were telling, but I wasn’t concerned about remaining completely faithful to the script or the scenes as shot.

I’m not going to relate the actual order in which I recut everything, because I didn’t do it from start to finish, and a number of things were happening in parallel, but here I’ll summarize the approach I took and the challenges.

My Editorial Priorities

• Get emotion in there (mostly via reactions shots)
• Resolve the problem (related previously) of the one-note tone of the act (created in part by Act 4’s start becoming Act 3’s ending)
• Bring the chaos from the end of Act 3 to a halt in order to create a moment for our characters and audience to catch its collective breath
• From that point on, build all the action towards the big boom, ratcheting up the tension by complicating the situation as the act progressed
• End the story on a note which appropriately resolves Garrovick’s story problem but isn’t mawkish or obvious

The Calm Before the Storm
Act 4 begins in chaos, and in order to create a “build” to the climax, I first needed to button up the situation from Act 3 and bring things to a momentary calm. I did this as follows.

• Show B’fuselek struggling to bring the ship under control (created editorially, not shot for this purpose) and during that…
• Show that the “weirdspace” out here is “patchy”, so that you can see bits of normal space, thus…
• Making it believable that they can detect the shuttle back in normal space (note that this is done entirely without dialog overdubs… and no one to date has questioned it)
• Make the shuttle decoy its own sequence instead of entangling it with the ship racing towards the target

• Restore the Tressaurian ambush (it had been cut out) so as to…
• Create a surprise moment and to cap the shuttle sequence and…
• Make it clear why the Tholians can’t send a dozen ships after our heroes

Tightening the Screws
Once the ship got going again I worked to ratchet up the tension. This was done by rearranging the action so that the problem gets more and more complicated in a manner wherein one complication builds on another.

• Establish a “time lock”, aka a ticking clock (created via Garrovick V/O and an unused bit of transporter room footage from Act Two), then…
• The Tholians spot the Exeter, pursue, and open fire, causing…
• Damage that allows the Tressaurian to escape the brig, adding more danger aboard the ship, thus…
• The Tressaurian can kill a redshirt, illustrating how dangerous he is, (I didn’t invent this, I think Scott did, and, again, it was never shot for this purpose… but cobbled together from unused Act Two footage and a lot of sleight of hand) as…
• Richards heads below to check on the Transporter, while…
• The time-lock shows us that time is running out (not shot for this purpose, but there were some takes of the chronometer for a planned end montage, so I stole a bit of it and animated the readouts to created the ticking clock)
• Richards faces the Tressaurian and LOSES. All hope seems lost just as…
• The clock runs out. It’s now or never, and…
• Hope! Richards' hand reaches for the phaser as…
• B’fuselek looks about to die in agony just as they get closer and closer to the deadly alien device
• Richards saves the day but ZAP! Is she dead?!
• Even after the prototype is successfully deployed, keep tightening the screws by

• Garrovick tells B’fuselek to “Get us out of here!” but the Andorian doesn’t respond at first (wasn't shot this way), and even after he does respond, place the shots of his collapse at this critical escape moment, thus…
• Making the ship's situation more precarious and...
• Create the question of if both he and Richards have died as…
• The device implosion causes weirdspace to collapse so…
• The Captain takes the helm and...
• Drives the ship to get “out” before everything goes to Hell (not in the script and not shot for this purpose)

Wrapping It Up
Finally, for the tag, I wanted to get to the point with the denouement/anticlimax and wrap it up quickly and neatly but still create some dramatic tension. Done by this approach.

• WHOOSH the ship pops out of weirdspace, safe!
• Big payoff shot of the black hole forming (as Harris predicted)
• B'fuselek is OK. But what about Richards?
• The Tressaurians appear and fly off without attacking. The closest thing to "thanks" you'll get from lizards. Their story is done.
• Gut shot: Reveal Richards’ sacrifice and yet…
• Make the story about Garrovick in the end as we…
• Sail off into the starset

There are probably hundreds of small differences between my edit and the previous Act Four edit, but below is a diagram crudely illustrating the big ones, and roughly how story events were rearranged.

​

Note: BOLDED items are unique to that edit and only roughly analogous to action in the other. I may have missed bolding a few or drawing broken lines for items which weren't moved but added or subtracted.​

 

[Tom Hendricks]

Maurice, I really want to thank you for these. As a fellow editor, people don't really understand what it takes when you have situations like this. As a free lance editor, I can't tell you how many times I've been given terrible footage, with terrible coverage. Having to create something greater then the sum of its parts is daunting.

 

[doubleohfive]

I'd like to thank you too Maurice -- these histories have been incredibly informative and enjoyable, and insightful into the process implemented on Exeter (and editing in general.)