Will reused sets/props help with the next flick's budget?

[Star Treks]

Since a sequel looks likely, with the success of Star Trek, I've been wondering: how much of the $150 million budget for this movie went into sets, props, and costumes that will be re-usable?

In the end, the success of the franchise on the big screen will depend on it being profitable, so it seems to me that if a smaller percentage of the next film's budget has to go to creating sets from scratch, either more money can go into other aspects of the movie or into advertising or be pure profit.

That's not to say, of course, that there won't be new sets and props, just that maybe some of them can be reused.

I'm just curious if anyone has any thoughts about how much they might potentially not have to spend thanks to the fact that they already have the Enterprise bridge, uniforms, phasers, etc. etc.

 

[Mr. B]

If they maintained the bridge set that might be 2+ million saved but beyond that I doubt there are any reusable sets. Costumes, props and CGI models could add up to another couple million I would guess.

 

[Star Treks]

If they maintained the bridge set that might be 2+ million saved but beyond that I doubt there are any reusable sets. Costumes, props and CGI models could add up to another couple million I would guess.

Well, might they still have sickbay, the transporter pad, and the corridors as well?

Anyway, I suppose a few million saved is nothing to sniff at.

 

[Chess Piece Face]

Hopefully they will NOT cut back the budget, and instead the savings will go towards us seeing other parts of the ship. I want to see the bowling alley.

 

[jefferiestubes8]

storage of sets at Paramount /models

I doubt there are any reusable sets.

Star Trek's engine room scenes were in the Anheuser-Busch beer plant in Van Nuys, California.
I really felt those locations were the weakest part of the nuEnterprise interiors.
If the production designer of TrekXII felt they needed to keep the look the same they only have to return and redress the locations.

CGI models could add up to another couple million I would guess.

These CGI models would save money when used again.

for this Star Trek, everything, grit-and-all, was built in CG. Alex Jaeger was visual effects art director.

from this article.

New technology shaders or lighting may be added in the future but the model itself should pretty much stay the same if there are 2 more feature films using it.
All of these ships had CGI models created for Star TrekXI. Every ship can be reused if the plot requires.

 

[perigee]

Hopefully they will NOT cut back the budget, and instead the savings will go towards us seeing other parts of the ship. I want to see the bowling alley.

... Or perhaps a real G-D engineering deck...

To tell you the truth, I couldn't even guess at how much would actually be saved - apart from the actual hardware, there's also design, revision, and architectural services that could be skipped, the cost of the CG monitor graphics that can be reused.. you're saving on not just what you see on film, but the work that went into designing and creating it.

The film "Deep Impact" had a budget of 1.2M just to dress the completed sets; extremely old data, but props, sets and wardrobe were 8% of "Casablanca"'s budget, which was certainly less demanding.


add it all up, and I wouldn't be surprised if the reusable aspects of ST wouldn't shave 10-20M off the overall budget for the sequel.

 

[Basil]

I'm guessing there will some sort of Trek TV series, and many of the props can be reused for it. By the time another film gets made, they'll probably redo or at least upgrade most of the sets.

 

[section9]

Well, Studio 9 was once again re-used. The most expensive dadgum bridge in history was built for the E. It is still in existence. They will use it again. The old TNG and E bridges have been put away in cold storage. All the costumes can be used again. Paramount will save a ton of dough on properties and sets for the next movie.

Sick Bay will have to be built out and Engineering will need more detailing. We'll also need a Briefing Room, Captain's Quarters, and perhaps Spock's quarters. Other crew quarters might be needed, according to script requirements.

 

[NCC-1701-B]

They could save loads of money by re-using the lens flares

 

[Aike]

Well, Studio 9 was once again re-used. The most expensive dadgum bridge in history was built for the E. It is still in existence. They will use it again. The old TNG and E bridges have been put away in cold storage. All the costumes can be used again. Paramount will save a ton of dough on properties and sets for the next movie.

Sick Bay will have to be built out and Engineering will need more detailing. We'll also need a Briefing Room, Captain's Quarters, and perhaps Spock's quarters. Other crew quarters might be needed, according to script requirements.

Didn´t they sell most of the stuff from the TNG era? I know they sold Picard´s chair.

 

[gastrof]

Personally, I've felt using the brewery, while "a nifty idea", was also dangerous.

What if the location installs new equipment, or the facility shuts down and dismantles, production being moved elsewhere, etc? What if some suit just plain decides "These movie guys ain't gettin' in HERE again"?

It seems they're taking a big chance. This move, possibly a means of cost cutting, could cost them big time in the future, since they might have to actually BUILD a set that looks like the brewery.

I know contracts were likely signed and such, but still, people can violate contracts. They might end up telling Paramount and JJ "Get lost".

No pun intended.

 

[Mr. B]

It seems they're taking a big chance. This move, possibly a means of cost cutting, could cost them big time in the future, since they might have to actually BUILD a set that looks like the brewery.

That would imply the production staff really cared about the appearance of the location. It's not like anyone would actually construct a starship engineering set with concrete floors, a pipe maze and cinder block walls.

 

[Nick Ryder]

Well maybe if they couldn't get the big brewery again, just show part of it via CGI from a window. I always sort of considered "main engineering" in TOS to just be a sort of central control room, but not really the "main main" part of it. So they could always develop a more standard looking control/junction area that just looks into the old brewery set. And then just re-use some cut footage of people running around the set or different angles of shots used in XI for XII if they can't get the same set. I'm sure there are ways of keeping the design asthetic without having to spend a lot recreating the old set.

But another savings will also be the R&D that went into creating this new world. I'm sure that designers and staffers and such spent a lot of time just figuring out what everything should look like, I'm sure they didn't do it for free, even if the designs weren't used. Plus some visuals can be re-used sparingly too. A few million saved is a few million earned right? I'll bet they'd probably save a good 20 Mil easy with all the 'groundwork' already laid. Remember they had to create new shuttles and sets for them and all the costumes and such. I'll wager each costume probably cost them (factoring in union seamstresses and the like) about $200 or more for each person wearing them, plus all the 'scene specific' damage to costuming. But as long as they have a good supply of costuming, they can put more of the budget into creating new alien costumes, maybe redo the Klingon costumes which haven't really changed much since the late 80s.

 

[Phily B]

A lot of money is saved purely from the fact you have a crew together ready to work - Superman Returns budget had quite a few million going to other ideas which is why the budget was huge. It wouldn't surprise me if a few million was put into Star Trek.

I remember Eric Bana saying that the Narada set was pretty huge as well, we won't be seeing that again.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

If the filming of the sequel can't use the brewery, there could be an explanation as to why Engineering looks different. They could say it wasn't finished in XI, or that it was being refit.

 

[theFirebottle]

If the filming of the sequel can't use the brewery, there could be an explanation as to why Engineering looks different. They could say it wasn't finished in XI, or that it was being refit.

Or that it got completely trashed in XI when the ship almost got eaten by a singularity.

I'm using that as my go-to fanwank for the timing questions at the end of the film (Kirk and Pike getting promoted in such a damn hurry before a full audience of cadets despite the heavy losses...) and there's no reason it can't be used to justify other stuff too.

 

[Cdr MacDuff]

With the money saved on reused sets maybe they will have some money to create a futuristic earth city.

 

[Peter the Younger]

If you look at it, they really don't have too many existing sets to work with - there's the bridge, one corridor, the turbolift, sickbay, and probably (guessing here) a partial set for the shuttle bay augmented with CG. The scene where Kirk goes to find Uhura, and she is for some obscure reason sitting in main engineering, suggests they were stretched a little thin. (I mean, what the hell is a comm officer doing sitting at a terminal between some big tanks?) At minimum they're going to need to build at least some crew quarters, and probably another corridor depending on how much ship-board stuff we see.

For the brewery, all they really need to to to satisfy me is to put up some fake walls that suggest the curvature of the hull - either solid sections they can throw up in the background, or greenscreens they can do some CG against. Well that, and maybe some warp cores; it would be kind of cool to see them walk between double rows of glowing M-AM reactors, a shot reminiscent of the missile room in Hunt for Red October.

 

[Cdr MacDuff]

People must remember they will also need to repay the rent to the apple store for all the bridge scenes. Its not negligible for many weeks of shooting.

 

[photon70]

If they maintained the bridge set that might be 2+ million saved but beyond that I doubt there are any reusable sets. Costumes, props and CGI models could add up to another couple million I would guess.

The new bridge was mentioned as costing around US$10mil.

That's a huge savings for any sequel.