Beautiful TOS Film Warp Drive Effects:

[In_Correct]

In TMP, perhaps for the very first time in Star Trek, The Enterprise is seen going into Warp Drive. Previously in TOS they showed the Enterprise in warp drive but not entering it nor exiting it.

The Enterprise going into Warp Drive in TMP is so beautiful, it literally looks like fireworks. Exiting Warp Drive looks even more beautiful! And then for some reason (or perhaps no reason at all) they decided that this is not how warp drive should look. The TV series from TNG onwards has a cheaper effect, and even in the rest of the TOS films isn't as detailed.

I just had to comment on it.

 

[Christopher]

I don't think the TNG effect was cheaper at all. They were both done using similar slit-scan techniques to optically elongate the images, but the TNG effect stretched the whole ship rather than just the lights. Slit-scan is a very intricate and involved technique.

In fact, the TNG slit-scan warp shots were so expensive and complicated that they only made three of them for "Encounter at Farpoint" (the two used in the main titles and the "turn and run" shot when they fled from Q) and just kept recycling the same three shots for seven seasons. The only other ship-stretching shot we saw was a side-on shot from "Where No One Has Gone Before" (where the Enterprise is already at warp and jumps into ultra-warp or whatever), which was easy to do since it was just a matter of optically widening the shot. And they did a number of warp entries shot from the front, where the ship just jumped toward the camera without actually stretching.

 

[publiusr]

I would have liked to see the slit scan effect done with the refit--but keeping the streaks and only using the TMP tube effect for the ringship types.

 

[2takesfrakes]

I agree that the TMP warp-entry effect was visually the most interesting. I'm not sure I like the prism, sundog-like aspect to it, though. It seemed a bit much, like it had a magical unicorn powering the thing. But they were definitely on the right track.

I liked the idea of the ILM warp speed effect, where it's just thick slabs of colour streaking behind it, like jet trails of some kind. And yet, it looked sort of lazy compared to the TMP effect. There was no detail in it - the sound effect carried it, mostly. The overall impression was that ILM was just looking to make it easy on themselves, rather than impressing an audience.

The stretching ship in TNG with the Q snap light at the end, I just have to accept as being on a TV budget. I mean ... the "D" is at least twice the size of "A" and there's just no dazzle, no razzamatazz, nothing. It's serviceable in simply getting the idea across. And when Generations used the same effect, it's like, come on ... what's with you people? I know I shouldn't get into such a tiswas. But this is ILM, we're talking about, here.

 

[Avro Arrow]

That TMP warp effect is my favourite warp effect of all time.

 

[Griffeytrek]

I agree that the TMP warp-entry effect was visually the most interesting. I'm not sure I like the prism, sundog-like aspect to it, though. It seemed a bit much, like it had a magical unicorn powering the thing. But they were definitely on the right track.

I liked the idea of the ILM warp speed effect, where it's just thick slabs of colour streaking behind it, like jet trails of some kind. And yet, it looked sort of lazy compared to the TMP effect. There was no detail in it - the sound effect carried it, mostly. The overall impression was that ILM was just looking to make it easy on themselves, rather than impressing an audience.

The stretching ship in TNG with the Q snap light at the end, I just have to accept as being on a TV budget. I mean ... the "D" is at least twice the size of "A" and there's just no dazzle, no razzamatazz, nothing. It's serviceable in simply getting the idea across. And when Generations used the same effect, it's like, come on ... what's with you people? I know I shouldn't get into such a tiswas. But this is ILM, we're talking about, here.

heck the TNG effect for the TV Budget was one of the most amazing TV effects that had been pulled off to that point in time. It literally upped the entire television game.

 

[2takesfrakes]

TNG's special effects hold up, even now. They get the story told, for one thing. And for another, effects shots from the STAR TREK movies would occasionally be used in the series, and they fit comfortably with what TNG was already using. Examples of this would be the mushroom spacedock from The Search for Spock, or the starbase used in Wrath of Khan and the outdoor shot of Starfleet Command HQ as it appeared in Voyage Home. So, I'm not trying to say that TNG's FX weren't brilliant, because they were. But when the "D" enters warp, there's no fanfare involved, as there was in the early STAR TREK movies. The distorted stretching of the Enterprise should've been accompanied by a similar effect within the starfield, at the very least. And that Q's finger snaps used the same effect Enterprise's warp speed used cheapened the latter, somewhat. It was just very austere, in the end ...

 

[In_Correct]

Yes, and I never meant to say that TNG's warp drive effect was poor quality. But it looks Run Of The Mill after every starship on TNG, films, and Spin-Offs has made the Slit Scan and Q Snap effects the established method that starships jump to Warp Drive, almost retconning the Warp Drive effects in TMP and the other TOS films.

 

[mos6507]

The blur effect on the ship in TMP is totally late-70s in the sense that it's the same effect used in the opening titles of Superman: The Movie. I just think that and the 70s rainbows have more retro appeal than the funhouse-mirror stretching from TNG onward.

 

[Khan 2.0]

TMP was the trend setter no doubt. Was improved upon (imo) for the sequels and then TNG was almost like a continuation of TMP where theres the white blast at the end..

But i liked TWOK the most . the rainbow FX transfixed me as a kid. especially at the end as it warps away from Reliant. it looks kind of magical (the science indistinguishable from magic thing) . repeated for III-VI of course but looked best in TWOK.. its one of the things that really encapsulated the Star Trek movie 'feel' of the 80s (and early 90s) along with the uniforms, the transporter fx, photon torpedo fx, the nacelles, mushroom spacedock, reliant/excelsior/BOP, the movie logo font, peaks posters, Horners score, and shatners dark curly hair

not really a fan of the JJ BSG thing. although STID did seem to be homaging TWOK a little with the dust trail

 

[Smellmet]

I like the first warp in TWOK the best out of all the movies. They took the TMP effect and refined it to look even more powerful and exciting.

 

[Christopher]

I like the first warp in TWOK the best out of all the movies. They took the TMP effect and refined it to look even more powerful and exciting.

Wasn't the first warp-entry shot in TWOK just a straight-up reuse of stock footage from TMP? I think the only new warp shot ILM did for that one was at the climax where the Enterprise warped away from the Reliant and came toward the screen with light streaks going back from it.

 

[2takesfrakes]

ILM sort of imitated the warp effect in TMP, the first time Enterprise entered warp in Wrath of Khan, but it's a brand new effect. As I recall, individual stars just sort of hurried out of the way, in that one, rather than appearing as long streaks of light.

 

[tharpdevenport]

I voted for the spin-offs.

TMP Christmas tree was always ugly. It had a wow factor the first few times, but it aged very poorly, very quickly.

And while I know nothing about the real science here, I like the streaking of light behind the Enterprise from TWoK onward. I think it could have looked better, but if the ship warps space away at such speeds, wouldn't it leave a streak of light since it's going faster than light be magnitudes of multiplication?


I'd like an updated combo, however. I'd like the rubber band effect improved and a streak left behind catching up at the speed of light. But not as bright and colorful a streak.

 

[Maurice]

Actually, they wanted to do a version of the stretch-snap thing on TMP but there wasn't time, so they went with the streaking instead.

The first warp shot in TWOK is not an entirely new shot. It's a reworked version of the first warp shot from TMP in terms of the ship, but they've done something to replace the warp effect around the ship.

 

[Khan 2.0]

but they've done something to replace the warp effect around the ship.

they just zoomed in so it tallys with the rainbow FX at the end

 

[The Toddler]

Was there consistency among the warp effects in the TOS movies? I got the impression from TMP that the Enterprise itself left streaks if it was accelerating, but only the stars streak when it's at a stable speed. Did they try to adhere to this in later films? I don't remember if they explicitly stated they were at a specific speed in any other movie, unless there's a bit of dialog in Star Trek V that I've forgotten.

I never cared for the firework effect in TMP.

 

[BillJ]

Star Trek III.

 

[tharpdevenport]

Thee warp scenes from lal the ten films and the first J.J. one. Some numb nuts mistook two non-warp scenes and included them:

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I'd say my favorite, having gone threw them now, is the shot of the Enterprise warping away from the Excelsior.


I thought there might be a shot of the Excelsior going to warp in that episode of Voyager[/i], "Flashback", but I couldn't find it on youtube.

 

[Richard Baker]

The Motion Picture Warp Effect is my favorite, to a point.
I love how when the Enterprise starts it's warp jump it moves forward, leaving the light behind- perfect for an extraluminal acceleration. I do not care for the rainbow line flash at the end though- a Q flash at the vanishing point would have been better IMO.