Prodigy continues a Vaunted Trek Tradition

[Serin117]

So earlier this year, Nickelodeon dropped a number for the length of the Protostar from ST Prodigy.
139m.

At the time, that number didn't phase me much.
My own modelling of the ship had more or less come to a halt due to lack of reliable reference. And I wasn't much concerned given it was a super official number.

That all changed when I got my grubby mits on the Prodigy Supernova game files.
See, turns out they contain within them an incredibly well detailed version of the bridge, and at least a semi-decent version of the Protostar herself. I assume the bridge is a direct bake down of the in-show assets.
Whereas the ship is a bit less clearly descended from the show asset.
Now obviously we can't take things in game as accurate on their own to their actual in-show assets, but we can assume that at least the character/bridge/rooms assets are accurate to each other.

So I set about doing the obvious thing - attempting to stick the bridge and characters into the ship asset.
That's where we run into problems with our 139m number.

As it turns out, Janeway (who is about 1.71m tall according to the game) would have to be about 0.629m tall for that initial number to work.

Which looks a bit like this.

So, in the greatest traditions of Star Trek, it seems that size and accuracy have taken the much-worn back seat to what looks good in camera and for the plot.

That's how you know its a real Trek show.

 

[Serin117]

Oh and here's a scale pic for the Americans.
Sorry, don't have any boulders the size of a small boulder.

 

[Serin117]

So that puts the Protostar firmly kinda there.
And there.

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

So that puts the Protostar firmly kinda there.
And there.

Can you add in the Galaxy Class and the rest of the 24th century StarFleet StarShips in for comparison and eliminate the inaccurately scaled USS ProtoStar.

Also addin the Enterprise-J & Enterprise-F just for fun in scaling.

Also add in Rio's La Sirena & the StarFleet Auxilliary craft (RunAbouts / La Sirena).

If you have the capability, add in the 31st century ships for scaling comparison as well =D

Heck might as well include the longer Connie from SNW as well =D.

 

[Serin117]

Can you add in the Galaxy Class and the rest of the 24th century StarFleet StarShips in for comparison and eliminate the inaccurately scaled USS ProtoStar.

Also addin the Enterprise-J & Enterprise-F just for fun in scaling.

Also add in Rio's La Sirena & the StarFleet Auxilliary craft (RunAbouts / La Sirena).

If you have the capability, add in the 31st century ships for scaling comparison as well =D

Heck might as well include the longer Connie from SNW as well =D.

Look mate I've only got 24gb of vram here :P

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

Look mate I've only got 24gb of vram here :P

Time to put that 24 GB of VRAM to good use =D

 

[Serin117]

Kinda sort somewhere around there.
I'll have to dig around for a D asset. And dig up Marc's La Sirena.

 

[Deks]

Wow... that certainly puts things into perspective, doesn't it?
I don't understand why would it be such a big deal for the show makers to redo the measurements of the Protostar and just say its 376m?

Really though, the perspective shots make it seem the ship is indeed smaller than what it is and in others, much bigger.
VOY in comparison looks very big especially in 'The Good Shepherd'... so, wouldn't VOY also be BIGGER in actuality?

But then, the Protostar runs into the issue of having WAY too much space dedicated to machinery/engines, does it not?
Well, maybe not since it IS the UFP Transwarp equivalent using a Protostar as a source of energy.

So, smaller crew than VOY (mainly in the saucer), and more automated.

 

[Tuskin38]

I was thinking maybe they scaled up the bridge interior for gameplay reasons, but it looks correct based off shots from the show

 

[Wouter]

So that puts the Protostar firmly kinda there.
And there.

And what length would it work better, that is to say, a compromise between the seemingly small exterior (in comparison with an Intrepid) and the too large bridge?

It was already clear that the scaling of the Dauntless vs the Protostar was also off, though I think the latter is meant to be significantly smaller (maybe the size of a Nova or thereabouts) but the bridge wasn't correctly sized on the exterior model.

IIRC, the size of the Defiant is disputed between 120m and 170m, as well? As you say, scaling issues are a Star Trek staple.

 

[F. King Daniel]

Third person videogames often scale indoor environments up by around 1.5 times in order for a better playing experience. I remember waaaaaay back in 2001 playing Max Payne and thinking the indoor environments looked wrong somehow but it was years before I read about this trick and it all made sense.

Remember also that Jankom Pog is canonically 3 feet tall.

It still bothers me that the 2009 Enterprise bridge should stick into the plaza behind, but... that's tv/movie magic

Also, why are there fan designs in an officially posted size comparison chart??

EDIT: Excellent analysis, btw

 

[Serin117]

Third person videogames often scale indoor environments up by around 1.5 times in order for a better playing experience. I remember waaaaaay back in 2001 playing Max Payne and thinking the indoor environments looked wrong somehow but it was years before I read about this trick and it all made sense.

Remember also that Jankom Pog is canonically 3 feet tall.

So on these points in particular, we can safely assume that the character assets are somewhere within 5cm - 30cm of accurate. Obviously no way to tell without getting mits on actual reference models.
But, we know that Kate Mulgrew is 1.65m tall according to the google - and our good holographic Janeway is 1.7m tall here in the game files. I could easily see the extra 5cm as hair and hair alone

In either case, we can see that the characters pretty spot on in terms of relative size to the bridge. Dal and co can sit happily in that centre seat without scale issues.
I think its safe to take them and their bridge as 'ground truth'.
And as I said, I also think they're all pretty damn close to being straight bake-downs of their show assets. The texture details are fantastic for what they are.

Here's our Tellarite's dimensions, btw.

 

[Serin117]

I was thinking maybe they scaled up the bridge interior for gameplay reasons, but it looks correct based off shots from the show

Yeah so don't trust actual gameplay for reference.
Devs pull all kinds of tricks in camera to fake out things and make things look better for a given shot.
Particularly with FOV - as in field of view. There are shots in there with the kids and Janeway that have them straight up flattened for a good shot.

 

[F. King Daniel]

So on these points in particular, we can safely assume that the character assets are somewhere within 5cm - 30cm of accurate. Obviously no way to tell without getting mits on actual reference models.
But, we know that Kate Mulgrew is 1.65m tall according to the google - and our good holographic Janeway is 1.7m tall here in the game files. I could easily see the extra 5cm as hair and hair alone

In either case, we can see that the characters pretty spot on in terms of relative size to the bridge. Dal and co can sit happily in that centre seat without scale issues.
I think its safe to take them and their bridge as 'ground truth'.
And as I said, I also think they're all pretty damn close to being straight bake-downs of their show assets. The texture details are fantastic for what they are.

Here's our Tellarite's dimensions, btw.

That height really doesn't square with this:

I mean, I know it's a cartoon but...

 

[NCC-73515]

I remember waaaaaay back in 2001 playing Max Payne and thinking the indoor environments looked wrong somehow but it was years before I read about this trick and it all made sense.

What a great game. The only thing wrong with it was his face! 2 was amazing as well, perhaps even better. Haven't played 3.

But, we know that Kate Mulgrew is 1.65m tall according to the google - and our good holographic Janeway is 1.7m tall here in the game files. I could easily see the extra 5cm as hair and hair alone

And heels I guess
Can you stretch the faces into funny caricatures and put the bodies in funny poses? I've seen people do that with HL2 character models

 

[Serin117]

What a great game. The only thing wrong with it was his face! 2 was amazing as well, perhaps even better. Haven't played 3.


And heels I guess
Can you stretch the faces into funny caricatures and put the bodies in funny poses? I've seen people do that with HL2 character models

I may or may not be capable of such things.

 

[David cgc]

Also, why are there fan designs in an officially posted size comparison chart??

Because if you want to make a Trek scale chart, there are a hundred on the internet that'll do half the work for you (my favorite part is the starfield background being added with the paintbucket-tool and eating away half of the Andromeda's nacelle). Dan Carlson at Star Trek Minutiae recognized the base chart as one of his and added in some more explicit acknowledgement of non-canon designs (see the April 5, 2022 news update).

 

[Tuskin38]

I knew that looked familiar.

 

[Serin117]

Ground truth.

Game assets.

 

[NCC-73515]

I may or may not be capable of such things.

Janeway when she sees coffee.