Rethinking TMP....

[Warped9]

Ever since Star Trek: The Motion Picture debuted in 1979 I have had a thought in the back of my mind that comes to the fore every so often.

Something was off with the overall look of the film.

Make no mistake I quite like a lot of what was done in TMP. It brought a level of detail and realism to the Star Trek universe that simply wasn't possible on the original series and to be appreciated on 1960's era television.

We're meant to accept the idea that TMP is definitely set in the same universe/continuity as TOS and that it takes place barely three years after the 5-year mission. But what has always bothered me is that the changes I saw on the big screen struck me as being too drastic to be of the same universe and within such a short period of time. TMP didn't look like an extension of TOS, but rather a reimagining of the TOS universe. It didn't look convincingly evolutionary particularly if we're to accept the story takes place within a scant few years of the original series.

So every so often over the decades I've taken pen or pencil to paper and sketched out ideas of how I might have designed the refit Enterprise, the Starfleet shuttlecraft, the weapons, the uniforms and such. And now I'd like to try modeling some of that in 3D.


I've long felt they went too far with the Enterprise redesign. It was fine if it was supposed to be an entirely new ship, but as a refit, even an extensive one, of the existing ship it just wasn't convincing enough.

The nacelles don't look too bad in profile, but in plan view they look too slender for the mass of the ship. The secondary hull looks a bit oddly bloated in shape compared to the original form. I never really cared for the arrangement surrounding the lower sensor array on the bottom of the saucer. And there are odd bits here and there that just don't work for me.

I think the general idea behind the TMP isn't bad, but I question the final execution.

It must also be said that whatever my issues with the TMP refit I do like it better than Matt Jefferies' Phase II version. While I think MJ's design for the TOS Enterprise was inspired I don't really care for what he did with his Phase II redesign. He is the one who originated the redesigned thin warp nacelles along with the swept back support pylons--apparently he was never crazy about the cylindrical style nacelles of the TOS design. I find that weird, but there it is.

MJ also relocated the main photon torpedo launchers to the base of the dorsal. That's fine, but then in TMP they decided to run the ship's main power conduit right up through the dorsal and right behind the torpedo launcer. That never struck me as a well thought out idea.

I think part of the problem I have with the TMP refit is that it some ways it looks more retro than the TOS E. Instead of allowing for the highly advanced technology assumed for the TOS E they decided to try depicting things as real world as possible. Hence we got the RC thruster all over the ship as well as the plating effect all over the hull. All sorts of stuff was added to eliminate the largely smooth appearance of the original deign. It was like taking the infamous gridlines and ramping up the idea.


Some early ideas from some years ago.




Anyway within the next few day I hope to start sharing some modeled ideas on a reimagined TMP refit.

Thoughts anyone?

 

[Kaiser]

Looks ok to me and the logic behind your idea's is sound

 

[Warped9]

I'm not thinking of just adding bits to the existing TOS design, but rather subtly tweaking the existing elements into something of a new form that you could still believe was the original ship refit.

 

[Kor]

Lately I question the notion that TMP only took place a few years after TOS. Were there any official sources that stated this prior to the Okuda Chronology?

In an interview included in the TMP-DE special features, Robert Wise said the understanding was that the movie took place ten years after the series, since that's how much time had passed in real life. He said he didn't know where the idea came from that the movie only took place a couple years after the series (he probably wasn't familiar with the Okuda book which came out years later, and nobody should expect him to be).

Maybe a timeframe of a decade would give a little more leeway for designs to have changed so much between the events of the series and the motion picture.

Oops, sorry, I'm getting off-topic.

I like your ship design. I think it's more of a natural progression from what we saw in TOS.

Kor

 

[Warped9]

^^ No, you're not off topic because I have long thought it made more sense to have another 5-year mission set between TOS and TMP. You can squint and rationalize it because there's next to nothing onscreen that argues otherwise.

There is only Kirk's line of "five years out there" to reconcile and you could accept that as an offhand remark. If only his line had said "my years out there" then everything would be peachy.

 

[Hartzilla2007]

TMP didn't look like an extension of TOS, but rather a reimagining of the TOS universe.

I can't help but think that was idea.

 

[aalenfae]

Wow, those are lovely nacelles! You've done a great job keeping the simple, greeble-free look of TOS, too. I like it. I'd love to see this version modeled out in 3D.

 

[Warped9]

I can't help but think that was idea.

I think they got caught up in the idea of what was possible with a feature film budget and lost sight (a little bit) of staying connected to the original source materiel.

Wow, those are lovely nacelles! You've done a great job keeping the simple, greeble-free look of TOS, too. I like it. I'd love to see this version modeled out in 3D.

Thanks. I hope to keep something of the original nacelle's heft to retain that feeling of power and visual balance.

 

[Kor]

I can't help but think that was idea.

Yes, Roddenberry's novelization of TMP rationalized it by presenting the conceit that TOS was actually a fictionalized (and somewhat stylized and sensationalized) account of what "really" happened, and that TMP was a more faithful depiction of the "real" universe.

Kor

 

[Hartzilla2007]

I think they got caught up in the idea of what was possible with a feature film budget and lost sight (a little bit) of staying connected to the original source materiel.

No they were pretty much over hauling everything as far back as the Phase II TV series.

 

[Warped9]

Wow, those are lovely nacelles! You've done a great job keeping the simple, greeble-free look of TOS, too. I like it. I'd love to see this version modeled out in 3D.

Thanks. I hope to keep something of the original nacelle's heft to retain that feeling of power and visual balance.

No they were pretty much over hauling everything as far back as the Phase II TV series.

Even though I don't care for the Phase II refit design it's easy to accept it as the same TOS ship. And Phase II was going to use the TOS uniforms and what we have seen of many of the sets look very much like redresses of many of the original sets.

 

[Warped9]

At this point very little is set in stone. There are elements of the TMP refit I might try to retain if possible.

The aztec pattern isn't one, though.

 

[Maurice]

Just to clarify, Jefferies didn't move the torpedoes to the base of the dorsal: he moved the phasers there. It was the TMP people who changed that phaser tube into the torpedo deck.

I don't think the Star Trek [Phase] II sets would] have looked much like those from TOS based on the photos I've seen of the sets under construction. They seemed to be going with a different aesthetic, albeit not the same one as the eventual TMP sets. The corridors are the things that looked the most TOS like. as below:

 

[Warped9]

I don't think the Star Trek [Phase] II sets would] have looked much like those from TOS based on the photos I've seen of the sets under construction. They seemed to be going with a different aesthetic, albeit not the same one as the eventual TMP sets. The corridors are the things that looked the most TOS like. as below:

That looks like a redress or moderate modification of the TOS corridors. The aesthetic might be different (more like "The Cage"), but it still looks essentially like what we saw in TOS. It's distinctly dissimilar from what was down with the coridors in TMP.

 

[Warped9]

I'll be using Polar Lights' drawings of the TOS E given I understand they best reflect the 11 footer's forms. Since there will be a lot of detail changes then I am most concerned with proportions as well as sizes and shapes of certain established elements.




A little free thinking. The ship could have some of its components separated during the refit. The saucer could be moderately reconfigured and even expanded to some extent although I quite like the overall original proportions. I could see making the scallop cut on the saucer underside less pronounced. It seemed to get even more pronounced on the TMP design. I also didn't care for how the lessened the angle of the saucer's rim on the TMP design.

The secondary hull could have its outer hull stripped away allowing for some reconfiguring to allow for some expansion. As such it's possible the dorsal could be moderately reconfigured or even replaced. A reconfigured secondary hul could allow for expanded shuttlecraft facilities.

It goes without saying the original nacelles and support pylons are completely replaced in conjunction with modifying the secondary hull given the contact point between the pylons and secondary hull are distinctly different from the original TOS design.

I like the idea of retaining a few of the docking ports seen in TMP. It makes a measure of sense for when the ship is in port.

 

[Maurice]

That looks like a redress or moderate modification of the TOS corridors. The aesthetic might be different (more like "The Cage"), but it still looks essentially like what we saw in TOS. It's distinctly dissimilar from what was down with the coridors in TMP.

Which is what I SAID when I wrote, "The corridors are the things that looked the most TOS like."

 

[Wingsley]

I had very mixed reactions from the very first time I saw "Phase II"-like artist renderings of the "new" Enterprise in the late 1970s. I grew up being terribly attached to what the original Star Trek series stood for, flaws and all, including the depictions of the original Starship Enterprise.

The one thing I loved about the "refit" TMP Enterprise was that they (mostly) preserved the vessel's outer-visible proportions. You can look at the vague silhouette of the ship and recognize it was at least being closely derived from the TOS version.

As for the greatly expanded surface details on the TMP "refit", I mostly agree with you that the did seem to take away some of the grace and simplicity of the TOS design. I always felt that some of this was done to give an illusion of on-screen size and depth so that movie-goers would be impressed with the more obvious "size" of the vessel. Some of this seemed to be Paramount's attempt to play catch-up with the budding Star Wars franchise. (Look what they did to the Klingon starships! They looked great! The "refit" Enterprise? Not so much...) I would not be surprised if Roddenberry himself wanted to add the "realism" you alluded to; it seemed there were many details added to both the ship's exterior and interior appearance to suit a late-1970s aesthetic of what a futuristic spaceship should look like. Again, in some vague ways (like looking through someone else's prescription glasses) this might work. In a blurry haze, you might envision the overall shapes of corridors, doorways, and some sets to be improved and more logical than TOS, but many of the details seemed more geared to Hollywood's penchant for dark lighting and "cool-looking" sets that photograph well for cinema.

From Pearl Harbor Day, 1979 (the day of TMP's debut), I was irritated by TMP's change of the external hull markings. The lettering was changed to an obviously computer-generated font that screamed "See?! See??!! We're all high-tech now. We're using this fancy new computer typeface! Looks like lotsa money, don't it???" It looked geeky and to this day I still want the TOS hull markings back, including the original block lettering on the saucer and nacelles and the pennant and pin-striping as well.

The bridge seemed recognizable (again, wearing someone else's glasses) but many of the set's "innovations" looked short-sighted and silly even in the 1980s. I saw no reason for the use of the excessively mechanical robo-voice for the computer. I missed the old whooping red-alert siren; the new one sounded excessively dramatic. (The new strobing alert graphic, though, did make sense.)

I always interpreted the TOS saucer-section as being able to separate, even though Kirk only mentioned it. The TOS and TMP versions of the ship were obviously modular, so it made perfect sense anyway, and since Space: 1999 showed detachable modularity being used to great effect with its Eagles, it would seem silly for the Enterprise to lack such an ability. I did not see the "refit" saucer's changes in exterior design as that much of an improvement. The only exception to this would be the arrangement of phasers, clearly derived from Franz Joseph Schnaubelt's schematics. The phasers made sense, particularly if the saucer was made to operate quasi-independently of the stardrive. Removing the torpedoes seemed dumb, but at least there was no direct cannon evidence that all that extra assembly around the saucer's lower dome couldn't house additional torpedo launchers as well.

Internally, Sickbay seemed unrecognizable and enough to make my eyes water. The Enterprise-D's Sickbay set, built only several years later, seemed far more sensible. The bridge suffered a similar problem; the TOS Bridge, with its unbroken outer-rim of control consoles and readouts, and the overhead display ring visibly a very different texture and color to make everything easier on the eyes, seemed both aesthetically more pleasing and much more logical. Engineering was another over-zealous waste of Hollywood big-bucks. I mourned the loss of the original Engine Room set. The transporter was over-designed and looked too, well, Hollyweird. I fail to see why it had to be so dark. The observation lounge seemed to be a semi-good idea, but why have safety-restraint seats on the Bridge and nowhere else on the ship?

Speaking of chairs, I always loved how Kirk's TOS throne had its own distinctive look and sense of style. Just like the big, fancy executive chair in Gary Seven's NYC office, Kirk's chair was a statement about his character. I mourned the loss of the TOS sense of furniture style with the excessively refined newer chairs. It wasn't until the last few years that I noticed that the major difference between Kirk's TMP chair and the other Bridge chairs was the color of the fabric. People on the forum will surely laugh at me for this, but I think Styles' throne on the NX-2000 Excelsior was a better idea. Kirk's chair should've had the Federation seal embroidered into it for an extra touch.

At least TNG got the notion of iPad-like touch-screen control panels/displays right.

The familiar TOS pneumatic sliding-door whoosh (or "sheeee-pap!") was MIA until it suddenly (and inexplicably) reappeared in The Undiscovered Country. Did it die in captivity inside some bamboo cage in south-east Asia, only to come back to haunt us?

As far as the nacelles are concerned: I interpreted the Federation and the Klingons as being in a technological competition of sorts, perhaps vaguely like Axanar's suggestion of an arms race. Spock's dramatic reports in "Elaan of Troyius" made me wonder if the Federation was warily admiring Klingon engine technology, and sought to copy it in the TMP refit. In recent years, I supposed that the new "linear warp drive" was a fourth-power warp technology, and this would explain the radical refit as being a major effort by Starfleet to pursue a quantum-leap in starship technology. While I could live with the idea of Enterprise having rad new warp engines, the surface details and wings left me queasy. Again, I agree with your "too far" remark. I immediately missed the large, block-lettered "NCC-1701", pennant and pin-striping. These items gave the ship some kind of part-naval, part-Saturn V authenticity. Your drawing of an alternative nacelle is intriguing. If it's all the same, I prefer the original straight pylons.

When it comes to improving the ship, first come the internal sets, then the engines, and then the saucer configuration. I am terribly fond of the original saucer, details and all. The surface details of the TOS saucer were very distinctive and gave it a visible personality. Messing with the lower dome area and the undercut would make it noticeably different and I failed to see why it was necessary to change. I was aghast that the saucer upper and lower domes no longer glowed. It's a personal aesthetic thing, but I don't see why they wouldn't.

If the saucer was supposed to operate independently, even if only on a temporary and/or "lifeboat" basis, then it would need its own shuttlecraft/pod- hangar facility. But adding a hangar implies a major change to the saucer. Would the outer disc have to expand? Could a hangar be added to the aft-end of the upper saucer, like with the Minmus? I have no idea, but I am in favor of the saucer having its own hangar, somehow, as long as it doesn't mess up the trademark TOS "look".

At least Jefferies' Phase II version of the "refit" Enterprise looked more like it could still be the same ship as we saw in TOS, even kinda-preserving the secondary hull's throwback "dish". TMP's excessively glowing dish seemed, well, excessive. TOS used parts of the ship that glowed and pulsated to effect, but TMP went off the deep end.

I always interpreted Kirk's "two and half years as Chief of Starfleet Operations" as being disconnected from the passage of time between TOS to TMP; Since TMP was released about 10.5 years after TOS ended, it seemed logical to me that at least 10 years had elapsed in-universe. The characters' visual aging and changing of uniforms, hairstyles and everything else seemed to reinforce this.

In the last large paragraph of your original post in this thread, I mostly agree with you on how it made little sense to change the TOS Enterprise's "smooth hull" aesthetic. I really like your drawing and think they have great potential. If a good 3D artist took these ideas and ran with them, there are some beautiful possibilities there.

I'm obviously a huge fan of the original TOS Enterprise design and believe it to be the best-looking and most "inspired" starship in the entire Star Trek franchise. I'm of the belief that "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". Having said that, there is a heavy logical tailwind behind the idea of a major starship refit after at least ten years. Enterprise alone encountered many strange new worlds, many new civilizations, and obviously many new technologies. It is reasonable to assume that other Federation starships (those that survive to return to home port) undoubtedly encountered many valuable finds of their own. A growing and prosperous Federation of many diverse cultures, with lots of energy and an ever-growing body of knowledge and skills, could conceivably launch new generations of better, faster, more powerful and more refined ships after a decade of absorbing all of this. So it makes sense that Enterprise would change as well. The notion of the same ship having so many of the same personnel makes far less sense of course.

The problem is, the studio simply took the TOS design and made it funkier and more like Star Wars. There isn't that much improvement there. If you're going to reinvent the wheel, you might as well do what they did with the MacQuarie-prise or the Enterprise-D. That paradigm seemed too Battlestar Galactica-esque, but at least it had some logic to it.

Your idea strikes me as aesthetically superior to the TMP Enterprise, no doubt about it. Maybe some tweaking, but it seems more true to the original.

 

[MadMan1701A]

Anyway within the next few day I hope to start sharing some modeled ideas on a reimagined TMP refit.

Thoughts anyone?

I absolutely love those nacelles! Can I use them for inspiration?

-Ricky

 

[Warped9]

At present they're only a general concept. I haven't yet worked out the exact shape abd details.

 

[INACTIVEUSS Einstein]

Ever since Star Trek: The Motion Picture debuted in 1979 I have had a thought in the back of my mind that comes to the fore every so often.

Something was off with the overall look of the film.

Make no mistake I quite like a lot of what was done in TMP. It brought a level of detail and realism to the Star Trek universe that simply wasn't possible on the original series and to be appreciated on 1960's era television.

We're meant to accept the idea that TMP is definitely set in the same universe/continuity as TOS and that it takes place barely three years after the 5-year mission. But what has always bothered me is that the changes I saw on the big screen struck me as being too drastic to be of the same universe and within such a short period of time.

Ahh, but things DON'T progress in a linear fashion in technology/science.

Rather breakthroughs and the needs of the times, determine sometimes radical departures from things.

Its only in the realm of smartphones, and car bodywork, where things just get a bit more rounded or whatever with a new release.

In technology, especially the military, form is determined by functionality.