posted
Another one of those little known classes of ships from First Contact. I was wondering if anyone knows anything about it. Dimensions and such. I'd especially like to know the condition of the CGI, has anyone taken it upon themselves to detail it a little more?
whoops... I suddenly remembered that it was Alex J. at ILM that did the Norway [and Mojo was with (strains because he hasn't gotten it straight yet) Digital Muse]. oh well, someone probably knows something more than I do [maybe even something more convincing than the DS9 TM... I'm having a time trying to convince some folks that the dimensions there (for that ship) are right].
-------------------- Later, J _ _ _ _ _ ___ _ _ _ _ _ The Last Person to post in the late Voyager Forum. Bashing both Voyager, Enterprise, and "The Bun" in one glorious post.
posted
I think the general theory is that the Norway CGI never left ILM.
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posted
Um, not quite. IIRC, Muse did mainly DS9 and Foundation did mainly Voyager, but they certainly collaborated and crossed-over on the two series fairly often.
-------------------- "I was surprised by the matter-of-factness of Kafka's narration, and the subtle humor present as a result." (Sizer 2005)
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posted
Where are those smilies with their heads exploding....
I'm more confused than ever. Where's Mojo from!!!
-------------------- Later, J _ _ _ _ _ ___ _ _ _ _ _ The Last Person to post in the late Voyager Forum. Bashing both Voyager, Enterprise, and "The Bun" in one glorious post.
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posted
Mojo's from Foundation Imaging. He worked on the pilot and the first three seasons of Babylon 5 (my favorite show) among other things, and yes, the company did quite a few DS9 shots, including the second half of "Sacrifice of Angels" and the fire caves in "What You Leave Behind".
Foundation Imaging also modelled the alien fleet from "Sacrifice of Angels" in LightWave. Everything had to be created from scratch, because VisionArt and ILM apparently don't use that software. Muse modelled the Fed ships, and then they merged libraries.
Norway probably wasn't built because the Muse modellers never received ILM's model. Before that, during the time Vision Art was still doing the FX, Stipes said the following (ref. PsiPhi's page for "Call to Arms"):
"I believe we removed the Norway-class for technical reasons."
Now, Vision Art didn't seem to have compatibility problems when it comes to using ILM's CG models, because we've seen them use the Akira, Steamrunner, and the Sabre, and I doubt Vision Art would build these for just five episodes. Who knows what the "technical reasons" could've been?
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posted
Either Foundation Imaging or Digital Muse also built the Galaxy-class from scratch. Mojo once commented that he didn't even know if ILM had a CGI Galaxy, although they almost certainly did, since we saw the Ent-D do the warp-snap effect in Generations, and after the pilot, that was always done with CGI models (There are instances of minitures being used for the "going to warp shot", but in those cases, the ship "smeared", like the Runabouts, or just movied quickly - like the Borg ship in BoBW or the three ships at the end of Generations. All the proper "snap" effects, such as Voyager and certain Defiant shots have been CGI, as far as I can tell).
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posted
If you check the "making of" section in the back of the "Generations" novelization, one of the guys talks about finally getting to do an Enterprise-D warp jump with a CGI model. In the show, according to him, it was done by switching from the six-footer to the two-footer after the nacelles flash, in such a way that the viewer doesn't notice. However, this may have been just the jump in the opening credits -- don't know about the others.
posted
IIRC, someone asked this very question a couple of weeks ago. Mojo said something to the effect that the Norway model computer files were corrupted/mislabeled or something, and the model effectively lost.
*getting flashbacks of the Ambassador model here*
Oh well... I'm not too fond of the Norway-class design anyway.
And for the record: Mojo definitely works for Foundation Imaging.
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posted
Actually, he no longer works at Foundation. Rob Bonchune is now the guy to ask about anything "Enterprise"-related.
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quote:Originally posted by Phelps: In the show, according to him, it was done by switching from the six-footer to the two-footer after the nacelles flash, in such a way that the viewer doesn't notice.
It's possible. I know part of the reason for the flash was to hide the transition in lighting in the model as well, as doing the stretch required a kind of slit-scan shot of the model to make it stretch. It might also have hidden the transition between two different models. A comparison of the ship before and after the flash might do a lot to answer that.
[ February 01, 2002, 19:31: Message edited by: MrNeutron ]
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Registered: Feb 2001
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posted
Hey Minute-Man (has anyone seen the smallish movie "The Specials" here!?! Mojo did CGI for that movie! - It is a LO(fucking)L movie!) that was moi ;o)
Can we hound... softly Alex Jaeger about that Norway!?!
Oh and about the Warp snap effect in Generations - I aslo read where the effects guys were so happy because it was the first time in seven years that they actually had the lights of the E-D on while it 'snapped' to warp!
Andrew
-------------------- "Bears. Beets. Battlestar Galactica." - Jim Halpert. (The Office)
posted
I'm in occasional contact with Alex Jeager, I'll ask him about the Norway when I can...
And I may be going out on a limb here but I don't think Next Gen EVER used CG Enterprise. The rubber band effect can be achieved using an old technique called 'slit scan.' I'd be surprised if people thought it could only be done CG. It's easier, but not the ONLY way!
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