posted
Of course, the Rec Deck cannot be where Probert placed it, because the concave lower deck of the saucer does not accommodate the volume. Nor would there be decks above or below the Rec Deck, meaning that the two turboshafts would go nowhere!
Relocating it to where the Officers' Lounge is would solve at least two problems:
1) How it can fit within the volume (the saucer is thickest near the bridge) 2) Why there are two vertical turboshafts side by side at one end (these are the immediate continuations of the two lift shafts that can be accessed from the bridge)
This would also free the saucer rim windows for the Kirk/Spock/McCoy get-together scene, which cannot really take place in the Rec Deck (the balconies aren't wide enough, the doorways don't match etc). As for why Kirk went that far... Well, he wasn't exactly busy. For most of the movie, all he did was change clothes, stare at the viewscreen, change clothes, stare some more, and change clothes. Must have been hot in there or something.
Trek sets seem to have a problem fitting where they belong. I propose that the larger inside than out technology used in Enterprises's Future Tense was developed earlier than we may think.
Registered: Mar 2004
| IP: Logged
posted
I just noticed something I never spotted before in that shot from the DE: you can see the tail of the port nacelle in the window view on the right. Assuming that these are the rec dec view ports, should you be able to see it at all? Judging from the angle, the window behind Kirk has to be almost in line with the nacelle center line; if this is one of the rec deck ports, it would have to be one of the outboard ports. Since the camera is some distance back from the window (and apparently facing dead center of the port), I'm not sure it's physically possible to fit the port nacelle into the field of view.
Then again, with the way the starboard nacelle appears in the shot, the orientation of the room would have to be pretty wacky as well. The engine is essentially in line with the window, meaning the window faces almost directly aft. The walls of the set don't match the curvature of the hull, if that is the room's orientation.
-------------------- The difference between genius and idiocy? Genius has its limits.
Registered: Aug 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
I'd say that these inconsistencies are just par for the course when you have a model of a fictional (and impossible) spacecraft and practical standing sets that must be designed and constructed utilizing available techniques and resources and which must satisfy various lighting, sound, and equipment requirements in order to be filmable.
In other words, just ignore the fact that what we see internally usually doesn't match with what we see externally. Hasn't this really been true of most Trek sets?
As Woodside Kid said, the very fact that none of these sets were built with curvatures conforming to their corresponding windows on the model will throw off any views of the outside. But saying "those aren't windows; those are viewscreens" and trying to locate the sets as buried somewhere in the saucer core seems too incongruous with the designers' (both of the model and of the sets) intents.
Suspension of DisbeliefTM, people!
-MMoM
-------------------- The flaws we find most objectionable in others are often those we recognize in ourselves.
Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
Sure, but when the nacelles were CGI'd in to make the scene look cool, it's kinda silly to make their placement wrong just so they can (supposedly) look "cool" in a shot.
If I were to really gripe about sets vs. ship exteriors, I'd point out that we never saw correctly scaled windows on TNG. ...and then there's the windows on DS9's Prominade...
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
posted
As to the whole Rec Deck/Officer's Lounge/Observation lounge issue, the fact is no matter what answer your propose, short of viewscreens, none of them make sense because...
a) In the Rec Deck scene you can see the starboard nacelle and the drydock outside the window, thus placing that room where the exterior windows are (despite the issue that the room hight would not necessarily fit).
b) Since we SEE out the windows in the area below the bridge in the scene where Spock's shuttle arrives, and it doesn't match either the Rec Deck of the room Spock meets Kirk and Bones in, that eliminates it as a location for the Rec Deck.
c) The window in the lounge where Kirk drags Spock is left over from the Rec Deck set and matches the shape of that window, and, from the DE's stupid nacelle addition, places it IN the Rec Deck.
In Andy's defense, he and Doug Trumbull tried to get them to reshoot a few shots of the Kirk, Spock, McCoy scene with a bluescreen wall so they could tie the set to the miniature room seen during the shuttle docking, but that was nixed .
-------------------- "Well, I mean, it's generally understood that, of all of the people in the world, Mike Nelson is the best." -- ULTRA MAGNUS, steadfast in curmudgeon
Registered: Feb 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
So, I still don't see how my interpretation doesn't work...once you allow for set/model flub factor that, as I mentioned, is not endemic to TMP. Everything is where Probert said it was and the Big Three's conversation took place on the upper Rec Deck level.
Registered: Jun 2001
| IP: Logged
quote:Originally posted by The Mighty Monkey of Mim: So, I still don't see how my interpretation doesn't work...once you allow for set/model flub factor that, as I mentioned, is not endemic to TMP. Everything is where Probert said it was and the Big Three's conversation took place on the upper Rec Deck level.
EXCEPT that the various angles seen of the room make it clear it's not part of the Rec Deck proper, which means those two meeting room windows don't exist on the ship. My point was simply that there is no way all those rooms fit in the ship in the locations seen unless you assume some of the windows are viewscreens or not visble from the outside.
-------------------- "Well, I mean, it's generally understood that, of all of the people in the world, Mike Nelson is the best." -- ULTRA MAGNUS, steadfast in curmudgeon
Registered: Feb 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
The easiest fix IMHO still is that the Rec Deck octuplet of window-like things are the viewscreens, while the remaining windows are for real.
This makes sense in terms of the function of the facility, allows it to be placed where it really fits, and does not unduly impinge on other facilities (the aft-of-bridge windowed space can still exist on the upper decks; the postulated auxiliary bridge need not be as large as Shane suggests; etc.).
And the view "aft of the saucer rim" is just the screensaver. Had we lingered on the Rec Deck a bit longer, we'd have seen the view rotate around the entire circumference of the primary hull in a grand panorama. That is, unless a crewman wanted to run Ilia Does Illinois on the upper right screen, or play tic-tac-toe with the four on the left, or something.
posted
I think it's easier to assume the lounge has the viewscreens, since it's silly to think they'd have eight windows on the saucer edge that just happen to match the eight in the Rec Deck and NOT have them connected.
A few other things.
The concave bottom of the saucer is addressed a bit in inthe Rec Deck room design, and you see that the outer area by the windows is lower than the main floor (albeit probably not enough).
The turbolift shafts could be the end of horizontal tubes on the upper deck w/a vertical jog to drop people off on the main deck.
But, let's face it, film sets rarely fit inside the exterior we are shown. This is true from the subjects of this discussion through the corridor outside the Engine Room that would go right out the hull. And outside Star Trek, this holds true in Lost in Space (no room for that lower deck), and even sitcoms (ever notice that the interiors we see almost never match the exterior houses?).
-------------------- "Well, I mean, it's generally understood that, of all of the people in the world, Mike Nelson is the best." -- ULTRA MAGNUS, steadfast in curmudgeon
Registered: Feb 2001
| IP: Logged
posted
Geez, I actually watched part of my TMP Director's Cut to see those scenes again.
Then I turned it off- man, I'd forgotten how boring that movie is! They tried so hard to capture the feel of "2001" that they completely lost what was cool in TOS. PLus, McCoy's disco-weirdo get-up makes my eyes water.
Getting back to the topic, I checked Barnes & Noble and Borders tonight for the calander, but it's not out here yet.
Anyone get theirs yet?
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
posted
I rather like the redone Motion Picture, though you're absolutely right about McCoy's choice of civilian clothing. And that medallion.
Registered: Mar 1999
| IP: Logged
-------------------- "Well, I mean, it's generally understood that, of all of the people in the world, Mike Nelson is the best." -- ULTRA MAGNUS, steadfast in curmudgeon
Registered: Feb 2001
| IP: Logged
quote:Realizing that the Enterprise wasn't as familiar to Hal, as it was to the rest of us,...,I rushed back to Abel's and put together the sketch below, in order to remind Hal what the saucer's cross section was like at the rim, hoping he would see the value in maintaining that level of continuity.....then I just grabbed my gun and shot Hal in the head rather than explain everything over and over....
That's how it went down in my alternate reality, anyway.
I sorta like those lower level rec-deck windows on the saucer, but it would have only a great view of the blue glowy impulse-crystal-thingie.
Might be cool to see a Phase II version with that though. Where's the Red Admiral when we need him to CGI a ship for us?
Mabye that Timo kid could do it in illustrator...
-------------------- Justice inclines her scales so that wisdom comes at the price of suffering. -Aeschylus, Agamemnon
Registered: Aug 2002
| IP: Logged
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
Printer-friendly view of this topic
