Comments on: Star Trek Movie ‘Rising From Titan’ Images Available Online

By: Jeff C

Jeff C — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 17:34:37 +0000

It’s great to see both Carolyn Porco and Rick Sternbach here.

By: Lord Garth, Formerly of Izar

Lord Garth, Formerly of Izar — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 18:07:52 +0000

As amazing as CGI is
Even in this day and age, still not kind to still photos. Blown up Galactcaprise looks like art (beautiful art but art none the less), blown up Doug Trumbull’s ship looked like a photograph of a real life battleship in space

The new design and size has grown on me quite a bit. We all know Kirk could beat Picard in a battle of wits and or fists but he should have a ship that could crush the Picard USS Toomanyportholesand neon La Quinta innprise as well. Now he does.
However I still hope they address the skinny tampon looking secondary hull and give it some more meat underneath for it’s refit or tweeking

By: Rick Sternbach

Rick Sternbach — Sat, 19 Sep 2009 01:28:44 +0000

#90 – Carolyn – Some of us feel that the basic planform or outer mold line or style of the ST09 Enterprise is too radical a departure from the Original Series Enterprise, aside from it being -way- too big in comparison, bigger even than Picard’s giant-sized Galaxy class Enterprise from Star Trek: The Next Generation. By now, you’ve probably gotten and “earful” of the online comments; there are fans who, at one extreme, are quite learned about the way this fictional technology is “supposed” to look and operate, and I’ve gotten in on some pretty intelligent BBS discussions about this stuff. I invented a pretty decent amount of it over 15 years, and even I get surprised about how some ideas just click. Some of the objections to the new ship are anchored in how it borrows heavily from the NCC-1701 “refit” from the first feature film, how the warp nacelles may not work stylistically with the rest of the vessel, how it took off from Iowa and not an orbital dock, and a number of other points. As an artist/designer, I feel their pain; I babbled on about it myself in this forum. Some folks may see the nitpicking as whining, but I believe there’s more to it than the stereotype of the nerdy fanboy, and the franchise has lasted this long -because- the fans talk it up. And I know they appreciate it when we go the extra distance to talk with respectable scientists like yourself.

By: Carolyn Porco

Carolyn Porco — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 20:58:59 +0000

Yes, some of my fondest memories are from Voyager. We were blessed to live through that one.

By the way, can someone (maybe you, Rick) tell me what the big deal is about the way the Enterprise looks in ST09 and the way it looked `way back when’? I’m not following. What has been violated that was so sacrosanct ?

By: Rick Sternbach

Rick Sternbach — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 17:43:51 +0000

#88 – Well, I’m glad you tried. Not being familiar with that particular production crew, I don’t know what I would have been able to push had I gotten hired on. As far back as Star Trek: The Motion Picture, I was able to offer Robert Wise a couple of script tech changes and actor direction, but needed to do it gingerly. Fortunately, for the TNG/DS9/Voyager era, we got science and tech fixes punched through about 80% of the time, which to this day I find amazing. Our producers and writers were very good listeners. Sure, some dramatic points trounced the science or “accepted” 24th century starship technology, but I think we left the franchise canon in better shape than when we first encountered it.

Heh. I remember hanging out in von Karman for Voyager 1 with Carl Sagan (a bunch of us were on COSMOS, of course) talking with Larry Soderblum about why so many craters on Ganymede looked like perfect doubles, one inside the other. The pix were just then coming down. Giddy times, indeed.

By: Carolyn Porco

Carolyn Porco — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 14:29:52 +0000

Rick Sternbach: Well, they did ask me, and that is exactly what I suggested, but the suggestion was not taken. The reason given: It would require too long a camera move. And to others, as I’ve said many times, I was not consulted on anything scientific in ST09 other than the problem of getting the Enterprise back into the solar system `under cover’. And my interactions with the ILM folks and with JJ were all finished before the script was finalized. Otherwise, I would have told them the rings have no magnetic field to scramble the Enterprise’s signals. So, it’s not perfect, but in my mind it was a small step in the right direction. And since the journey is not over yet, there’s hope for improvement. And to Paul B….I don’t even know what the TWOK scene is! The idea of having the Enterprise hovering over Titan is a scene that has been with me since the days of Voyager, when it felt to me, as we were first encountering Titan in 1980, that Building 264 at JPL, where all the imaging scientists were located for Voyagers’ encounters, was like the Starship Enterprise and we all were the crew inside. So, personally, for me, it was like a dream come true to see that scene make it to the big screen.

By: Paul B.

Paul B. — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 11:13:26 +0000

I’m not going to complain about the flaws–uh, questionable artistic choices?–in the new ship. Nor about the tilt of the rings.

But I have to say that I really did NOT like this scene at all. From the cheesiness of the entire set up (hide in Titan’s atmosphere, beam across the Solar System, blahblahblah) to the silly clouds-pushed-up-by-the-ship (might be realistic but LOOKS stupid to me) to the ripping off (sorry, homage) of the TWOK scene of Enterprise rising behind Reliant before attacking, this was NOT a dramatic scene, nor was it the “money shot” or any other such thing.

To me, it was a weak and pointless bit in an otherwise entertaining movie. The only good thing is that it’s almost the only scene where JJ lets us see the ship in something like her full glory. The rest of the movie never gives us a sense of her grandeur and majesty, just size and speed.

By: Admiral New

Admiral New — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 04:25:58 +0000

Hi res image is hi res. 0_0

By: JB

JB — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 23:21:50 +0000

84: Thanks, but I when I commented that there were no forward-facing windows/viewports (or at least none I could identify), I was referring to the new ship, not the original.

By: Jesse

Jesse — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 22:37:16 +0000

@80: On the original Enterprise (not the new one), there were forward and side facing windows on the “bulge” on the bottom of the saucer. They’re barely visible in this picture at http://cache.g4tv.com/images/blog/2008/11/12/633620844201693577.jpg
which I chose because it happens to include the new ship to compare with the old one. How convenient! There are better pictures at Ex Astris Scientia also.