SFX Video
(WMV)
Remastered & Original
Assorted
Galt teaches discipline to Kirk
Kirk teaches birds and the bees to Shahna
Kirk teaches Gamesters a lesson in wagering
Kirk teaches some thralls how to die
The crew watch on pay-per-view
Pre-order TOS-R Season One Box from Amazon – now $129.95
Star Trek: The Original Series – The Complete First Season [HD DVD] — $129.95
Dammit, Spock, I MISSED IT!!
(First??)
Looking at this SFX is almost funny! Why bothering changing those shots of the ship when the originals were just fine?
This is one of those episodes where it’s so BAD, it’s GOOD!!
Why bother? To make them look better, just like this DID!
Again, the issue of the incredibly tiny planet. Looked like the E could complete one orbit in under a minute! I wonder what these effects would look like if they were made by people who passed high school physics?
Too bad they couldn’t change the background from “The Devil in the Dark”, but it would have been too expensive and time consuming, but EVERYTHING looks great!
Ah @5 its a planetoid not a planet so it should be smaller.
Yes changing the Devil background should have been done.
*Sigh* Wonder what constructive criticism regarding these
fx would look like coming from those who didn’t think belaboring the obvious makes them sound really clever?
Love that last shot… the big close up of the nacelle, almost as if the CBS team were thumbing their collective noses at the people who used to complain about them!
Gotta say that the ship visuals are always fun to watch. The argument about the planet sizes – I totally agree.
Most of the effects work has been with the wide visuals and space shots. This is the one time I wish that the brains of the gamesters could have been improved. Heck, the Futurama take-off was better.
All in all – Star Trek (the original) just increased it’s shelf life for the HDTV generation. Great work!
Not much to knock here. It’s amazing how many planets have rings now.
I’m collecting thoughts on the red running lights on the round hull part immediately below the main bridge. I can’t spot the lights here. There are only a few shots in both unremastered and remastered where they appear. Frankly, they look too large. Maybe they were an early incarnation of the 11′ model and were removed? Anybody know for sure? They’re extemely visible on the Defiant in “In a Mirror Darkly.”
(and for bonus points… whatever happened to the enormous white
light(s) to either side of the hangar deck? We all commented on them — some said they were tractor beam emitters. But, now they’re not to be seen. What gives??)
My last pet peeve with the CG E is the anti-collision lights are way too dim. They were very bright on the original model and on the TMP version (in TMP they were bright enough to cause lens flares). These “anti-collision” lights are so dim, you couldn’t possibly see them before you saw the ship. It also bugs me because those lights were a detail Roddenberry asked for, as he was a pilot and aviation buff.
OK, here those bad boys are. Comments? Am I the only one who can’t see them most of the time?
http://ent.trekcore.com/gallery/displayimage.php?album=95&pos=664
#5 You wanted to know what VFX would look like if animators passed physics….look at #13’s pics and watch the episode.
The best episode of TOS-R was “In a Mirror Darkly, part II” ;)
I seem to remember standard orbit as being 30,000 kilometers. The planets shouldn’t look like earth does from the shuttle.
Sean4000 said: “The best episode of TOS-R was “In a Mirror Darkly, part II”
Good one! I love that model! Why on God’s green Earth would CBS / Paramount not hire Eden FX to do this remastering job. More expensive? Probably, but I am absolutely sure they would have nailed it based on the work they did for Enterprise.
#11-“Not much to knock here. It’s amazing how many planets have rings now. I’m collecting thoughts on the red running lights on the round hull part immediately below the main bridge. I can’t spot the lights here. There are only a few shots in both unremastered and remastered where they appear. Frankly, they look too large.”
#12-“My last pet peeve with the CG E is the anti-collision lights are way too dim.”
—————————-
Oh boy. Did anyone notice that an original episode that described, but never showed, three suns now shows three suns? No. Did anyone mention that one of the suns is drawing gas from the other, and how cool that looked? No. How many cratered planetoids/planets were in the original? None, but they have it in this remastered version.
Some of the posts reflect not merely the sensibility of those who see the half empty glass- (that is too positive)- but a powerful commitment to misery.
Missed this one. On Purpose.
When a science fiction show temporarily puts its crew into slavery you know its running out of gas, or soon will be.
The roto-scoping they did for Wink of an eye was more work than what they could have done here. Why did they not change the background power station from Devil in the Dark?? I thought the mandate if this re-mastering project called for them to re-do Matte paintings?? Yet another half ass-ed job by CBS Digital. How hard would it have been to put a conduit with some sort of energy bolt, beem or some type of reactor at the end of a long hallway?? It sure would have made a lot more sense than just a re-used matte painting from a previous episode that is there completely out of context. I guess it’s all about making a buck or two and rushing it out on DVD
Nice job on the ringed planet and the Tri-nary stars at Triskellion were very well done. All in all I will wait about 3-4 months to buy this set off of e-bay for 30 bucks. There is no way on God’s green Earth I’m buying this half ass-ed attempt by CBS – Paramount for over $100.00 . Shame on you guys.
#13 CmdR
Is it just me, or is the antenna sticking out of the deflector at an agnle?
Missed the show, my job had me out of town this weekend, and with the Bo. Sox/Indians, no use in setting my VCR (my switch to Dish-DVR is coming soon). Turns out KLSR Eugene is not showing encores at 11:30 pm Sunday. Can any Eugene market folks give me any insight?
As for not changing the Devil in the Dark background, that does sound disappointing. I thought they decided to take care of things like that…
Good shots of the Enterprise, but nothing new this week, but still good.
Oh yes, the planet is great too
Sean, 2 of 3,
It had to be a money issue. Although it could not have been THAT big. CBS isa screed up company that is headed for disaster. Eden did a fantastic job on Enterprise. As did Digital Domain/Eden FX for Nemesis.
That being said we now have half way decent remasters and an inconsistent DVD box set. Hmm. “someone’s” philosophy worked out just fine didn’t it?!?!
There is nothing we can do except thank God that CBS-D has no influence on, and ILM has the reigns for, Trek XI’s VFX. That would be a worse call than not including Shatner in a TOS Trek flick. Which I could actually live with. :/
Not sure if Boston even saw this episode. It was scheduled for thee wee hours of the morning and college football ran more than an hour over.
As far as the ENT being too close, orbiting too fast etc. That was always a problem with TOS, not just the remastered version. Orbit times depend on planet size, of course. But for a 30K km orbit about earth should take 9 hours. It always looked like the E made a complete orbit in 40 seconds
I hope the actual ep. looks better than these grabs. Looks INCREDIBLY washed out, dull, flat. The original FX shots, (at least above) look MUCH more dynamic, colorful and even, (gasp!) realistic!
“Some of the posts reflect not merely the sensibility of those who see the half empty glass- (that is too positive)- but a powerful commitment to misery. ”
Beautifully said. And T-Negative’s name is aptly chosen.
“I hope the actual ep. looks better than these grabs. Looks INCREDIBLY washed out, dull, flat. The original FX shots, (at least above) look MUCH more dynamic, colorful and even, (gasp!) realistic!”
The grabs are weak representations of what the actual shows look like – especially this week’s. As I have said many times before, don’t judge the work if you can’t watch the show. The grabs don’t do the work justice.
looked okay to me
The new CGI effects looked good but not great in this episode. But since I never really cared for this episode, any CGI improvements wouldn’t make much of a difference anyway…
But I did like that close up shot of the nacelle cap during the end credits. That looked pretty cool!
Episode grade: C+ (mediocre)
Mike :o
So, you’re asking yourself where did the Providers get that cool Pyrex (r)dome to shield there brains?
http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/displayimage.php?album=67&pos=229
They bought it from Lazarus…
http://tos.trekcore.com/gallery/displayimage.php?album=53&pos=195
Uh, that is, “their brains.”
#24 – The new FX shots have NEVER looked washed out on my display (55-inch Sony SXRD) at home. I don’t know what program Anthony is using for his captures, but I think his captures do make the new FX shots appear a bit darker. In terms of lighting, they have always looked fine to me and should look even better when they arrive in HD – which’ll be the true litmus test for all of this work from CBS Digital, imho.
@13 – CmdrR
Thanks for the link, I don’t think I’ve ever noticed the detail through the windows before, really gives it a sense of scale (actually makes it a little smaller, but more ‘believable’ IMO). Must go and find a similar shot of the TOS-R model for comparison now.
UNACCEPTABLE.
Why didnt they change the matte? I dont care how rushed for time they are. DO IT. Thats the one mandate that they should at least follow.
This is ridiculous and UNACCEPTABLE.
I’d have traded the rings for a new matte painting. Without it, it seems hardly worth bothering with the rest of the episode effects.
Is it just me, or did some of the shots of the Big E look better in the original episode, than in this remaster? Now, don’t get me wrong: I love the new planets, and all the extra detail, and many of the beauty shots of the ship, but there are some new shots of Enterprise herself that look rather flat, and cartooney, and have none of the presence–or dare I say I, gravitas–of the original filming of the studio model?
I think it would have been better for CBS-D to remaster those things that needed it (starscapes, some planets, some inconsistent shots of the ship), but NOT MESS WITH the good shots! Clean them up, maybe add a litle detail here and there, but don’t remove the old shots, just for the sake of redoing them. Even LUCAS didn’t do that…sometimes :)
Case in point: WNMHGB. The original shots of Enterprise in the energy barrier were beautiful, made the ship look realistic (and scaled correctly) while the remastered shots of Enterprise were boring and carried none of the weight of the original. No drama, no nothing. Just another pass of the ship through another strange thing. In the words of the Black ‘Lectroids from Planet 10, “So what. Big deal.”
And, while I’m bitching, shouldn’t we have seen some damage on Enterprise during “The Doomsday Machine?” I mean, c’mon, the thing ripped Constellation a new one, but Enterprise doesn’t have a scratch, even though it got nailed by the planet killer SEVERAL times. We even hear from the Comm officer, “Lt. Don’t-you-wish-Nichelle-would-take-more-days-off” (or whatever her name was, if she even had one) that there’s been both an outer and an inner hull breach. Shouldn’t we have seen some damage on the ship? Even if we don’t see any action shots of hulls blowing out, shouldn’t there have been some damage–or repaired damage, like in ST:TSFS–visible during flybys?
Say what you will about ENT, but even though many of the stories sucked, and it tended to use canon as toilet paper, they sure beat the hell out of NX-01, and it looked GREAT taking that beating. CBS-D, take a cue…
Okay, I’m done complaining. G’nite, all.
That shot of Kirk with the three brains was completely locked down – no camera movement – that could have been rotoscoped relatively easy enough – not a slam dunk, but certainly worth it in order to liven up that whole scene.
Also, in the first shot when Uhura, Chekov and Kirk first appear in the arena – Kirk looks up and talks about the 3 suns. That would have been a perfect spot for a nice cut away of the Triskelion sky…
Wow! I hope those screengrabs aren’t the final version because the originals were actually better!!!!!!!!!
36:
Exactly. It would not have been that tough. Hell, the rotoscope shots they did in “Wink of an eye” were a lot more complex.
All the Enterprise orbiting shots were stock shots used from their “library” of Enterprise images. All they had to do was create the ringed planet. THATS IT. Why not make a new matte?
This is something that should be mandatory. Like I said, I dont care how rushed they are. I really dont. They should have done it.
Compare the sixth and seventh sets of pics of the Enterprise as seen from below the wmv file–two pics of the Enterprise in space with no planet in the background. I’m sorry, but the old versions are WAY MORE believable images than the new editions.
I guess any hope of improvement is not realistic. Can’t wait to be disappointed by “The Ultimate Computer”…..
The FX were not good, because of it they change.
It is an absurd remastered the whole series and not to do it in this one.
If you do not like the changes simply do not see it.
Ok…..rather then using Wikipedia I wonder…..does any know the name of the big beastly brute with the huge fangs that carries and uses a whip? With his eyes rolled up in his head its a wonder he could see anything or anyone. So does anyone know? Thanks a lot!
#Sigh# Once again, the appeal of some very nice new shots by CBS Digital are tempered by something really distracting ( such as the series’ wobbly old handphaser beams ) being untouched…such as that ‘cave’ matte which cried out for a redo.
Oh well, onto the next one…
The planetoid is alright. Personally I think planets with rings are the coolest thing in the universe, although I realize there are fewer than say, planets without rings.
As for planetoids with rings … or “Dwarf Planets” as we call them here in the not 23rd century … I don’t know the physics of it. Anything with a big enough gravitational pull to form itself into a spheroid should technically be able to have orbiting particles of dust.
Anyway … Triskelion itself is a decent looking, interesting to look at planet. Not just some gray rock in space … and its rocky, craggy colors match the cave backgrounds from the sets. Not that a striking blue planet with blotchy green continents couldn’t have rocky, craggy caves.
#41 – “does any know the name of the big beastly brute with the huge fangs that carries and uses a whip?”
Must use Memory Alpha myself – –
‘Kloog was played by actor Mickey Morton. Kloog has the same relative appearance as the Kaylar species, which means he may come from Rigel VII.’
http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Kloog
The bad thing about this episode is that Chekov has too much screen time.
I liked the effects.
I love this episode. For all the messages TOS sent, for all the great writing, for all the great acting, and legendary shows, this episode was simply Kirk kicking the crap out of people. It rocked. The opening scene was one of my favorites ever especially when Chekov and Uhura were subdued, and Kirk beat his opponent.
Anyone else notice the CG folks seem to really like rings aronud their planets? *LOL*
Is it me of is the hull of the Enterprise a bit too clean on the CG Enterprise?
#45 – Apparently true because I was looking forward to that CHEEKOOF bit and missed it.. I think it was cut for syndication..
I always thought it was funny how the rule of fighting at the end was that you couldn’t step on certain colors, but Kirk was all over them while doing his trademarked Shatner moves!