[ghostbuster]

how come in some "first contact" publicity photos the enterprise has an all white deflector dish, but the one in the movie is black and yellow?

 

[chiangkaishecky]

If it's the same shot I'm thinking of the surrounding trench also changed.
The publicity pictures were a little early before last minute tweaks and artistic decisions.

 

[trevanian]

The area around the deflector dish was supposed to be curved ALL the way around -- which is how the model looked early on (and it looked much better IMO.) But the set people messed up the mostly-full-size deflector, so ILM had to go back and redo the area around the dish to conform to the fullsize one AFTER they started shooting on the model (fortunately approval on the E exterior was very late in coming, so that delayed construction and shooting, so it wasn't like they had gotten many shots done at the point when all this became clear.)

This was all in my draft of the FC article in CINEFEX, but it all got cut out when they sent the article out for pre-publication review -- presumably Lauritson or somebody at Paramount thought it made them look like idiots.

In addition to those early PR shots with the round all the way around deflector, I think there are a couple shots in the Eaves Sketchbook that are pre-revision as well.

 

[hunky_artist]

basically the model was designed and built, but once it became apparant that they needed to have the characters walking around the dish, and therefore would need a full size set, they realised that the curved version would be too expensive to build full size.... and take too long. So they changed the model.

The dish went from blue to yellow to accomodate the blue screen work that would have been going on around the set as well.

..... that's what i think anyway, and i think im probably right

 

[chiangkaishecky]

..... that's what i think anyway, and i think im probably right

You weave a convincing case .... verrrry convincing.
Blue Sky and Digital Domain really should've reinstated the curved trench just to ease the workload of all the modelers who have the AMT kit.

 

[trevanian]

basically the model was designed and built, but once it became apparant that they needed to have the characters walking around the dish, and therefore would need a full size set, they realised that the curved version would be too expensive to build full size.... and take too long. So they changed the model.

The dish went from blue to yellow to accomodate the blue screen work that would have been going on around the set as well.

..... that's what i think anyway, and i think im probably right

I don't remember if they shot bluescreen or greenscreen, but either way it wouldn't matter much now that comps are handled digitally, so the color change wouldn't be linked to that.

As for the history you outline ... the sequence was scripted and boarded (and reboarded) LONG before the E-E exterior was finalized, even finalized on paper, let alone the model being built.

AMERICAN CINEMATOGRAPHER's article on the film has an odd and interesting but confusing quote about shooting on the fullsize dish. It is attributed to an associate visual effects supervisor Moore, but there was no such person at ILM or Paramount on that picture (Ronald Moore was Par's guy on GEN.) They make it sound like using PowerBook was how they figured out the action while shooting. As to WHY they couldn't build the deflector area properly -- as in, as planned -- it may relate to expense of fullsize compound curve stuff, or it could be incompetence. Both of these have certainly reared their head often enough on Trekfilms. Stage space could have been an issue as well, but since forced perspective was supposedly used, it shouldn't have mattered.

With the number of revisions Paramount was asking for on ILM's shots in FC, it doesn't surprise me that ILM didn't do the later films; I have a feeling nobody at ILM would have wanted to do them if ILM had lowered their bids and won either show. Kinda seemed weird that they wanted so many iterations, given that ILM's stuff in FC -- like the PHOENIX shots and the E miniature -- is largely excellent, except for the shots that got dumped on them late in the game, like the coolant, which was supposed to be done more as a physical effect on set till they decided to CG it up, and then kept asking ILM to do 'jello fire' as if it were something you could just type into a computer and hit ENTER. When I talked to John Knoll before, about GENERATIONS, and years later about M2M and TPM, the guy was very happy, but on FC, he was really out of sorts, and barely discussed Paramount's input.

 

[perotis]

I fully understad to be a good modeler you need to get even the littlest detail correct, but this is star trek we are talking about. As cool as it is, amost everything in ST is ripe with inconsistantcies. To a certian extent i believe it is futile to try and find THE acurate version of most ST ships.

 

[trevanian]

Agreed! The only way to do it right would be to build different versions, photograph each, then marry them together as one of those hokey old 3-D lenticular postcards, where the image changes depending on how you tilt the picture. That's a lot of work to go to in order to cover the bases, not to mention, plain-out crazy!