"Star Trek Into Darkness" Poster Released!

For those of you who are fans of JJ Abrams' Star Trek (2009), here's the official poster for the film's sequel, Star Trek Into Darkness, which was made available today:

 

Personally, I'm not too crazy about this poster. It reminds me quite a bit of the Batman sequel The Dark Knight Rises, a film I didn't particularly care for. Plus, the words "Star Trek" and "darkness" sort of conflict with one another, since the Star Trek future is supposed to be a bright and utopian one. I'm trying to reserve judgement here, but I'm not liking what I've seen and heard about this movie so far. Then again, many of us said the same thing about the first Abrams film when it came out, and it ended up being not too bad.

Anyway, what do you guys think?

Happy Thanksgiving!

For all of you here in the US and Canada, Happy Thanksgiving!

 

But in all seriousness, I hope you have a chance to enjoy the holiday with family and friends and eat lots of good food. Just make sure to keep in mind what this one day of the year is truly about: being thankful.

Safe travels and try not to eat too much turkey :-)

Welcome to the 24th Century, Now in Glorious HD!

It's been 25 years since Star Trek: The Next Generation hit the silver screen to initially mediocre reviews. "There can't be Star Trek without Kirk and Spock!" they said. But after the first two seasons, TNG finally got its 'space legs' and became one of the best Trek incarnations of them all. Now, us Trekkies have the opportunity to see TNG receive a similar remastering/high-definition conversion treatment as the Original Series did back in 2006, but in a manor that I think preserves the original show even better.

Earlier this year, CBS brought on-board several important members of the old TNG production team to bring the classic series into the 21st century, most notably, Doug Drexler and Michael and Denise Okuda. The team is now using modern technology to not only convert the show to HD, but also show off the highly-detailed Enterprise-D miniature like its never been seen before. For the Original Series, the old, grainy model shots and special effects footage was, as Okuna put it, "reinvented, [using modern CGI], pulling you out of the show". This time, the remastering will be 100% true to the original; the only difference: it'll look like the show was produced yesterday.

The Next Generation was originally recorded using natively-high definition 35mm cameras and with highly-detailed miniatures and then-state-of-the-art visuals, which grew much more complex as the series progressed. In fact, the visuals for the pilot "Encounter at Farpoint" were provided by Industrial Light & Magic (ILM), the same company that created the revolutionary effects for Star Wars. All live-action and model footage was then transferred to standard-definition video tape for editing, with a significant loss in quality. However, since SD was truly standard TV quality back then, no one worried about the quality loss.

Today, the difference is quite clear:

The original SD shot ("Farpoint")...

...and the recomposited HD shot.

Currently, a team at CBS Digital is pain-painstakingly reconstructing each episode from the original elements in exactly the same arrangement as the originals. The already-high definition live-action footage will be combined with newly recomposited VFX footage, both of which were preserved almost in their entirety by the studio. Elements such as starfields, planets, phasers, transporters, and shields will be recreated in CGI, since the original effects only exist on SD video tape. In the rare case that model footage is missing elements, deemed of too poor quality, or can't be located all-together, those shots will also be recreated in CG, matching the originals exactly.

At the same time, CBS Digital has also been known to correct minor VFX and 'equipment visible' errors, but these corrections are not always consistent throughout a given episode (hectic production schedule, anyone?). For instance, in "Farpoint", the Enterprise was shown firing its energy beam from the location of the Captain's Yacht (coincidentally, the same place Kirk's Enterprise fired during in the Original Series), rather then the 'correct' location along the lower phaser strip. The HD version corrects this error and is also a complete CGI reconstruction since the original shot was missing elements and deemed unusable:

Original VFX Shot ("Farpoint")...

...and its corrected CGI counterpart.

Many planets are made to closely resemble the old ones, but without the blurriness or distortion typical of planets early in the series. Thus far, many of the worlds in Season 1 are much more faithful recreations then the totally redesigned ones used in TOS-R. In the case of Ligon II in "Code of Honor", the original planet map was actually scanned and digitally wrapped onto the surface of the CGI planet, creating an almost perfect duplicate. Although this isn't always the case, it shows how meticulous the production team is when it comes to recreating elements as close to the originals as possible:

Original planet model ("Honor")...

...and its CG counterpart

In the case of live-action footage, it is generally left unaltered. However, due to the much higher picture quality of the original negatives, the footage looks crystal-clear. Compared to the originals, which actually look faded and unclear in comparison, the picture is far sharper and the colors vibrant and really well balanced. It really does look like the footage was filmed yesterday! What if live-action footage is missing? In that case, the team resorts to up-converting SD video tape footage to fill this void. Thus far, there has only been once instance of missing live-action footage (a brief 13-second clip from season three's "Sins of the Father"), but that missing segment was recently rediscovered. The team plans to reinsert that footage into "Sins" for the Season 3 Blu-ray release.

The Enterprise away team ("Justice")...

...and the same shot in HD.

With the overall sharper picture quality, many previously-blurry background details have become quite visible, which isn't always a good thing for the production staff. for example, some previously-unclear computer graphics, which were sometimes filled with production in-jokes or incorrect information (mainly because such things wouldn't have been visible when the show originally aired), had to be fixed by the remastering team. A few examples include a graphic depicting the wrong version of the Kirk's Enterprise ("The Naked Now"), an on-screen Captain's Log that was simple a mirrored image ("The Battle"), or a family tree filled with the names of the production staff and dates that didn't match spoken dialogue ("The Neutral Zone").

The movie-era Enterprise...

...replaced by the correct TOS version.

In addition to the amazing picture quality and visual effects, the soundtrack has also been converted to 7.1 surround sound. Unfortunately, just six days after the release, customers began reporting sound problems with three discs in the set. CBS later put out a press release stating that some episodes of season one "inadvertently had their front channel designations incorrectly mapped, resulting in an undesired playback experience when listening to them in a 7.1 or 5.1 Surround Sound environment". To correct this, CBS has set up a program to replace the damaged discs free of charge.

Initially announced late last year (November, 2011), a Blu-ray sampler pack containing the episodes "Encounter at Farpoint", "The Inner Light", and "Sins of the Father" was released on January 1, 2012. Before season one was released, two special episodes ("Where No Man Has Gone Before" and "Datalore") were shown theatrically on July 23rd. The complete first season was released on July 24, selling over 95,000 copies in the first five days (US sales only)

Recently, it was announced that season two is due to be released on December 4th, and will also contain extensive bonus features. Besides these bonus features, the set will included an extended cut of the fan favorite "The Measure of a Man".

Finally, pending the success of the TNG remastering, CBS has expressed their willingness to do the same with DS9 and Voyager...

Although I'm not yet convinced that Blu-ray is the wave of the future (I've yet to see anyone with a Blu-ray player..), I am quite impressed with the extensive work CBS has done on a 25-year-old series. It still amazes me that we can take something made over two decades ago (and even something made 40+ years ago) and use modern technology to make it look like brand new. One can only wonder what these shows will look like in another 20 years...

For complete coverage and continued updates on the TNG remastering project, make sure to check out TrekCore, one of the greatest sources of Trek multimedia on the Internet. Also, huge thanks to the folks at TrekCore for the amazing screencaps and much of the information found in this article. Additionally, don't forget to visit the 'Observations' index of Ex Astris Scientia (EAS) for detailed information on exactly what was done in each episode.

Until next time, live long and prosper :)

"Where No Man Has Gone Before" Alternate Footage

 

Sorry for the lack of posts lately. I've recently gotten a job and no longer have all the free time I once did to write things like this. I won't be posting as much as I did when I first started, but I'll continue to put articles up every few weeks or whenever I can. So make sure to check back for updates :)

Here's the original introduction used for Star Trek's second pilot, Where No Man Has Gone Before. This intro (as well as some other elements) were later edited/removed when the series was green-lit for production and had to meet the then-standard 50-minute time limit. The removed footage was long-thought to be lost, but was recently rediscovered by a German film collector and made available on the Season 3 Blu-ray release of TOS. The existence of this 'alternate version' of the second pilot has been known to fans since before series actually premiered (and low-res VHS dubs have been floating around ever since), as it was shown at a conference only days before the first broadcast episode, The Man Trap, hit the airwaves.

Anyway, enjoy this little piece of early Star Trek production history!

The "Battlestar Galactica" that Never Was: The Desanto-Singer Project

 I've always enjoyed classic Battlestar Galactica, despite its flaws. Although the reimagined series portrayed events in a far more realistic light, the old series was simply a lot of fun. It's unfortunate, though, that the series' expensive price tag and sometimes too-family-friendly plots (a result of meddling by ABC network execs) eventually led to the show's downfall after only one season. Even so, Galactica still makes for some enjoyable '70's sci-fi, filled with space battles, obvious villains, action-driven plots, and an excellent soundtrack, to say the least. Definitely recommended!

Originally announced in the early 2000's, the studio and Glenn A. Larson-endorsed Desanto-Singer Project was one of only three Battlestar Galactica revival attempts (the other two being Glenn A. Larson's Battlestar Atlantis and Richard Hatch's Battlestar Galactica: The Second Coming) proposed since the series' cancellation in late 1979. Although the series did have a short-lived spin-off, Galactica 1980, the show was generally panned by fans and critics alike (except the final episode) due to it's questionable writing, which, amongst other things, was filled with a boatload of science fiction cliches. Some have even gone as far as to forget it ever happened, leaving the door open to future stories involving Galactica discovering Earth.

Of the three revival attempts, the Desanto-Singer Project, headed by producer Tom Desanto and director Bryan Singer respectively, was the only one to come even close to production, only hampered by what would later become the 'reimagined' or rebooted Battlestar Galactica, which premiered in 2003 to technical and popular acclaim. In fact, the show was only eight weeks away from filming when the news came.

The basic storyline of the Desanto-Singer Galactica pilot was as follows:

"The continuation, built from the events of the episode "The Hand of God", tracks the Fleet after Galactica and Pegasus shake off the Cylon pursuit. The opening depicts a Colonial classroom where a teacher reviews the history of the Fleet, 23 years prior. Pegasus is confirmed as lost, and the Cylons themselves paid a high price in the battle. 

The quest for Earth continues, but Commander Adama has died, and Colonel Tigh assumes command. The citizens of the Fleet tire of spacefaring life, and, after a civil uprising, convince their leaders to settle the Fleet in an asteroid field that is rich in resources. The new colony, named New Caprica, builds new ships, settlements and facilities from the asteroids.  

The Cylons themselves reflected on their failures and determined that free will was a serious issue that caused problems in their logic-based civilization. When Baltar is found marooned, the Cylons initially held him up as a perfect example of their failures. Baltar convinced the Cylons that some qualities of humanity are useful, and underwent a cybernetic transformation into a new Cylon model to prove this. More dissent arose among the Cylons as a result, leading into a civil war. Out of the ashes of their war came a new Cylon race that, instead of obliterating the remnants of humanity that it finds, begins instead to assimilate the conquered humans as Cylon cyborgs.    

The character known as Boxey has grown up and assumed command of Galactica under the name of Commander Orin who faces the loss of his command from political pressure to decommission the battlestar as it has become outmoded and difficult to maintain. The political pressure becomes a command. The Colonial president, a woman named Mara, visits the battlestar in her shuttlecraft to attend the battlestar's decommissioning ceremonies.
 
Just as the battlestar's systems are powered down, the Cylons, who have studied New Caprica in secret and devised an elaborate plan for success, strike." 

 
   










 








 The project was green-lighted in June, 2001, with Fox on-board to host the two-hour pilot. Construction of viper mockups and sets began shortly thereafter in less-expensive Vancouver, Canda. Scripts were drafted and revised, ships were redesigned and modeled in CGI, and the cast was assembled. Both Dirk Benedict (Starbuck) and Herb Jefferson (Boomer) were signed on to reprise their original roles, despite the producer's original intent to not include any of the original actors.

Then, after the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center in New York, major flight delays and heightened security forced Singer to leave the production in order to meet deadlines for his new X Men film. Production on Galactica was halted for roughly a month after the attacks as the network searched for a new director to take Singer's place. The execs were also understandably nervous about using the concept of a Cylon sneak attack only a month after 9/11, a fact which probably contributed to the project's cancellation. With Singer's departure, support for the project quickly fell apart, eventually leading Fox to pull out in favor of pursuing Josh Weadon's space-western series Firefly instead (another very good, but short-lived series, by the way).

Unbeknownst to Desanto, who was still optimistic that the production would move forward with a new director, the Sci-Fi Channel began work on a totally new version of Galactica, which eventually evolved into the 2003 reboot. The producers of the reimagining (amongst them, veteran Star Trek writer Ronald D. More) intentionally distanced themselves from the concepts developed by Desanto and Singer, taking a completely different approach to the series while still retaining the basic premise of the '70's version. With the project effectively dead, the nearly-completed sets and mockups were placed in long-term storage. However, when the studio's storage lease ran out, these items were broken up with sledgehammers and disposed of, effectively ending any hopes of a continuation of classic BSG.

Despite all this, the Desanto-Singer Project met it's end in the face of a new beginning for the Battlestar Galactica franchise. Although not all are happy with the new direction and darker done of the reimagined series (I'm a bit on the fence myself...), it's here to stay, and ended up being one of Syfy's most successful shows. There's been talk of bringing back the old show for years, so I wouldn't be at all surprised if another attempt is made in the future. And if someone were to combine the best elements of both the classic and reimagined series...well, then they'd really have something. Hmmmm....

For further production details and a full plot synopsis, check out The Tombs of Kobol as well as the Battlestar Galactica Wiki. For more production concept art, including redesigned interiors, ships, and Cylon centurions, check out this link and this link. 

Happy Anniversary Star Trek!

In honor of the 46th anniversary of The Original Series, here's a short piece of real person fiction for your reading pleasure, entitled Visit to a Weird Planet Revisited, by Ruth Berman.

Trek actors William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy, and DeForest Kelley switch places with their 'real' future counterparts, finding themselves transported off-set and onto the 'real' Enerprise, far in the future. The plot actually reminds be a bit of the movie Galaxy Quest...

I originally read this story in the anthology Star Trek: The New Voyages (released in 1976), which I picked up at a book sale back in 2005. Apparently, this tale has a sister story, which was actually written first and by different authors, entitled (coincidentally) "Visit to a Weird Planet". That story tells us what happens to Kirk, Spock, and McCoy when they try to 'play actor' on the plywood Star Trek sets, 300 years in the past. I haven't been able to find that story online anywhere (I think it only appeared in magazine form, and was never officially published), but if anyone has, let me know. I'd really like to read it.

"Visit to a Weird Planet Revisited" has been out for quite a while, so chances are you've read it, but I thought it appropriate for the occasion. Anyway, enjoy, and make sure to check out today's Trek-themed Google Doodle. It's pretty well done :)

Android Market on the Pandigital Nova - A Failed Experiment

I've had the Pandigital Nova for over a year now, and even though it's a low-end tablet, it works fairly well as an ereader, email, and web-surfing platform. It may not be as robust or have the support base of many other high-end tablets, but it's also quite a bit cheaper. For those of you who happen to have the Nova, you probably already know one of its biggest limitations: no access to the Android Market (aka Google Play). Even though that's never been a big problem for me, I thought it would be a nice feature to have, since third-party apps don't always do it. Well, that feature ended up being more trouble then it's worth.

I found a set of online directions here for rooting the Nova as well as installing, fixing, and updating Market. The first step was to boot the Nova into recovery mode and install an update package which would root the device. That went off without a hitch, and I successfully rebooted. Next, I got back into the recovery mode and installed another package, this time the installer for Market and several other included applications. That install also was successful. When I rebooted a third time, I found the Market icon and tried searching for several popular apps, including Dropbox, Gmail, and Youtube, but to no avail. Following the article's directions on what to do if apps were missing from the Market, I still couldn't resolve the problem. 

I ended up installing and reinstalling new and old firmware several times as well as doing a hard reset multiple times, loosing all my installed apps and settings in the process. I even went back and started the procedure from scratch, this time including a few optional steps the author of the tutorial had used to fix a few problems he had encountered. That ended up making Market work a little better, but it still wasn't where it should be. I probably should have cut my losses then, but being the perfectionist I am, I was still determined to make this work.

Tired and frustrated (by this time, it was almost 8:00 at night), I tried installing the new Google Play app on top of everything else I did, which ended up almost being a fatal mistake. After a reboot, my Nova would freeze at the Pandigital splash screen, and attempting a hard reset had no affect. I also tried manually installing the old firmware, but it wouldn't let me. I was pretty nervous at this point that I had succeed in turning my tablet into a useless paperweight, but I had one more thing to try. I downloaded an even older version of the firmware from Pandigital's website and successfully installed it from my SD card. Thankfully, my tablet booted, and I was able to upgrade to the latest firmware from there. After taking a little time to put everything back the way I like it, I'm now back up and running, sans the Android Market and the other official Google apps that came with it. I would have liked to save them if I could, but I'm just happy to be up and running. Folks, this is a perfect example of how not to install Market on your unsanctioned Android device. Even though risk is a big part of R&D, I think I'll leave my tablet well enough alone for now. That was a bit too close for comfort.

The more I think about it, the root of my problems (no pun intended) probably lies in the fact that the Android Market was recently merged with several other Google services to form Google Play. Throw in the fact that the Nova isn't a sanctioned Android device and that the tutorial I was referencing is over a year old, and you've got a recipe for disaster. It wasn't a total loss, though, since I did learn quite a bit about Android system recovery, firmware updates, and what it means to root a device. I also took the opportunity to customize my home screen a bit.

With that said, I may try my luck with the Amazon Apps Store, which seems much less concerned with whether a device is 'officially sanctioned' or not, and it doesn't require any rooting or a tutorial to install (I foresee a follow-up article in the near future...). Pandigital Nova users: please do let me know if you've had better success with installing Market/Google Play then I did. I probably won't go there again, but I am curious, since no doubt someone will find a way eventually. As our good friend Spock says, "There are always possibilities...".

As always, thanks for reading, and for those of you here in the States, Happy Labor Day!