2006-09-17

Uh-oh ... ST:TOR First Looks

"The Original. Remastered." is the tagline on ads for the new TOS, so I'm assuming TOR is the appropriate three-letter designator.

In any case, TrekMovie.com has some images of the remastered Balance of Terror. The images are at standard definition quality, so it's not the HD glory we're hearing of.

While it's unfair to judge based on these screenshots, I have to say that perhaps the attempt to replicate the 1960's over-lighting of the Enterprise was not the best plan. The ship looked pretty good rendered in the ST:ENT lighting style, but while I haven't seen her in motion yet, in these images the ship looks flat and kinda cartoony, with only the vaguest hints of the details seen in the beauty shots posted online. Of course perhaps the show looks better in HD, but perhaps TOR is not the best thing for standard-def.

One thing that seems clear, though, is that the forward nacelle caps are crappy, with none of the multicolored christmas-light look. I don't get it either . . . the ship looks absolutely frickin' gorgeous in the beauty shots, lit properly and with nacelle caps that are multicolored and very wait-is-that-the-real-model?-esque. But in the images we're seeing the nacelles look like they were done in Windows 3.11 Paintbrush with the Pepto-Puke color selected.

Hopefully the situation will improve, and Balance of Terror (serving here as the "pilot" for TOR) will either look really great on HD or else will be redone to do so. Or, most hopefully, maybe the screenshots are just crappy and things look great in full motion.

Fingers . . . crossed.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I've seen it, and yeah, it seems to look rather... cartoonish.

(incidentally, while plasma torpedo most obviously doesn't get fired from the center of the screen, it doesn't move to the center now).

Author said...

Actually, thanks to the beauty of the internet I've seen the ep now, and the plasma torpedo is even better in its maneuvering. It's launched from above and to the side.

Anyway, a more thorough review of the episode will appear soon.

Anonymous said...

Hm, let me draw some lines...

...

Yup, it is launched from above and slightly to the left.
However, it doesn't move to the center of the screen after that. While the old torpedo moved to the center after being launched, this one movement are much slower.

Anonymous said...

Well, yeah, but if you take a look at the previous screencap...

http://www.trekmovie.com/tosrem/BoT/new_plasma_1.jpg

It's quite obviously not in the center, yet, isn't it? Even "10 seconds before impact", it's still not in the center.

To me, this represent distinct change from previous version. While the old torpedo went for the center pretty quickly and stayed there, the new one took its sweet time getting there.

But, it still evident to me that this is a self-guided missile.

Why, some Warsies may ask, since it doesn't go for the center? Well, precisely because of that :)

While the old one flew diagonally down to where Enterprise once was, didn't found her there and so started chasing her, the new one seems to be updating her trajectory from the very beginning. So, this new torpedo seems to be even better than the old one :)

(Ach, the memories... it was during he original scene analysis when it turned out that Wayne Poe is suffering from peculiar eye disease that prevents him from judging positions of the objects on the screen correctly :D)

Author said...

http://www.st-v-sw.net/STSWromplasw.html#IV

I think you guys will find this interesting. The above explains what I meant when I said that the Romulan weapon started off to the side.

Anonymous said...

Heh... Now that's a difference between you and me: I would never think of overlaying those images and thus would proceed from incorrect assumption that stars recede directly to the center of the screen. :)

Anonymous said...

So, hang on... I'm trying to visualise the trajectory of the torpedo.

Assuming that stars do converge in the direction of Enterprise travel, it means that BoP was actually to the right of the Enterprise. So, it means that torpedo turned left in order to follow Enterprises mad emergency backward warp :)

So, basically, "fired to lead the target" my ass :)