The Unauthorized Trekkers’ Guide to the Next Generation and Deep Space Nine. James Hise van

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      The control of the starship is handled by two bridge duty officers assigned to the tasks designated command and control. These are designated as CON (command and vessel control, including helm and navigation) and OPS (vessel operations, including some duties formerly performed in Engineering).

      The center of the bridge consists of the Command Area, which is the focal point of all bridge activities. The captain, his Number One, and close advisors are located here. Just in front of this area are the previously described OPS and CON. Geordi La Forge and Data are in charge of these stations when not assigned to an Away Team. Their backups, who assume these duties when either Data or La Forge is unavailable, are simply referred to by the designations of their duties: OPS and CON.

      At the rear of the bridge is a raised semicircular area separated from the Command Area by a railing, behind which is another set of console stations. This is the Tactical Control for weapons, defensive devices (such as the shields), and the internal security of the Enterprise.

      MORE CONSOLES

      On the rear wall of the bridge are the Aft Consoles. These five stations are generally unsupervised functions unless specifically needed. Viewing them from left to right, they are as follows:

       Emergency Manual Override: In the event of main computer failure, many of the ship’s primary functions can be operated from this station.

       Environment: This can adjust the life-support systems and related environmental engineering functions anywhere on the ship. A similar system was employed against the bridge crew in Kirk’s time in “Space Seed” as well as against Khan’s cronies during the same encounter. No doubt this is to prevent the vessel from being used as a weapon against its inhabitants.

       Propulsion Systems: This is a backup system to OPS and CON that ties in directly to Engineering and the control of the warp drive and impulse engines.

       Sciences: This is essentially a research station. It is used by the Science Officer and various mission specialists and can also be accessed by the Chief Medical Officer.

       Sciences II: This is a second console identical to the Science station next to it so that more than one researcher at a time can access information and interact.

      The stage-left side of the bridge has two turbolifts and a door leading to the Captain’s Office (also called the Captain’s Ready Room). This has an auxiliary turbolift as well as the Captain’s private head and washroom.

      On the right side of the bridge is a door leading to the bridge head and washroom, something they didn’t seem to have on the original starship. A running joke at the time of Captain Kirk was that the Klingons didn’t have a head anywhere on their ships, which is what made them so mean.

      WINDOW INTO SPACE

      Continuing the overview of the bridge, the forward section contains a huge wall-sized holographic view screen. This viewer is almost always activated and dominates the bridge, giving the impression of a window into space. The view screen has magnifying capabilities and in some cases can lock into equipment on another vessel and send back an image of the other vessel’s bridge.

      Behind the bridge, but not immediately visible from inside the bridge proper, is a room filled with comfortable furnishings and lined with actual windows facing to the rear of the vessel. This affords an awesome view of the aft portion of the Enterprise saucer section as well as of the nacelles of the starship. This lounge is completely equipped as an observation deck and contains food units and often serves as a retreat from the pressures of duty by bridge officers. Access to it is a privilege.

      The Transporter Room is more colorful than the plain battleship gray of the old Enterprise. Although people to be beamed out usually go to stand on the transporter pad, site-to-site transportation is also possible, and people can be beamed directly to the bridge or elsewhere in the ship. Communicators, now a part of the gold-plated chest insignia, can be locked in on by the Transporter when needed. The transporter beam has a range of 16,000 kilometers (roughly 10,000 miles). The transporter is also designed to filter out viruses, bacteria, and other alien matter that might be picked up on the surface of a planet. It can also be used to detect and, if necessary, deactivate weapons.

      QUICK ESCAPE

      A special feature of the new Enterprise is the ability of the saucer section of the vessel to separate from the main hull in emergency situations. The only drawback to this escape procedure is that the warp engines are located in the main hull while the saucer section contains only impulse power from an engine located at the rear of the saucer.

      There are also shuttlecraft aboard the Enterprise that are used when the transporter is malfunctioning or should the starship become disabled and evacuation in deep space become a necessity. This new Enterprise 1701-D is the most amazing in a proud heritage of ships bearing that title.

SPECIAL EFFECTS

      Special visual effects are those shots done separately from any live-action shooting. Some special effects shots, such as on-set explosions, are done by a different crew entirely. Optical effects are done after live-action shooting is completed.

      In the 1960s, when the Enterprise was first given special-effects life, the process involved was difficult and time consuming. Thus new and extensive special effects didn’t appear on the old series often, and shots of the Enterprise flying from left to right, orbiting a planet, or warping through outer space were reused over and over again. The audiences of the eighties and nineties, accustomed to the extravagant special effects of motion pictures in the post–Star Wars era of motion pictures, expect more.

      In the fifteen years since Star Wars revolutionized special effects and the science-fiction film, television has found itself in the unenviable position of having to compete or look pathetic by comparison. While motion pictures can take days to get one shot right, television technical crews have only days to get upward of fifty shots done right. What has made this possible are the strides in video and digital technology.

      When Star Trek: The Next Generation premiered in 1987, much was made of its tie-in to Lucasfilm’s Industrial Light and Magic. But while ILM did contribute the dazzling special effects for “Encounter at Farpoint,” they performed little for the series thereafter, because Lucasfilm was geared toward the more time-consuming schedules of motion pictures, not the rapid pace of television production.

      Industrial Light and Magic produced some fifty special effects shots for “Encounter at Farpoint,” but a new team of specialists was hired by the time the second episode was in production. In fact, two teams have worked on the series producing its special effects since 1987. One team consists of Robert Legato and coordinator Gary Hutzel, the other of Dan Curry and Ron Moore.

      TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCES

      They began with a weekly special effects budget of $75,000, only $25,000 more a week than the old Star Trek had for its FX shots twenty years before. But the modern technology surrounding both videotape and motion control gave them the advantages of speed unavailable to the old series.

      For The Next Generation, special effects are shot on film and then transferred to videotape for both editing and composition purposes. This gives a sharper resolution to the image, which is why the new Enterprise never looks grainy or fuzzy the way the old TV Enterprise often did. While the special effects on the sixties СКАЧАТЬ