Broken Bow - Diane Carey [73]
Knowing the look of the main vehicle, the production team could then move on to its shuttlecraft. The Enterprise shuttles will play a more integral role in this series than in series past, because transporter technology is so new. As Zimmerman previously noted, the Enterprise transporter platform is technically approved for biotransport, but shuttlecraft are still the preferred method of getting the crew from one place to another.
“The shuttle design is almost a direct steal from the shuttles that are being built right now,” Zimmerman admits. “The X-33 [Reusable Launch Vehicle] is probably the closest model to the actual shuttlecraft that we are using on Enterprise. We feel that reentry vehicles, right now, are as close to state-of-the-art as they’re going to be in the next hundred years, mainly because we lack the propulsion system that Star Trek has so blithely invented without explaining quite how we acquired all that power. Also, I think that will be a delight to the science-oriented viewer, because it’s familiar.”
The conflicts of designing a series being filmed over thirty years after The Original Series yet taking place almost one hundred years previous to its setting presented a number of problems in the course of the design. At some point in the planning for each set, prop, costume, and even makeup application, a decision needed to be made on where to bridge the gap—whether to make extrapolations based on current technology or on the vision of the future circa 1967. In the end, a combination of periods was achieved, with the emphasis being on a future based on the technology of today.
The most difficult challenge for maintaining design continuity was the props, since some concessions needed to be made along the lines of the more portable equipment. Considering how far technology has come in the last decade alone, what may have appeared futuristic in the sixties does not hold up to today’s technological advancements. According to Berman, the decision on how true to remain to the original needed to be made on a case-by-case basis; as an example, he points out that the computer on his desk is less bulky than the one that sat on Captain Janeway’s desk on Voyager.
One of the most recognized props from The Original Series was the communicator. The wireless handheld device, so ahead of its time for the original audience of Kirk and Spock, is old hat for today’s audience, many of whom have similar devices in their homes, cars, and jacket pockets. Again, Zimmerman was required to bridge the gap between the technology of yesterday’s future with today’s. “They’re quite along the lines of the communicators that we saw in the classic series and the early movies, but, because they are being designed now, they are much cooler and much more interesting pieces of equipment. Their function is pretty much the same. We’re not doing badges—we’re doing flip-open communicators, tricorders, and other diagnostic equipment that is small. It is microminiaturized, but it is not vastly different in its design from the great things that are being done now.”
This quickly became the defining element for all props, Zimmerman admits. “The truth is our props are more capable but less slim and compact than what you can buy today. That’s part of the dramatic necessity, so the actor has something that the audience recognizes instantly and that works. Having said that, they are really interesting props and they will make interesting devices for the telling of a story.”
And it is those stories that the designs will best serve. “There’s a lot of wonder and awe and sense of the first time in all of the concepts for the stories,” Zimmerman explains. “This is no ‘Ho hum, we’re out in space again, we know how to do this. Just sit back and watch us.’ It’s like we’re discovering it for the first time and it’s really very exciting. It’s reinventing the franchise in many, many ways.”
And the designer is just as excited about this new opportunity. “Personally,