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1978 Movie Model Enterprise

By D.A. Hill

Click on an image to see a larger view.




As a young college student and lifelong "trekkie" I was so excited to purchase one of the first-run movie Enterprise models back in 1978. I still have the model, but it is now disassembled awaiting its own refitting! Below are some photos from 1978 which I recently found while cleaning out my closet. I thought I would share these to help other Star Trek modeling folks see what the original issue model was really like. Later, in 1980, I would do a major "refit" of this model, with extensive lighting, wiring, and repainting. (See below).

As you can see from the side shot above, I built the model as it was, out of the box, following the instructions to the letter. (I should have known better!) This was 1978 after all! I was just a young and stupid kid. (Now I'm old and stupid, but at least I know it!) The paint was "duck egg blue", very light. And the reflective decals that came with the kit went on the nacelles, and on the photon torpedo launch bay. You can see that one of the front window panels did not have a complete set of windows. There is NO cross-hatching on the ship in any way. It was very, very smooth. Lastly, I still left the switch on the belly of the secondary hull, though I did not use the lights and battery holder that came with the model.

Though these pictures are somewhat fuzzy, I had originally painted the deflector dish a metallic aqua. A really crummy idea. Notice that the phaser banks are flat. They were simply decals. There was no raised marks for the phasers. The nacelles tilted too much. I needed to modify the struts on that kit but didn't know any better at the time. Again, the window panels do not have all of the windows showing. You can see the reflective photon torpedo decal in the adjoining picture.

In the top view (left) you can see much more clearly the flatness of the panels, including the phasers.



1980 Refit

These photos show several items: drilled out windows, lighted interiors, nacelle lighting (at both ends!), and the impulse engines carved out and replaced with "fogged" tissue and glue to give the right effect. The lights were all HO gauge grain-of-wheat types. I sprayed the interior of the model silver, to help maximize the lighting effect. Notice there is some bleed through around the torpedo section of the "neck". I also reinforced the neck with an internal superstructure from the belly of the secondary hull, through the neck, and into the saucer section. I used thick plastic "girders" fitted around a hollow tube for the support stand (partially shown). The wiring shown on the right side of the model plugs into an RCA miniature phono jack receptacle where the docking port would be.

As you can see, the lights were very effective. The exposure on the camera was a little too long and does not really give a fair view of the deflector dish. Still, you can see that the lighting is thrown off from the deflector and from the nacelles. The photon torpedo launch tubes have a real "red" light behind them, instead of the reflective sticker that originally came with the kit. (I drilled the photon torpedo launch tubes as well as the windows). Again the stand and wires are also shown.

The last photo shows more evidence of bleed-through on the nacelles and photon launch tubes. Otherwise, a good example of how I wired the model.

Finally, I used this Enterprise model to composite my "beauty shots" in the next section.




Enterprise "Beauty Shots"

Image 1 : One of my personal favorites. I created the star background and flares using Adobe Photoshop. then I "matted" my models of the Enterprise and Klingon D7 cruiser. After that, I used Photoshop to apply "aging", "flaring", and battle damage.

Image 2 and Image 3: In these pictures, the backgrounds were rendered with Bryce 3D, and then the Enterprise model was "matted" into the picture using Adobe Photoshop.

Image 4 : Earth and the Enterprise. Using Adobe Photoshop I "matted" a photo of earth, and then matted my Enterprise onto an astronomy photo. I then added some lighting effects and flares on top.

Image 5 : This one done the old fashioned way, sticks, black poster board, styrofoam, and timed exposures on my old Ricoh 35mm camera. Additional sun flares were later added using Adobe Photoshop.

Image 6 : This and Image 7 are, again, the old fashioned way. Timed exposures against black posterboard with pin-holes lighted with a lamp behind the posterboard. (Step 1 - Photo without Enterprise "lite-up" while lamp is on behind posterboard. Step 2 - Enterprise "turned on" with lamp behind poster board off. Step 3 - Ambient lighting on Enterprise to help the colors show. All done with single exposure of film using a lens cover and stopwatch).

Image 8 : The NEW fashioned way. Enterprise model added with "matte" effect in Adobe Photoshop to a planet rendering done with Bryce 3D. Enhancements to nacelles, running lights and motion effects were done via Photoshop filters.

Image 9 : Here, the background clouds and shadows were created via Adobe Photoshop. The Enterprise was "matted" using Photoshop, and then additional fog and lighting added.




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