Species of the week: Gorn

Jim · Post by **Jim** » Fri Oct 12, 2007 8:08 pm

Monroe wrote:Star Wars IV did have an extremely low budget. Most studios turned them down and 20th century fox wasn't about to invest a whole lot into what they saw as a huge gamble.

Yes, but they went WAY over the original budget given. I remember Lucas saying that they blew throuh the ENTIRE budget for effects before shooting a single frame of effects shots.

Post by **Teaos** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 1:22 am

Care to provide evidence for that?
If CGI cost next to nothing, then it would have been used far more extensively in the following decades.

Yeah Rochey I will provide an example... 2cm under the lines you quoted.

Some of the stuff they might not have been able to do with the budget (Not sure what each budget was) but as I said from watching that doco quite a bit of it was just hard work and original though.

Aaron · Post by **Aaron** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 1:56 am

Teaos wrote:Not all but a lot. Quite a bit of the stuff the did in SW cost next to nothing it was just a new way of doing stuff. Some original thought mixed with a bit of work.

As an example they were the first people to think of moving the camera across a model to simulate movement rather than the other way around giving them far better shots. That cost nothing! Yet it added a lot to the quality. I saw a thing on the making of star wars on the discovery channel a while back. While there were a few things that ST might not have been able to do a lot of it thety could have.

Wow, what does that have to do with the quality of a rubber suit? And how do we know that the ST SFX crew could have come up with that trick on their own where as the SW SFX crew had ten years of time and experiance to build on to come up with that. For all we know they might have been thinking of that for years and never shared it with anyone. It's unfair to judge one era's SFX creativity with anothers. For all intents and purposes they where living in another world.

Post by **Teaos** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 10:48 am

Wow, what does that have to do with the quality of a rubber suit? And how do we know that the ST SFX crew could have come up with that trick on their own where as the SW SFX crew had ten years of time and experiance to build on to come up with that. For all we know they might have been thinking of that for years and never shared it with anyone. It's unfair to judge one era's SFX creativity with anothers. For all intents and purposes they where living in another world.

Yeah cause all those tricks like moving a camera took years of R&D to work out.

Its the attitude behind them. The Star trek guys seem to have a "What does it matter" attitude.

Sionnach Glic · Post by **Sionnach Glic** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 12:26 pm

Yeah Rochey I will provide an example... 2cm under the lines you quoted.

And this has nothing to do with the cost of CGI. What does running a camera down a track matter, if you don't have the CGI budget to make it look like a proper space scene?

Post by **Teaos** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 1:10 pm

They had the budget for the background and flashing lights. It the execution of the filming. Trek used old out dated ideas and didnt try anything new. Most of the space battles that SW did ST could have done. There was no new amazing technology for most of it. Just using what was already around in better ways.

Sionnach Glic · Post by **Sionnach Glic** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 1:46 pm

They had the budget for the background and flashing lights.

Barely. A lot of the SFX you see was the limit their budget would stretch to.

It the execution of the filming.

Having the budget to make the ships also helps.

Trek used old out dated ideas and didnt try anything new.

True. But modern Trek is hardly cutting edge either.

Most of the space battles that SW did ST could have done.

Er, not without using the enitre season's budget at once, no.

There was no new amazing technology for most of it. Just using what was already around in better ways.

And having money.

Post by **Tsukiyumi** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 3:04 pm

I have to agree with the budget argument here. As I recall, Lucille Ball fought hard to even keep the show on the air (Desilu Productions, you know), and only a fan campaign got them a third season. The rubber suit sucked, the concept and story were awesome. I'm also fairly certain that they spent a lot of their FX budget for the season on 'Arena', so that shows how desperate they were.

They reused sets and props from other CBS shows (this is why every other episode was on a 'western' or 'Roman' planet), kept the space battles to a minimum (you don't even see the Gorn ship in 'Arena'), and the actors/writers weren't paid much even by 1960's standards. If Trek had been given even 150% of its budget, I'm sure they could've done considerably better.

Post by **Mikey** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 3:27 pm

There's another factor which makes it almost academic to compare a TV show to a film in this regard - time. You have a great deal more time to thnk of, and execute, innovative new SFX when you're making a film vs. making a serial TV show. Bear in mind, also, that Lucas was working on some of the ideas for new FX since "THX-1138."

Aaron · Post by **Aaron** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 3:30 pm

So are you going to address the rubber suit issue or are you going to continue to ignore it?

Post by **Mikey** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 3:31 pm

Cpl Kendall wrote:So are you going to address the rubber suit issue or are you going to continue to ignore it?

Who are you talking to? I already said that I didn't mind it.

Post by **Tsukiyumi** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 3:33 pm

I said, I think it looks hi-larious, but it was the best they could do, and it doesn't detract from the story that much. It's still one of my favorite TOS episodes.

Post by **Teaos** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 3:33 pm

Me? I think it was crap and could have been made a bit better but it was the execution of it which I found annoying. A guy walking really slowly going Grrrr. If you cant do it right dont do it at all.

Aaron · Post by **Aaron** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 3:33 pm

Mikey wrote:
Who are you talking to? I already said that I didn't mind it.

Sorry I'm referring to Teos. He should get what I mean.

Aaron · Post by **Aaron** » Sat Oct 13, 2007 3:34 pm

Teaos wrote:Me? I think it was crap and could have been made a bit better but it was the execution of it which I found annoying. A guy walking really slowly going Grrrr. If you cant do it right dont do it at all.

You claimed in response to the rubber suit that ST could have done better and cited SW SFX in response. I'm still waiting for proof that they could have done better. Especially since their contemporary Dr. Who had similar results.