im not sure i like the new horta tunnel…

It’s really becoming comfortable and familiar now, the new material transistions nicely into these classic jewel episodes.

Now TOS visually exists much closer in the same universe as the motion pictures.

To qoute Rick “the hatchet man” Berman, “I am pleased.”

I felt the horta tunnel was a bit cheap; sort of like a quickly done Premiere effect or something.The Horta itself actually comes out pretty well considering how cheezy it was. You can see it was sprinkled with gold glitter when the light hits it just right, something I don\’t think I noticed before.

Looks like they hit this one pretty much dead on - fixed the perspective of the matte painting, but kept the “vintage” look intact. I wasn’t even expecting the burn-through fix. Looks cool! I was hoping we might have gotten a look at the “Chamber of the Ages” but figured that would be going too far afield for the remastering. Probably just as well. Looking forward to this one!

I agree, this looks very nice. Great work putting this together!

Here is the first glimmer of hope… I really like this. See, told ya it would just take some time for them to get in the swing of things.

Daren!!

Now listen, when Daren comes around, especially Daren, something magical is happening in TV land all over again!

God I can’t believe Trek is back again and not that POS, PC stale, tired, flat rubbish that has been stealing the name Star Trek and stinking up airwaves for the last 15 years or so,

welcome back, it’s been ENTIRELY too long

Wouldn’t it be insane if this show became a bonafied hit again in syndication?

We might see some Kirk era marketing and products hitting the stores again after all this time!

I just seen the Devil In The Dark and I’d have to say that that this episode since it was based on the planet seemed much better then BOT. The part where the Horta came through the rock seemed fine and well thought out in the special effects department.
However….just before the Horta burned No Kill I the Denver station cut to
a commercial. But….they didn’t cut it out when they came back it was just a poor choice to cut away. It also seemed that the shots of the Enterprise that they did show were a lot better too. Likewise…the planet had real definition so that was a welcome sight. Hope they keep that up.

…just watched it…I really liked the revamped “matte” painting as well as the added smoke effects from the machinery in the background. Here’s hoping they will introduce a few high flying, whispy, clouds into some of those orange sky backdrops to add some depth. The departure of the Enterprise looked really good this go around. Well done on all fronts CBS. Looking forward to next week.

The Horta Tunnel Burn through — is that not acid being sprayed from the front of the Horta? Looked good — didn’t expect that effect either. Overall was very pleased with this effort.
The Enterprise flyby at the end had me saying out-loud, “Now that’s more like it!”. However, I still believe the nacelle caps (bussard collecters) need more work (please!) and I too would have loved at least a 2 second shot of the ‘Chamber of the Ages’ (a Darren Dochterman “missed opportunity”?).
One quick note on the hack job done on the editing of the episode — I was fine with it right up to the deletions in Spock’s meld with the Horta. How can you see the episode and not hear “Cry for the Children … Walk carefully in the Vault of Tomorrow.” Its a shame — left on the cutting room floor. I expect “editing” but not at such a key moment.

I pretty much agree… a job well done. It’s like Star Trek is a new series. Some how the fixed special effects allows the story to follow thru. Excellent acting.
Also this time around my local station didn’t butcher it with the editing. But still no promotions here in Middle Georgia.

i thought i saw a new CGI matte in the background of the one scene when Kirk was standing in front of the window and he was in his superman pose while he was talking to the other workers…i wish there was a screen cap of that up…maybe its not new CG, i cant remember…

I had to watch it on a crappy antenna feed because I got stuck at a party about 100 miles from home… UGH!

Anyway, what I could see was good, and though the editing job was bad, it appears I got a better edit than some of ya’ll out there in TVLand.

My favourite shot was the closing shot of the Enterprise with an actual, honest to God, single camera tracking flyby…. not an “Enterprise flies at you, change camera, Enterprise flies away from you” shot. That was so good!

Can someone out the Enterprise fly by at the end on here because my dvd recorder stopped during the mind meld!

Ack, I forgot to set any recoding devices! Agh.

after my disappointment with balance of terror i have to admit i did enjoy this remastered episode. the devil in the dark was perfect mix of new and old. the balance of terror was an episode begging to be redone with battle scene special effects, but instead we got updated recreations of the same old shots. Anyways im looking forward to the next redone episodes like i did when i was a kid watching it for the first time with my dad. Honestly, im greatfull to CBS for bringing back the original and to me the best of all the star trek series. Can u tell im and old guy lol

David, that is the same matte as seen in the begining, and from the same office as the clip I made. So I only did a picture and video clip from the end of the episode when Vanderberg calls and says production had started again, and thus smoke was coming out of the stacks in the background.

I will see what I can do about putting up a clip of the Enterprise leaving Janus IV for you all who did not see it.

EDIT: OK it\’s up!

This one worked great. Except the nacelle caps.

I do think that CBS are showing improvement already. like the Matte work, not sure about the horta tunnel.

btw Matt just added the ent flyby from the end titles.

great work on all of this Matt

I have to admit I really loved the closing flyby shot.

I tried to put together a move like that about 13 years ago when I was in “Broadcasting” school.

Of course the “commercial stuffer” edits are driving me completely wild.

The dialog between Kirk and Spock when Spock tells him to kill the Horta was much longer in the original.

I did NOT even notice the smoke in the closing matte painting it is so close to the original.

Did anyone notice there was less reverb in the opening Shatner narration than last week?

“I did NOT even notice the smoke in the closing matte painting it is so close to the original.”

Did you notice the two workers in the forground in the same scene? Not only is there smoke, but two CGI guys in orange suits come out to work on a valve or something of that nature in the foreground of the matte.

“Did anyone notice there was less reverb in the opening Shatner narration than last week?”

I noticed it too, much better.

Haven’t gotten to see the episode yet, thank you very much for posting these clips and images! This has become one of the two or three sites I make sure to check when I come online for the day. I think they did a great job updating the the cave/matte paiting, liked the improved horta tunnel and from that final shot of the enterprise I think they are improving there as well! Of course I guess depending on the ep it could be better or worse but I like the lighting to it better.

My biggest complaint (having only seen BOT) is the syndication edits… but when the dvds come out I will be sure to get them!

First of all,

BLOOPER: In the original, both Kirk and Spock fire at the Horta. The remastered effect shows only Kirk’s phaser! This is not a correction as the dialog clearly indicates “we” meaning K+S shot the creature.

Now, I only had a VHS tape to watch, but I sync’d it with my DVD. The music is precisely the same — not so much as a note is off beat — and I wonder if it is simply the original recording. Shatner’s voice over however, is completely different, losing sync with the original rather quickly.

Also, I noticed the DVD showed the actors much “pinker” which I attribute to the same dye fading that afflicts my collection of original film clips, (some of which are restored at Curt McAloney’s “Trek History” website as “Joe A.”). The negatives are not subject to fading…

Otherwise, I think the lower resolution of the DVD et al is kinder to the actors whose every flaw is now visible for posterity.

I’ve put up a little bit of a technical review on TrekEnhanced.com. I quite liked the new stuff, with the exception of the shots of the 1701 itself. They are definitely getting better, though… (At least the ship isn’t a warm grey anymore) Some impressive subtlety in this episode… I’m impressed and relieved.

Of course, I’ll be with ‘em every week… no matter what.

drd

Please use Quicktime for your video clips. I have a windows media plug-in, but it still won’t play on my Mac.

This was a big improvement–the shot of the worker walking into the tunnel at the bottom of the opening matte painting, matched with the cut to the actor walking onto the live action cave set, actually made me say “Cool!” All the integration of the matte shots was seamless and quite subtle (although it has to be said that the pergium station painting was probably the worst done for TOS so there was nowhere to go but up).

The horta wall-melt was interesting, still jarring the way they integrated the photographic imagery of the horta, but probably neither way better nor any worse than the original effect. The ship shots are still the problem areas and still mostly look like the Animated Series to me–although the last shot was a major improvement and hopefully an indication of the direction they will begin to move in after they’ve demonstrated their loyalty to the original FX shot library by recreating all those basic shots. I still wish the model were better lit and textured–the last shot at least had a nice highlight on the engineering section, and the overall design of the shot–and the way it worked with the music!–was exciting. Now I’m getting excited again…although the syndication cuts ruin one of the raison d’etres for this idea, which is to hopefully allow us to show these episodes more easily to non-fans. Why would you want to show them the episodes with key moments edited out? That’s particularly infuriating here in L.A. where it’s running in a 55 MINUTE time slot!

Bummer, My media player is choking on whatever avi codec you are using. Can you also post .mov files too?

I’m having the same problem with the Quicktime clips.

WNBC in New York isn’t giving Trek a chance, again they started late and of course, finished late. The real shame is that the local Channel 9 station in NY (formerly UPN and now “My 9″) has a digital HD corresponding channel and could show Trek on Saturday or Sunday evenings at 6 or 7 with a latter repeat. Trek should be yanked from WNBC in New York and given a better home.

Hi all,

I was reading through the posts and was looking to see if anyone had the same feeling I did, but I didn’t see anything so let me raise the issue because I’d love to get your thoughts on it.

The hand phasers….I know we want to remain as true to the original as possible, but with the new matte paintings, planet effects, and the Horta burning through the wall (which I thought looked fantastic by the way), would it not make sense to upgrade that corny old phase effect?

I mean, the undefined lines of it and the blue “shrapnel” that is coming off the horta at impact….one of the things I love about this project is that they don’t seem to be doing anything that takes you out of the original story…it’s not too jarring. But that old effect I find now takes me out of it, especially because it provided one of the most ample opportunities for improvement.

Am I the only one that felt cheated on that? I was expecting the burn through by the Horta, but I was shocked not to see the phase effect revised.

Much better

People, if you can’t play a video file, get VLC player (aka VideoLAN). Don’t complain to the poster; get a program that plays everything.

For QuickTime and Real, get QuickTimeAlternative and RealAlternative. The *newer* quicktime & real files are the ONLY ones VLC can’t play — it has like 1000 codecs built in at the DLL level.

These are encoded in XviD format, I mention it at the begining. I will be switching to DivX from now on, because DivX filters are easily available for both Mac and PC. XviD produces better results, but I guess you guys with Macs are having an issue.

For Mac users go get DivX:
http://www.divx.com/divx/mac/?prima=homewantmac

and then QT component that helps play XviD using the DivX foundations.
hrefhttp://www.xvidmovies.com/mac/ rel=”nofollow”>http://www.xvidmovies.com/mac/

VLC is a great choice if you are having issues playing for either PC or Mac.

For all the new special effects, the rock behind Bones in that last picture still resembles crumpled up and spray painted paper! LOL

It seems clear to me that the horta emerging effect is not up to snuff. The whole take should had been replaced with CG.

A lot of the problems in the original shot remain and little care has been taken to clean these up. For starters, the horta is no where near the hole when it opens. I understood the horta as “eating” through the rock, not just magically vaporizing it a metre or so in front of it. Second, as much as I like the addition of smoke, its not enough, and the red hot rock still cools unrealistically fast. The whole thing just looks painted on and its so disappointing.

I always imagined the horta rolling into a ball shape as it moved through the tunnels. This would explain the circular holes we see. A CG horta could be made to do this, unlike the original that looked like an awkward carpet. Also I’d had liked to see the part where it knocks its own egg taken out. Surely the horta should be more graceful.

On a still frame during the closing credits of Catspaw, there is a shot of the hand phaser effect of Kirk and Spock shooting the Horta. In the still frame, the effects look different than in the re-mastered version; more of a dark red where in the new version, they were a brighter red and had a pulsing effect. I hope to see the original version on TV Land next month to make a comparison to find out one way or the other.