Here’s hoping this year is a great one, and we get to discuss a lot of fun subjects.

cheers

daren

Thanks… talk to you soon

Daren

The time of year is here when my memories drift to a simpler time where I’d find on christmas morning a few representatives of the MEGO Star Trek family.  It’s funny how much memories can stay with us.

I’d just like to take this chance to wish everyone who wanders here a lovely Christmas and Holiday Season… Also a prosperous and joy filled new year!  It’s been a busy 2007 for me… and I’m hoping that will continue. I look forward to updating you all on stuff that happens here, and I welcome your comments and thoughts.  Thanks to all for visiting.

Daren Dochterman

I just saw the preview of the TOS:Remastered version of “The Man Trap”… one of those early episodes that scared and delighted me into fandom. Will never forget the nightmarish rememberances of this… and the drive to try and figure out how it worked. Seeing the new preview, however… made my heart sink, yet again. I sure hope this new “Morphing” of the Salt Creature is temporary, and one just generated in the edit bay at CBS, cause it is full of stuff that can be found in a dozen MTV Videos of the 90s. One of the great things about the original, simple though effective and eerie dissolves, is that it is very mysterious and etherial. Kind of like a walking nightmare vision… yeah, I know it’s just a dissolve… but your mind fills in stuff. The new effect has none of that… in fact, the backgrounds are morphing too… so that salt sucker must be pretty powerful in the illusion gland to transform a wall too. This can be fixed relatively easy by isolating one of the backgrounds… (or doing a quick matte and using a newly generated background from photoshop) and doing the trickery just on the figure. Whatever the case, I thought that the effect should look something like what could be done in an optical printer of the time… using just light filters and distortion and diffusion… so I quickly put this together this afternoon in a frenzied lunchtime binge.

Now, without further ado… my humble attempt at a 60s type morph… finessed in the 21st century.

TrekMorphTest

What do you think of that? The guys at CBS Digital long ago stopped talking to me… so I can pretty much assume that I won’t get a call before this weekend… But I’d be glad to show them how to do this. lol

Oh well… back to the drawing board.

UPDATE——————————
Well, I saw it over the weekend, and it was good to see that those “Morphs” didn’t make it into the final show. Guess the trailer people couldn’t resist to add to the “magic” and decided to do their own morphs for it. Guess a dissolve wasn’t enticing enough. Ah, showbiz.

I just had the opportunity to see a screening of Star Trek New Voyages’ “World Enough and Time” with one of the writers, Michael Reaves, at the home of a mutual friend. I had the opportunity to view it earlier, as I have begun helping James Cawley and the other folks over there at STNV to increase the “Original Series” feel into their effects… but I hadn’t looked at it on purpose… I wanted to see it in its final form. I didn’t want to be influenced by unfinished editing, or temp music, or incomplete effects. I had seen “To Serve All My Days”, the “Chekov Episode”, and though I found the ending a bit mystifying and the acting still a little stilted, I did think it was a momentous improvement over their previous episodes.

Now, with this new episode, to be released in late August, Cawley, Director/Writer Marc Scott Zicree, Reaves, and the rest of the enthusiastic cast and crew have taken yet another large leap by actually making me believe it is Star Trek. I found the episode engaging, fascinating, entertaining, and emotional. The story maintained my interest level as no modern trek has in quite a long time. There is an intangible quality to this that makes it feel like the spirit and sense of fun has returned… without all the technical mumbo jumbo that is usually substituted for in the later incarnations of the show. John Lim turns in a truly enjoyable performance as younger Sulu without blatant mimicry or parody. He simply became Sulu. Frankly, this is the level of “honor” I want to see in the next Trek film. I don’t want new actors playing the old actors. What I want is the new actors playing these roles… and getting to the same place that the older actors did. This has been accomplished with New Voyages more than any other attempt I’ve seen. Yes, there is still room for improvement… but most of the fannishness is gone, and has been replaced with confident bravado.

The effects are top notch… and aren’t so flashy that they call attention to themselves. They seem to fit pretty well into the classic trek envelope. Ron Thornton, Lee Stringer, Joel Bellucci and the talented folks at the DAVE animation school really look like they’re having fun. It will be great to work with them on the next episode.

I’m glad to see the advancement of this project from a little backyard star trek fanfilm with cool sets to a viable continuation of the original series spirit.

This is the best meal of Crow I’ll ever eat.

drd

It’s been quite a while since I’ve posted… so I thought it was about time to. Have been quite busy moving and trying to continue my career in the movie business. Had a stint on Warner Brothers re-make of “Get Smart” and had a fun time there, then moved to a northern suburb of Los Angeles into a nice house with enough space for me and my vast collection of “stuff”.

There had been a lot of good reaction to my “Doomsday Machine” version, and a heck of a lot of downloads. I was glad I got it done before the self-imposed deadline… and glad that so many of you contacted me saying how much you enjoyed it. I appreciate your feedback, and am glad that you “got” what I was trying to do.

In the interim between finishing the project and now, I had the urge to put another cap on it, and release a commentary to accompany the effects only reel that I released back in February. So I did. I recorded one very early one morning last week, and now present it to you. It’s very much off the cuff… and hopefully has a couple of insights that you didn’t know about me or the project.

So, without further ado…

Just play this at the same time as you run the effects only video, and it should sync up fine.

TREK ENHANCED COMMENTARY

On Friday:

5:30-7:00 Trek Lives! The Rise, Fall and Rise of Star Trek— Our panel of Geek Monthly expert Treksperts discuss the past, present and future of sf’s first franchise as the 40th anniversary festivities conclude, showing rare and never-before-seen audio and video material from the history of Trek and weigh in on J.J. Abrams and Star Trek XII. Featuring panelists Jeff Bond (author, Music of Star Trek), Anthony Pascale (webmaster, TrekMovie.Com), Robert Meyer Burnett (director, Free Enterprise) and Daren Dochterman (visual effects producer, Star Trek: The Motion Picture DVD). Get out of your parent’s basement and into a seat for this not-to-be-missed panel featuring a few special surprises. Room 220

And on Sunday:

2:30-4:00 Starship Smackdown 6: Alien Armageddon— You’ve savored the Starship Smackdown and trembled at the Robot Rumble, now get ready for the most hellacious conflagration of all-time! For the first time ever, witness the Alien Armageddon, in which your favorite aliens go toe-to-toe in deadly combat. Can the Borg assimilate the Klingons or will the Minbari be schooled by the Krill? All will be revealed by our expert panel of alienologists from everyone’s favorite magazine, Geek Monthly. Featuring all new quips from Robert Meyer Burnett (DVD producer, Requiem For Krypton, X-2, Usual Suspects), Daren Dochterman (Visual Effects producer, Star Trek: The Motion Picture), Steve Melching (writer, Animated X-Men, The Batman) and Jeff Bond (editor, Geek Monthly). Room 220

And of course you’ll be able to find me wandering the dealers room for various treasures.

Go to www.wondercon.com for more info.

Hope to see you there!

So, It’s fixed now. Thanks for letting me know.

I’m starting out slowly here… but I wanted to get everything done, so I gave myself the deadline of when CBS/Paramount released their version of “The Doomsday Machine”… and I made it. Finished the final shot on Wednesday night.

There sure were a lot of shots. lol

As I stated before… I’m gonna start out slowly… so here is the FX only reel… I’ve left a few of the live action clips to bracket everything so you know the context of the shots… and it is quite choppy… but it should give you a good idea of what I’m doing here.
I may consider releasing the episode in its entirety, but after all… this is supposed to be a demo reel… and that’s what I’m presenting now.
Now… to fend off the usual questions:

1) Yes, I know there is a “mistake” in (a certain shot… name it)… it is intended. An homage to 60s FX technology. (lol)

2) Yes, the Doomsday Machine is transparent in some sections. This is intended. I still maintain that part of the transparency in the front of the cone was meant to be.

3) The shuttle name I’m using is the NCC-1701/1 “Spinrad”

4) I know the shots are grainy. They’re supposed to be.

5) I don’t show exterior damage to the Constellation’s bridge much. There is a little bit of a burn mark… but that’s it. The original model shot had no damage to the bridge… and yes, I’m trying to duplicate that… but not have it look a foot long.

6)I don’t have time to do specific conversions into your favorite movie format… You are welcome to convert what I’ve offered. Just let me know so we can share it with the rest of the class.

7) Additional hosting is on its way for a couple other formats (including xvid AVI)… just have to hear from the people involved.

8) Here are the WMV versions to start out with:

This is the first time I’ve used Rapid-share… so if there are problems, let me know.

SMALL VERSION (wmv) about 29 meg
LARGE VERSION (wmv) about 75 meg

SMALL VERSION (h.264) about 96 meg

And here are mirror sites with a couple other formats…

MIRROR 1

MIRROR 2 (Creative Digital Moments Website)

MIRROR 3 (trekmovie.com)  Large AVI   Small AVI
MIRROR 4 (Renderhosting.com)  HDmaintitles  TRAILER

Hope you enjoy it… and if there are problems with downloading, let me know… a couple more mirror sites are supposed to be up by the end of the day…

LL&P

Daren