15-2 Stuart Ziff on the Troubled Effects Production of Star Trek: The Motion Picture
About this episode
The episode features Stuart Ziff discussing the troubled visual effects production of Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
Before Star Trek: The Motion Picture reached theaters, its visual effects production was already becoming legendary… for all the wrong reasons. This week on The Trek Files , Larry Nemecek welcomes visual effects veteran Stuart Ziff for a firsthand account of the chaotic early days of TMP production under Robert Abel & Associates. Using internal memos and legal correspondence from 1977 and 1978, Larry and Stu trace the rapidly escalating budget, the mounting pressure from Paramount, and the growing realization that the ambitious effects work was spiraling out of control. But this isn't just a story about production disaster. Stu shares what it was actually like inside Abel's experimental effects operation during a revolutionary moment in Hollywood filmmaking, where engineers, artists, and filmmakers were inventing techniques on the fly in the years between Star Wars and the digital era. Along the way, Stu reveals how some of his work survived the production shakeup and made it into the finished film, including contributions to the unforgettable V'Ger probe sequence aboard the Enterprise bridge. It's a candid look at one of the most turbulent creative periods in Star Trek history…
More episodes of The Trek Files: A Roddenberry Star Trek Podcast
- 15-11 The Next Generation Before Picard
- 15-10 Star Trek II Retakes: The Scenes That Changed The Wrath of Khan
- 15-9 No Landing Gear Required - The Origin of Star Trek's Transporter
- 15-8 Rewriting Joan Crawford
- 15-7 Majel's Vision - Lwaxana in the 24th Century, Revisited
- 15-6 How an Official Star Trek Stage Show Nearly Reached Broadway
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