The Enterprise of Star Trek: a design icon of science-fiction

In this video, we shall take a look at the original Starship Enterprise, which flew on to our screens in the 1960s. Designed by Matt Jefferies to a brief from Gene Roddenberry, it is recreated here using my rudimentary Blender skills.

#culture #StarTrek #Blender

[billmullins]

Most people who watch this have grown up in the 55+ years since the original Star Trek series debuted. They cannot imagine just how radical a departure Matt Jeffries' design was. Take a look at every SciFi ship from the movies, television and print fiction that came before it and compare them. Jeffires' design was absolutely unique! Now look at what has been depicted since. Jeffries opened the door to a whole new universe of fictional spaceship designs!

[StarsInYourMultitude]

The nacelles do not use propulsion. They help form a warp bubble which curves the space around the Enterprise, so no need to worry about the centre of mass. Great video though!

[keith]

Part of the brilliance of the Jeffries design is that it leaves a great deal of room to tweak the basic shapes and still be recognizable as Enterprise. The movie refit version, the Discovery version, even the 2009 film version, all still instantly identified as Enterprise (or a sister ship) despite large differences in detail.

[originaldarkwater]

I remember reading in "The Making of Star Trek" that the inspiration for the nacelles having the tall, narrow struts that they do comes from the masts of 18th and 19th century sailing ships. Since one of Roddenberry's major inspirations for Star Trek was the Horatio Hornblower series of adventure novels, which follow the career of a British navel officer, the Enterprise was meant to evoke the feeling of one of those sailing ships. The tall nacelle struts mirror the lofty masts of a sailing ship and the nacelles stand in for the sails, that power the ship. The curved bow of a sailing ship is always the most impressive view, so the Enterprise has 360 degrees of curved bow, making it look great from any angle. The barrel-like engineering section isn't too far off in shape from the hull of a sailing ship, but the sides curving up over the top to enclose it, since it's in space. Even the little scooped out section underneath the shuttle bay is clearly inspired by the stern of a sailing ship, where the rear cabins overhang the rudder.

[glenn_r_frank_author]

Something not mentioned in the video... the engineering access crawl-way tubes used several times in the original series (we see Scotty, Spock, and others using them to do critical emergency repairs during episodes) were called "Jeffries Tubes" in reference to the designer of the Enterprise model.

[bedtegx]

The Enterprise always struck me as a "friendly" flying saucer. In other words, unlike a flying saucer, which has no visible means of propulsion, and no sense of front or back direction, which makes it mysterious, the Enterprise has visible propulsion and direction, given it by the nacelles and secondary hull. A beautiful design. Never thought the design was structurally weak because of the neck section. We have no idea what the state of material science is in the 23rd century, they likely have access to metals which could make that neck, and the struts, exceptionally strong. The fact the Enterprise is designed so attractively makes it that much more futuristic.

[joaocarlosferreira]

The most beautiful and beloved starship ever!!!

[ddbrock]

I believe it was Roddenberry himself that decided to name the ship Enterprise to capitalize on the contemporary popularity of the nuclear powered CVN-65 USS Enterprise that featured heavily in news stories of the day, further bolstered by the outstanding record of the previous CV-6 Enterprise.

[imkerrusin]

I always thought it was also a reference to the "The Big E" that served the US Navy in World War II. It was an aircraft carrier that went through a lot of bouts in the Pacific theater and still managed to bring her crew home every time.

[komradewirelesscaller]

1000 years from now, and beyond, the Enterprise will still be a wonderful inspiration to people!

[n.b.barnett]

Just an aside. Desilu was the production company created by early TV stars Desi Arnaz and Lucille Ball, famed for the hit "I Love Lucy" and its follow up programs featuring Lucille Ball. Desilu's name is pronounced Deh-ZEE-loo. Desilu was the initial producer of TOC. Other than that, a good video. Thanks

[vpreggie]

Great video - a topic I often ponder (but keep it to myself 😋). Early on you mentioned the ship was designed not to land but “beam people down to planets”. Actually, the transporter wasn’t conceived until much later. Shuttlecraft were the original method of transporting the crew but the budget didn’t allow for such an extravagant method to be presented. Thus the Transporter was conceived. Not only was this much cheaper to show it also allowed for people to move about in literally seconds, keeping the show moving along quickly.

[NCMA]

A very nice video with great images and a wonderful tribute to Matt Jeffries' wonderful design. One thing though - "registration numbers" are something that civilian aircraft have, like Jeffries private plane. Warships, which the Enterprise most definitely is meant to be, have "pennant numbers". So the "NCC-1701" on Enterprise's hull is her pennant number. Rather like HMCS HAIDA in Hamilton, Ontario had the pennant number "G 63" during WWII and "215" during the Korean War.

Just in case anybody thought the two post-war HMS Enterprises might have been named after the Star Trek vessel, "Enterprise" is in fact a very old Royal Navy name starting with a frigate commissioned in 1705 - before in fact the USA was founded. The name is even a few months older in the French Navy, since the Royal Navy's first HMS Enterprise was actually captured from the French - the L'Enterprise which was commissioned at the start of 1705 by France before being captured by the British In May of the same year.

[stevenewman]

🖖😎👍Very cool and very nicely well done and very well informatively explained and executed in every detail way shape and form possibly provided indeed, And I myself have always loved the design of the Constitution class starship's from the very first time I saw it on tv back in 1966 when it aired. And I am a big fan of the Refit design as well indeed, 👌.

[kdrapertrucker]

Both Roddenberry and Jeffries had extensive backgrounds in Aviation. Roddenberry was a bomber pilot in WWII, and a commercial pilot after, Jeffries worked for aviation companies before working for desilu, and was still on mailing lists for aviation advertising.

[mikejhorn]

A very nice and thorough recap of the history of the Starship Enterprise. As one who watched Star Trek since its debut in the 1960s, it's nice to know people still are interested. Two previous comments stole my thunder regarding the pronunciation of Desilu (not important) and the fact that the "engine" was actually a matter/anti-matter reactor located in the secondary hull providing plasma (later called "warp plasma") to the technology in the nacelles. The nacelles seemed to be comprised largely of "Warp Coils" with Bussard Collectors in the front. The amazingly prescient idea of warp drive in Star Trek was that the Warp Bubble would contain the Enterprise, and by changing its configuration one could move space around it. The "Impulse Drives" (using normal physics) were located at the back of the saucer section; which would make it easier to balance the mass. 

My only other comment is about the name, "Enterprise." Don't look at the production of the original Star Trek as one would today; in this globally connected media market. This program was made for weekly television viewers in the 1960s USA. The reason the name Enterprise was finally settled upon was the recent proximity (in time) of the 2nd World War. Most men working on Star Trek had served in the US military. Also, most American adults at the time knew the name USS Enterprise! The USS Enterprise was an Essex-class aircraft carrier of the US Navy. She was based in Hawaii when the Japanese attacked. However, she was at sea and not at Pearl Harbor during the sneak attack. She was at Midway 6 months later when we essentially wiped out the Japanese aircraft carrier fleets. She served in almost every major battle in the Pacific and survived them all. She was the most decorated warship in US Navy history then and now. Because of all the newsreels before movies during the war, the USS Enterprise had a special place in the hearts of most Americans and their children that cannot be understood today. The reason why there will always be a USS Enterprise in the US Navy is not because of Star Trek–rather the reverse.

[CaptRobertApril]

Matt Jefferies didn't get that Waco biplane until after Star Trek had wrapped, and it had nothing to do with the Enterprise's registry number. Rather, it was a process of elimination to determine what numbers could be easily read from a distance, i.e., on a small 1960's tv screen. This narrowed things down to 1, 7, and 0. The NCC bit had already been determined (based on a variation of US and Soviet aircraft tail numbers, to give it a familiar-but-different feel), so with a second 1 tossed in for balance, we got NCC-1701.

As for propulsion, the warp drive is non-Newtonian, so no actual thrust involved. For that, you have to look to the impulse engines, located at the rear of the saucer, and right at the ship's center of gravity.

Needless to say, Jefferies and his team put in a lot more thought into the design of the Enterprise than other similar shows of the era did for their designs.

[AppallingGrandeur]

'All I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by'. She looks beautiful.

[captcorajus]

As already mentioned, the Warp Nacelles do not directly 'push' the ship. They create a warp field AROUND the ship, and then the entire ship rides the 'space warp' created like a surfer riding a wave. Conversely, the impulse engine DO propel the ship directly, and are located at the ship's center of mass.

[generaldodger]

Great Video - I always imagined that the Klingons had their own designations for Federation Ships seen through their cultural lens. So for example the Klingons many times made claims against Starfleet for being belligerent whilst Starfleet claimed to be mainly interested in Science and Exploration. So id suggest that the term 'Battle Cruiser' to be a term the Klingons used to categorize Starfleet ships based off those ships capabilities/fire power/manoeuvrability compared with their own ships.

So perhaps Mirada's being classed as frigates or escorts and Excelsior's being capital ships maybe from a Klingon point of view? We do this today when categorising ships, air craft and tanks in the 21st century on Earth, theres grey areas and we compare the enemy capabilities to our own, this helps commanders with planning operations and estimating the strength of opposition forces.

For example a USN Arleigh Burke or Ticonderoga ships compared with a Soviet Kirov class, the capabilities vary wildly.

Also in terms of the vulnerable neck and nacelle pylons issue and these concepts appearing in both Romulan and Klingon designs that perhaps the idea was that if a ship was damaged the inhabited areas of the ship would break away from the nacelle and drive sections to preserve the crew were as a more integrated designs might end up destroying the whole ship if hit.

The Constitution class is such a wonderfully unconventional design yet it is also beautiful like the tall clipper ships of old. It could have been very goofy looking but they pulled it off well i feel. And the TMP refit introduction is a cinematic joy.



Just my personal spin on it.