Star Trek’s Most Annoying Prop Is One You Never Notice
As a franchise, Star Trek is filled with many cool props (including the iconic Enterprise-D) and some pretty lame ones (like that time Odo hid inside a breadmaker). However, Star Trek: Voyager has the dubious honor of having the worst prop, albeit one that most fans never really notice. We’re talking, of course, about the starfield outside the ship’s windows, one which caused the crew many headaches during production.
A Star Curtain
In theory, Star Trek: Voyager should have had an easier time with this particular prop. Starting with The Next Generation, producers began using a wonderfully low-tech method of showing the stars outside areas like the Ready Room. Rather than being the product of any digital wizardry, this effect was created by using a simple curtain.
Such a curtain wouldn’t give anyone any trouble if the ship was always at rest. However, the main function of said curtain is to show the stars flying by when the ship was traveling at sublight speeds. To achieve this effect, the crew would have to move the curtain in a slow and precise way, and when done right, the final effect looked very convincing onscreen.
Problems With The Curtain
By the time Star Trek: Voyager came around, the crew thought they had a handle on how to use this particular prop during production. The curtain hung on a specialized track near the stage ceiling. On paper, this would make illustrating sublight speeds easier than ever before; in reality, however, the prop caused endless headaches for directors.
One such director was TNG legend LeVar Burton, who helmed the Star Trek: Voyager episode “Ex Post Facto” and ran into his own issues with this prop.
At one point, he was shooting a simple scene of Tuvok and Tom Paris talking to one another, and he thought everything was going just fine. Suddenly, though, the director of photography stopped the shoot, which initially annoyed Burton.
The Shimmer
What Star Trek: Voyager photography director Marvin Rush had noticed, though, was a problem with the starfield prop. The prop in question was a sequined curtain, and Rush had noticed a shimmering effect that would have looked awful onscreen.
This problem was magnified by the curtain now looking more gray than black, so such a shimmer would call attention to the onscreen starfield looking far murkier than it should.
An Expensive Dud
The good news was that Star Trek: Voyager chief lighting technician Bill Peets knew how to handle this prop issue because, even though this was only the show’s eighth episode, this shimmering had become a constant problem.
By readjusting where the lamps were illuminating the starfield, it was possible to avoid both the shimmer and the washed-out appearance. Peets was understandably annoyed at having to constantly fix the same issue, and he muttered “God, I hate that thing,” pointing out that Paramount had paid $25,000 for the specialized prop “and it still doesn’t work.”
Burton Kept Going
Despite this temporary (yet permanently annoying) setback, LeVar Burton enjoyed directing his first Star Trek: Voyager episode, and this problematic prop didn’t keep him from coming back to helm seven more episodes. Still, learning about the issues with the starfield curtain means we’re going to stare extra hard at the passing stars to see if outer space looks more gray than black. There may be coffee in that nebula, but thanks to the curtain and the lighting, it may look like the coffee has plenty of creamer.
