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10 Legendary Star Trek Ship Kit-Bashes
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00:00Hello, Ellie here. Today's video is brought to you by Surfshark, but more on that in a bit.
00:06Hello my friends, how are you? Sean Ferrick here for TrekCulture. I've said it before,
00:09I'll say it again. You know me, I love ships. I love playing with model ships,
00:14I love seeing them fly around. Good lord, didn't any of you build ships in a bottle
00:19when you were kids? Please tell me you get the reference. I'm sure you do.
00:23With all of that, we are going to have a look at those ships that had a bit more of a,
00:27shall we say, rushed production schedule. Some of them may surprise you, others may
00:34haunt and scar you the rest of your lives. I'm Sean Ferrick for TrekCulture and here are 10
00:39legendary Star Trek kitbashes. Number 10, the Proto-Nebula class.
00:44The USS Melbourne was introduced in the best of both worlds part 2. Well I say introduced.
00:51The ship itself had been introduced by name in part 1, with the appearance happening in
00:57part 2. We have come to understand and expect a nebula class now to have that triangular shaped
01:04sensor dome, for want of a better word, above the very galaxy class saucer section,
01:10but that was not always the case. In fact, the Proto-Nebula class had two smaller warp nace cells
01:17where that triangular piece was going to be. Two physical models of this Proto-Nebula,
01:23USS Melbourne were built. One was going to be heavily damaged and destroyed to be shown in
01:30the debris field after the Battle of O359. The other was then kept and used for a display piece
01:37in Captain Riker's ready room in the episode Future Imperfect. It's also the only kitbash that
01:43was seen in both the best of both worlds part 2 and Emissary as it was glimpsed through the window
01:49of Cisco's escape pod from the Saratoga. There is the long standing story of Emissary also
01:54introducing an Excelsior class USS Melbourne, so in the universe the Excelsior USS Melbourne was
02:02already in service with this new USS Melbourne being rushed into release to face the Borg and I bet
02:08they'd wish they'd left it in space dock. Number 9, USS Elkins. The Elkins is barely shown on screen in the
02:16season 6 opener of Deep Space Nine, A Time to Stand. The script called for a battered federation fleet
02:21to be limping back toward their territory after having seven levels of shite knocked out of them
02:29by the Dominion. To fill out the numbers of this fleet they called for several new ships to be
02:35created, one of which was the USS Elkins which was named after VFX designer Judy Elkins. The body was
02:42based on parts from an F-14 jet, the nacelle struts were based on the Danube class runabout and the
02:49nacelles themselves were borrowed from the Miranda class. Number 8, Intrepid type. The Intrepid type
02:56appeared in Star Trek Enterprise and it's heavily based on Doug Drexler's design for the NX-01. The
03:04saucer section itself was halved as well as the nacelles being swung up and stuck to that half saucer
03:12section. This was an example of CGI kit bashing rather than model kit bashing and by model kit
03:19bashing I mean of course taking pieces that were commercially available. This, according to senior
03:25CG supervisor Rob Bonsoon, was a case of having to deal with creating these new designs with precious
03:31little turnaround time. In fact this one, while it got some of the most screen time of any support
03:37vessels from Starfleet in Enterprise, they didn't really refer to it as anything until it was named
03:43Intrepid type on screen. It was generally referred to as the one with the half saucer right up until
03:50it with its additional numbers helped to support NX-01 in the various battles against the Zindi
03:57and whatever time traveling nonsense was happening that week. Number 7, The Challenger class. The
04:03Challenger class, so named by designer Ed Miarecki, was named after the space shuttle and it was unique
04:10among Starfleet starships at the time that the two nacelles were not perfectly in line with each other.
04:17This technically broke Gene Roddenberry's rule of line of sight. In fact Miarecki originally designed
04:24the ship with only one nacelle but Maiko Kuda would go on to suggest that maybe adding a second one would
04:31help to fill out the overall design. Okuda then said that actually he regretted that bit of advice
04:37because it made the ship look a bit like a lollipop. The Buran was one of 39 vessels that were lost at
04:42Wolf 359 and you can see it as the Enterprise slides into the field of destruction in the Best of Both
04:48Worlds Part 2. What up my dudes, it's Chad Tarka. Some people think I might be a famous meteorologist, I like to
04:55think I'm just a friend of the weather. Right now I'm back on Ryza looking after my mom and I'm about to
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05:58Number six, the Jaeger class. I'm not going to lie to you folks, I hate this ship. I hate it. And because
06:05of that, I'm kind of delighted to have the model. I mean, I mean, I mean, look at it. The model was
06:12designed by Gary Hutzel and it was actually praised by Mike Okuda because I mean, whatever else you want
06:19to say about it, it is an immediately recognisable silhouette. Like you look at this and you know it's
06:25not an enterprise. The model was built from commercially available Voyager and Mackie
06:30Raider model kits. It was often seen then in various episodes of Deep Space Nine as a ship that was
06:37lazily floating by the station. Now, this was never shown in a close up high definition way. So if we ever
06:45do get around to that long fabled remaster of Deep Space Nine, you have to wonder. I can appreciate the
06:54absolute ingenuity of taking these two ships and sticking them together and throwing them in the back.
07:00Doesn't mean that I like it. Number five, Curry class. The Curry class that was introduced in
07:06another of the ships introduced in Deep Space Nine's A Time to Stand was named after famed artist
07:12Dan Curry. He designed the ship to be one of the fleet that was limping its way back to Federation
07:17space with their tails between their legs. He came up with a kit bash for the Curry class in just a few
07:22hours, raiding the boxes of model kits and coming up with pieces of Excelsior and Miranda class ships.
07:28For the overall shape of the vessel, he took inspiration from World War Two landing craft.
07:34This is they had the engines toward the back, the saucer section there, but they had the shuttle craft
07:40or the shuttle bay right up the front. So think of those landers on D-Day where the front drops down
07:47and well, unfortunately, a lot of people never came home again. Now, despite the ship only being on screen
07:53for seconds, it was one of the ones that Eagle Moss commissioned for their collection. I have to say,
07:59I really like it. Number four, Cheyenne class. This four nacelled vessel was, if you like,
08:05something of a spiritual sequel to the Constellation class USS Stargazer, USS Hathaway and USS Constance.
08:14This was another one of those very quick kitbashes that was put together for the Wolf 359 fleet.
08:21It has the legend of being one of the luckier ships. I'm going to say one of, I mean,
08:27the luckier ship. The Awani was the only vessel to survive the Borg invasion and the Borg destruction
08:35at Wolf 359, as it would return as part of Picard's fleet in redemption. Designer Edmi Arecki
08:42built the ship using commercially available parts of the Galaxy class, and also,
08:46and it will not be the only time on this list, highlighter pens were used as well.
08:53Number three, New Orleans class. The New Orleans class had something of a false start when it came
08:59to Star Trek The Next Generation. When it came to new designs, the Galaxy class, the Constellation class,
09:05and even later on the Ambassador class were all major new designs for the series, with Excelsior,
09:12Oberth and Miranda class, filling out some of the gaps in Starfleet. Now, this left the impression
09:19that Starfleet was generally staffed by much older vessels, so Edmi Arecki was given the task,
09:26create something new that we can use to fill out the gaps. The New Orleans class is a put together of
09:34the Galaxy class saucer section and the Galaxy class star drive section. Now, the nacelle struts are swept
09:41back and up, but it wasn't enough, so the feedback came down if you gotta give it something a little
09:47bit extra, and those marker pens, three marker pens were added, two to the top and one underneath,
09:53to give the New Orleans class its own distinctive look. With this design, it was ready to go into service,
10:01once, as the USS Kyushu, the best of both worlds part 2, didn't get a lot of screen time. Number two,
10:08Springfield class. The Springfield class was another of the Edmi Arecki kitbashes that were put together
10:14for the Battle of O359. The only known model that was built was to be named the USS Chekhov,
10:22named after Pavel Chekhov, but it would then only be seen burning in space. The main saucer section was
10:29based on the Galaxy class saucer section with, you guessed it, some more marker pens used for nacelles,
10:35however, it had a separate secondary hull, complete with its own Galaxy glass inspired deflector dish
10:42as well, giving it quite a distinctive silhouette. Two changes were made to the USS Chekhov in the
10:49best of both worlds part 2. The first was that the spelling of the name was changed, so rather than
10:56C-H-E-C-K-O-F, which is Pavel Chekhov, it was changed to drop the additional C and then just
11:04became Chekhov as in the playwright. The second change, when it was deemed too depressing to have
11:11the name of an original series character called out among the dead of Wolf 359, is that it was changed
11:17to the USS Tolstoy when being said out loud by Shelby. Number one, Centaur class. The Centaur class
11:26went from one of the briefest glimpses to becoming one of the most beloved extra designs of a starship
11:34in the franchise. The story of how it came to be is quite a funny one. Adam Buckner, who had been
11:39working under Gary Hutzel, was tasked with coming up for new designs for Deep Space Nine's A Time to Stand.
11:47Before this, however, between seasons five and six, he had gone traveling and was using this time to
11:53try and come up with new ship ideas. He was traveling in Spain and he met a young man named
11:58Guillermo. In the course of chatting he promised Guillermo a ship of his very own. Flash forward
12:03now to production on A Time to Stand and the order came in, it's like look we need a ship that's going
12:08to be seen moving fast, we don't need massive amount of detail on it because it's gonna, you know,
12:13it'll be in shot but it's gonna be zipping in and out and heading off again. So Buckner taking parts
12:20of the Excelsior class and the Miranda class put together with little extra bits stuck on and some
12:28UV strips to create the blue of the nacelles created what we then found to be the Centaur.
12:35And that could have been the end of it, but it wasn't because years later the Centaur would return
12:42in Star Trek Resurgence. It would also appear as part of the unlucky fleet that faces off against the
12:50living construct in Star Trek Prodigy. Now both times it was refined a little in terms of the design
12:56but still it was that original Centaur. And yes, Buckner did get a model of the Centaur to Guillermo.
13:04That's everything for our list, folks. Thank you very, very much. What did you think? Do you like
13:07lists about these sort of lesser known ships? Let me know in the comments below. Don't forget to get
13:12in touch with us over on Twitter at TrekCulture, on Instagram at TrekCultureYT, on both Blue Sky
13:17and TikTok as well. I'm at Sean Ferrick on the various socials. You are wonderful, you are fantastic.
13:23Give a bit of love to the editor who looked after this video.
13:25And to our friends in the Middle East, we pray for a quick and safe ceasefire.
13:35Everyone look after yourselves. Stay safe. Make it so.
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