The Roddenberry Archive is creating 1:1, 360 immersive recreations of Star Trek ships and scenes, available online for free.
Roddenberry Entertainment has been working with cloud technology company OTOY on “The Roddenberry Archive” for the last few years with the goal of creating a digital archive of the work of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry. The initial projects include virtual recreations of the Star Trek ships bearing the name USS Enterprise and they have just launched a brand new portal where you can tour the iconic bridges and see how the fit in the timeline. The site is both desktop and mobile friendly. Scroll down on mobile and click on the ship, or scroll right on desktop.
“The Roddenberry Archive is a multi decade collaboration with The Roddenberry Estate, OTOY, and iconic Star Trek artists Denise and Mike Okuda, Daren Dochterman, and Doug Drexler to collect significant documents and art from Gene Roddenberry’s lifetime of work, beginning with the Starship Enterprise, and to make them accessible through innovative means of presentation. The project aims to preserve this information for those studying his career in the future, for those who appreciate his work, and to provide accurate information for those involved in future productions and other projects based on Roddenberry’s work.”
Over two dozen USS Enterprise ships are in the archive (with more on the way) – from the first 1964 concept art to the newest ship called Enterprise, revealed at the conclusion of Star Trek: Picard Season 3. All the immersions are beautifully detailed.
The Roddenberry Archive has also released a new mini-documentary, celebrating Star Trek: The Next Generation with the showrunner of Picard, Terry Matalas. There are many fine interviews, BTS tours, and some amazing new creations of Star Trek scenes never previously visualized – here: OTOY-RODDENBERRY YouTube. The new Spock images are state-of-the-art (with Lawrence Selleck).
Their first featurette teases Shatner’s in depth interview for the Roddenberry Archive, captured holographically from within a perfect recreation of the 1979 USS Enterprise bridge. The star therein shares his memories, aspirations and intentions in bringing Captain Kirk to life in 1965 and portraying his death in 1994, as well as his personal views on the future he envisions for this beloved, iconic character.
Majel Roddenberry’s voice is part of the experience as the Enterprise computer, based on phonetic recordings she made in 2008, similar to what was done later for James Earl Jones for another iconic character. Rod Roddenberry, President of Roddenberry Entertainment, said he was proud that he could her his mother’s voice again, after 15 years. John de Lancie is the main narrator (he also narrates for The Getty Museum). Numerous in-universe environments and set recreations are being studied and digitized by the Roddenberry Archive for future updates, covering productions from the The Cage pilot onwards, plus a complete 1:1 scale recreation of the entire interior of the original USS Enterprise, as featured in Star Trek: The Motion Picture.
The Archive repeatedly says they are aiming for historical accuracy, and they seem to be achieving it.
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David Raiklen wrote, directed and scored his first film at age 9. He began studying keyboard and composing at age 5. He attended, then taught at UCLA, USC and CalArts. Among his teachers are John Williams and Mel Powel.
He has worked for Fox, Disney and Sprint. David has received numerous awards for his work, including the 2004 American Music Center Award. Dr. Raiklen has composed music and sound design for theater (Death and the Maiden), dance (Russian Ballet), television (Sing Me a Story), cell phone (Spacey Movie), museums (Museum of Tolerance), concert (Violin Sonata ), and film (Appalachian Trail).
His compositions have been performed at the Hollywood Bowl and the first Disney Hall. David Raiken is also host of a successful radio program, Classical Fan Club.
