Star Trek: Voyager Documentary Planned for 2022

[Kamdan]

Originally Posted by GlitchBob452

Regarding remastered (not upscaled, or recreated CGI) footage from the series:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/voyd...2907067487772/

At some point (post 2020?) CBS decided in their infinite wisdom to SHUTDOWN the department of CBS Digital responsible for rescanning and remastering film, even going so far as to scrap the film scanners. So that's why the VOY Doc couldn't do any remastered video, though I did get the sense that unlike the DS9 Doc, CBS wasn't really willing to play ball this time. Not sure if anything has changed with upper management over there, but something certainly has changed....

So now, if they ever do decide to remaster DS9/VOY, they'll have to outsource it, and we know how well that worked for the remastered TNG Season 2 with HTV Illuminate.

But really, who knows how long they'll even bother keeping the film reels in storage at this rate.

Why would they shut down that department post-COVID? That would have been an ideal time to work on that without major projects going on. Many libraries that had to close during the pandemic made use of that time digitizing material. Something’s faulty with this explanation.

[cavedoctor]

It'll probably be outsourced to illuminate, and I'm betting DS9 got digitized.
(There are threads of a story with the remaster saga. a la Babylon 5.)
From what I gather, if a Voyager remaster happens, under ideal conditions the whole show is gonna be opened to 16:9, and that will present an issue.
If you keep the aspect ratio, space shots can be upscaled.
However, the original crew have two problems.
One, with CBS digital shut down, you have to scan all negatives.
You can hone that, and you don't need a research team, just an AI to assemble the footage with a reference master (it has to be upscaled.)
CBS digital appears to be a redundancy.
Paramount probably has more than one film scanning division.

You have another issue though.
Finance, South Park and the Late Show are examples of financial cutbacks.
New VFX might not be a possibility for Voyager.
IDK about DS9, I think it's safe. (most of it's VFX are on film)
Voyager I'm kinda worried about. (There are some wild things to speculate here.)

[cavedoctor]

Originally Posted by GlitchBob452

Regarding remastered (not upscaled, or recreated CGI) footage from the series:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/voyd...2907067487772/

At some point (post 2020?) CBS decided in their infinite wisdom to SHUTDOWN the department of CBS Digital responsible for rescanning and remastering film, even going so far as to scrap the film scanners. So that's why the VOY Doc couldn't do any remastered video, though I did get the sense that unlike the DS9 Doc, CBS wasn't really willing to play ball this time. Not sure if anything has changed with upper management over there, but something certainly has changed....

So now, if they ever do decide to remaster DS9/VOY, they'll have to outsource it, and we know how well that worked for the remastered TNG Season 2 with HTV Illuminate.

But really, who knows how long they'll even bother keeping the film reels in storage at this rate.

I hate to say it, but it's a cropping issue with Illuminate.
I'd be content with what they provided, assuming they didn't DNR the **** out of it.
An X files situation isn't ideal, but it's better than Babylon 5.
Like give me all of the grain and gate weave you want, I don't care.
Hairs, pops, grain and gate weave give a film negative character, film needs to breathe.
If DS9 and Voyager were at X files quality, I wouldn't complain, even if there is some over scan errors.
In fact, you could take the worst episodes of the show, and provide grindhouse cuts in HD.
Then focus remaster efforts on the best 130 episodes of each series.
I wouldn't complain, "Distant Voices" and "Move Along Home" could be grindhouse style cuts and I wouldn't care.
Same applies to Voyager, a grindhouse cut of "Threshold" isn't going to make a difference to me.
As long as Caretaker, Equinox, Endgame, Year of Hell and all of those episodes got remastered properly.
There's a handful of shit episodes that aren't jewels.
If you could get it now with a few errors or perfect by 2050, I'd take it now with a handful of errors, as long as it's off the OCN.
Those errors can be remedied, painfully remedied, but remedied nonetheless.

Like if you had to.
Move Along Home, Distant Voices, Threshold.
You have 376 episodes.
Identify the worst 10-20 percent of these 400 critically, and remaster them Babylon 5 style.
Minimal work, upscale VFX etc.
The very best of these 400 get the TNG treatment, like 250 of them are critical perfection.
The rest could be at X files quality.

TNG/Twin Peaks tier
X files tier
B5 tier

I'm not saying any of the prior shows are bad either, but I'm saying as far as remasters have went so far.
These are the tiers of good remastering for Bluray, vs outright okay by quality standards.
This would stop you from overwhelming the team, it would allow everything to be safe, and then from there, storage of these new masters, as well as extra work and maintenance over the years could be handled by the Roddenberry Archive.
I'd add, that Kinograph looks like a solution you could deploy at Strataca to get these done faster, if scanning hasn't commenced.
I think the problem is everyone is stuck in the past thinking we're going to get a Criterion grade remaster.
It would be nice.
But we can all agree a few compromises isn't going to hurt.
No one wants a pure upscale, a pure upscale of an SD master is garbage tier.
The Studio has the one thing that no idiot can do.
A film negative to scan.
Any idiot can pick up the DVD and upscale it with AI.
For a studio to do that and sell that at a premium is pretty cheap.
Especially when there's evidence of film negatives being stored.
Very Damning evidence.
But you could pool a budget, make some corrections, and focus the money.
It's not ideal, but it's gonna get us out of the rut, and we won't be stuck with the ghosts of 480i past for eternity.


More money can be saved by recycling old 5.1 mixes instead of providing new ones.
There is a lot of stuff that can be done strategically.

[cavedoctor]

Purists can whine, but we’re in an era of compromise. This ain’t 2012 anymore. If you want “Caretaker,” “Scorpion,” “Far Beyond the Stars,” and “In the Pale Moonlight” in jaw-dropping HD? Cool. Then accept that “Move Along Home” might get the Babylon 5 deluxe.

Because the alternative?
We get nothing.
And the negatives rot in a vault until they bake into vinegar soup.

[CouncilSpectre]

I think at this point it's probably more about keeping options open and to that end the focus needs to be on digitizing everything. If everything's digitized then it takes away some of the time pressure on using the negatives. Then it's a matter of waiting for technology to improve to the point where the project becomes economically viable, waiting for the streaming model to collapse and die, or for someone to figure out "Why the hell are we spending $125m on one season of Discovery when we could spend $20m on remastering DS9 or Voyager for seven season's worth of content?".

They won't go down a hybrid approach route. They'll remember how well the inconsistency of season 2 went down and this would be far more distracting than that.

It wouldn't surprise me if we see a "best of" set at some point though, similar to the TNG taster.

[cavedoctor]

Originally Posted by CouncilSpectre

I think at this point it's probably more about keeping options open and to that end the focus needs to be on digitizing everything. If everything's digitized then it takes away some of the time pressure on using the negatives. Then it's a matter of waiting for technology to improve to the point where the project becomes economically viable, waiting for the streaming model to collapse and die, or for someone to figure out "Why the hell are we spending $125m on one season of Discovery when we could spend $20m on remastering DS9 or Voyager for seven season's worth of content?".

They won't go down a hybrid approach route. They'll remember how well the inconsistency of season 2 went down and this would be far more distracting than that.

It wouldn't surprise me if we see a "best of" set at some point though, similar to the TNG taster.

Who cares about the inconsistencies?
Only two people ever cared. Illuminate the so called butchers got an emmy for remastering season 2.
The problem was the time crunch of remastering 7 seasons in 3 years, CBS farmed out two seasons.
However for DS9 and Voyager, CBS has had since 2015, they've had what? 10 years, both could have been done in 10 years with time to correct TNG's errors from Illuminate.
A fan could simply crop the shot, run it through a basic upscaler, and no one would notice that 5 percent of missing overscan mistake.
You care, most of us would forgive it because the wait has been too long.
I can watch TNG season 2 and be content with an overscan mistake.
It's legitimately not an issue for me.
No. 2
The FX especially in DS9 for the most part are basic ***** '90s FX.
I agree with digitizing everything, but I suspect based on all of the digging I've done that part might be complete at least on DS9.
What I'm gathering is, it's not the executives holding this back, or at least if they are, they're doing it out of respect.
They could always tell the VFX team to bugger off.
They won't. Which means there's a lot more to this than money.
Here's the thing too, we already got the sampler disc for DS9.
"What we left behind" was a sampler disc that showed us how Effing Gorgeous, sharp and stunning DS9 is.
It'll be reference grade if they actually do what they're supposed to.

[cavedoctor]

The other thing is, 40 years for TOS to get a remaster.
25 for TNG.
Voyager and DS9 are approaching 35.
It's time.
I think that means if there's a handful of flaws in the product so be it.
The fans can damn near seamlessly correct these issues with free assets.
The studio should be able to do better with the actual studio assets available to them.
These FX seem to be an overcomplicated issue just like scanning the film back in.
They've had the filters and software to do phasers and transporter FX since 2013.
Digitizing the footage, shouldn't be an issue.
With modern advancements like smaller modern film scanners from Black Magic Design and open source kinograph, putting a film scanner down in the mine shouldn't be an issue.
Spirit Datacines are behmoths, that while a good investment and still useful, are limiting most remastering efforts.
That's cheap.
As for Digital FX, I believe that plateaued in 2015.
Finally, you could use Illuminate's AI to at least assemble the masters in 4k before stepping down, then color time the shit on a $600.00 mac mini, or series of them with After FX subscriptions.
They need to rebudget, but I believe things are as cheap as they're going to get, if you look at all of the modern advancements.

Right now...You've got teenagers deepfaking Obi-Wan and restoring 35mm trailers on YouTube. The fact that a studio with actual negative rolls and archival-grade gear can't even match that? That's shameful.
And these teenagers could do this shit faster than a studio with a deadline can.
There's no excuse at this point. Fast doesn't always mean great, but I guarantee, this could be done in 3 years, and match TNG.
It also should be about half the cost at this point.

So the only other thought I have is,
Corporate is doing the thing where it charges teams extra money for assets that are cheaper on the market.
That really stupid thing where a camera sensor that cost 6k, gets charged 50k to the team for no reason.

[cavedoctor]

I'll also make one final point.
It's a mammoth undertaking the second time it's done.
But it wasn't a mammoth undertaking in the 90s when the show was produced.
The FX were innovative then, and are basic ***** FX now.
It's not like the FX for 90s TV were on par with Avatar, or are on par with SNW.
They weren't, they need to look good in HD, not on par with SNW or Discovery, even though I'll argue DS9 and Voyager deserve to look that good.
It's also not like we're popping open a time machine and pulling the entire cast through to remake the shows. They're literally, just redoing post production.
This could be accomplished within a week in the 1990s while filming the cast, and the tech for HD has advanced to the point, where we're basically better than the 90s ever dreamed of being.
It's literally just film scanning, cleanup, automated reassembly, and quality control.
Upscaling the tape masters would take just as long, and be the shittiest move to make.
Every time I hear a defense on the part of the companies, it's an excuse, a bad calculated excuse.
If you take (Corporate internal upcharging for equipment and resources) out of the equation, I'm betting it's quite affordable, and the Bean Counters lose their power.
They're inflating spreadsheets, but the Executives go after the producers, not the trusted bean counters who are robbing them blind.
If you want to optimize cost, let the free market into the company, don't let the company govern a walled garden market.
They shot themselves in the foot with the TNG remaster.
A. Charge 100, when MSRP reasoning was 70 tops.
B. Release it to compete with Netflix.
C. DVDs looked like shit, the fandom paid a premium for those when they were first released.
Basically, you can make some money, or no money, but expecting overperformance in a recession market, is little picture thinking.
These people weren't visionaries, they just accidentally profited off of TNG:R long term. It was pretty stupid.
The Executives should return their business school degrees, they failed Business 101.
They aren't good Ferengi.

[Agent Bond]

Rather have a new version of Voyager.

[MarcelS1]

I would be satisfied to finally get the blu-ray of Voyager's documentary!

[cavedoctor]

Paramount deal is gonna close.
Paramount paid 16 million to Cheeto Jesus apparently courting the FCC and appeared to have canned the late show for him.
Then finished by firing off an announcement on a 1.5 billion dollar agreement deal with Trey Parker and Matt Stone.
Voyager Doc has no remastered footage, as much as I want a BR of it, I feel like this.
Each of these docs is also a supplementary product to the main show.
They're a special feature, and I'm betting the footage (Which isn't in that doc, but would be from the Original Camera Negative) is just as stunning as DS9's is.
Finally on DS9... and likely Voyager as well.

1. 25,000 film reals in a Strataca Salt mine in either Kansas or East Coast. *50,000 including Voyager.

2. Negatives still exist.

3. Production teams were not happy with either the chemical process or the way these negatives were stored.

4. RMB said they weren't stored as well, but they seem to still exist.

5. There are contradictions.

6. DS9's remaster is going to be good when it happens. Most likely 4:3, even though it was shot 16:9 safe, there's a difference between 16/9 safe, and intention.
For "WWLB", DS9's footage was "recontextualized".
6a. DS9's remaster has been in talks since 2013 after TNG finished.
6b. DS9 rumors started in 2021, and was listed twice once in 2021, once in 2022, I suspect it hasn't been revealed but it's close.
That could be a good sign for Voyager
6c. Babylon 5 had a quiet remaster that took 7 years to complete.

7. When Voyagers remaster happens, it could potentially be the most stunning of them all.
Based on what little I do know.

8. Selling off the film scanning division sounds like an overplayed hiccup. If I wanted a specific individual shot off of those negatives, I'd need to go to the CBS Digital division and find it in the shooting script with Research, using a shooting script. At which point they'd scan the footage, and send me a hard drive to weed through myself. However, with Illuminate's Iconform, you'd use a bicubic upconversion of a mastertape as a template, and as you scanned in the footage, it would start replacing and conforming shots, and in 2012, probably required a little human oversight, no telling how advanced it is now.
You could probably use an LLM and pdf files to replace the numbering system, and Paramount probably has enough redundant film scanning departments that it's not as bad as people are making it out to be.
This numbering system is an old cataloging system from the 1990s, and is probably a lot older.
Remastering would probably allow for modern cataloging, and that would mean any future rescans would be a lot easier to pull off.
It's not just about scanning, it's about sorting through every single take, (Why a conformed negative is a good thing to have?)

9. Paramount probably has it's own team for this now, and they're probably going to be under Star Trek's in house management, as opposed to CBS broadly.
I wouldn't be surprised if Jon Van Citters and the Roddenberry Archive and a group of folks from Paramount+ Assets division took over Stewardship of those Film Negatives. The Roddenberry Archive has demonstrated that it cares deeply about every single thing that comes out of this franchise, and thus preservation of these products is pardon the pun "Paramount".

These are my extrapolations after spending a year digging and debunking most of the bullshit I've read on the internet.
DS9's CGI is used so sparingly, Ars Technica and Trek Core literally break down a few details on it.
1. Ars Technica can be used to guess that the film reel counts roughly match TNG, as the remastering team for TNG said 25k reels just for it.
2. TrekCore revealed that most of the CGI assets survived, and Mojo Liebowitz a VFX supervisor on both shows demonstrated that on both documentaries.
3. TrekCore has a list of all CGI used on DS9, and all corrections on TNG.

Finally, I'm worried about these for political reasons, and I think if you're worried about them ending up like Farscape, write Paramount.
I'm very passionate about these, I think we all are.
Let them know you want to see this on bluray or remastered. Get eyes on this, write them a request here.
As much as I like framing these executives as bumbling fools, butter them up, frame them like, "Would you guys be heroes and make this a reality."
https://www.paramountmovies.com/
Hit support
Or….
phe-physical-consumer-support.imoxiemedia.com
Let them know it’s about title availability and ask them to be a hero, and authorize remasters of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine and Star Trek: Voyager on Blu-ray.
We can do this.

[cavedoctor]

Finally, I'll add this.
People will argue over the profitability of such an endeavor.
"Mac and Me" got a 4k bluray release, ****ing "Mac and Me"
All of 3 people are gonna purchase that disk.
"Mac and Me" got a remaster before DS9 and Voyager.
Another Example, is "Tammy and TRex", that's gonna gonna make someone pivot to 4k,
I've never heard anyone say "I didn't know if I wanted 4k bluray, then I learned about Tammy and the Trex on the format and invested a thousand dollars in a dolby vision home theater system."
With the cancellation of Colbert's iteration of "the Late Show" Jon Stewart recently said "these shows are what made you money." In an excellent rebuke to corporate crackhead logic.
DS9 and Voyager kept that franchise afloat for 9 years, and made money, and still makes money.
I don't want to hear the profitability argument, they're probably more profitable than most of the content on Paramount's streaming platform, including SNW, I bet DS9 and Voyager in their remastered forms, would make more money than state of the art productions.
DS9 and Voyager had heart. The problem with new Star Trek productions is that it's content, it has no soul, and that soul can tank any LED video walls.
Since to some, LED video walls are now the thing that make a production good.
I've had that argument..."It's a state of the art production, it's better." It's really not.
The lighting is good, and I like anamorphic lenses, but... the costumes feel cheap, the sets feel cheap, LED video walls, digital cameras, Dolby Vision, and Unreal 5 don't make a production good. They make a good image, but they can't make up for bad storytelling, and a pointless string of franchise shit.
DS9 and Voyager, those were made with care and love. Modern productions feel like more franchise for franchise sake, Akiva Goldsman couldn't impart meaning to these shows like he did with Jeff Pinkner and J.H. Wyman on Fringe, which is a tragedy in and of itself.
Jericho got a second season because there were bags of peanuts sent to CBS. I sent one. 25 tons of Peanuts got a renewal.
That second season was made on a shoestring budget, and I'm betting it cost more in 2008 than DS9 would cost to remaster now.
Several of those projects get greenlit, and cancelled in a year, and obviously make less money for that company than DS9 and Voyager make now.
A remaster is more than warranted.
Right now, (profitability/viability vs. cost) is a horseshit argument, it's smoke and mirrors.
This studio could stare moderate profit in the face, and still chose obvious failure, and me being humble, can look at this and be like.
Take the last three seasons of Discovery, and the first two seasons of Picard, the most hated Star Trek Productions of all time, they cost for 50 episodes 300 million dollars, and probably made less money for CBS than a 40 million dollar remastering project.
Those numbers should tell you, anyone defending failure vs even moderate success, should be rebuked.
I know Mac and Me isn't from Paramount, but the fact that the industry can release that, tells me it's not all profit and lace.
If you care, check my modified post above for the links, grassroots can be successful sometimes.

[cavedoctor]

Finally let's just assume
Babylon 5 is questionable to cite for remaster, I disagree.
Seaquest DSV has also been remastered.
Tammy and the T Rex and Mac and Me are in 4k.

Between all of this in the industry, that means somewhere there is money for DS9 and Voyager.
DS9 and Voyager internationally also produce a lot of money.
DS9 is the critical darling as far as that goes, but it's consistent.
Extremely consistent.
Voyager is highly regarded internationally.
I'd argue if you're saving 40 million dollars a year by cancelling Colbert, you could greenlight these remasters tomorrow.

Add in "Section 31" was a sleeper hit, and probably even tells the fandom to wait.
It probably will never be as good as some of the other content in the franchise, but the fact that it made money long term, and has good views long term seems to be a very good sign, since now it only takes a month or two to decide if something is a cult movie or not.
Star Trek has always been a long game franchise, short term numbers aren't gonna be as good as the long term ones.
A good steward should understand those metrics.

I also feel this way, I think that corporate should actively be trying to get new fans to watch old content.
If you want new fans, they need a taste of where the franchise has been.

[oddbox83]

Finally? That happens once, mate.

I agree with some of what you say, disagree with others.


What you haven't taken into account is that shows like B5 have had cut negatives for the live action, which was seemingly normal for Warner. So it was easier and cheaper to scan episodes when they were already conformed rather than from bits over dozens of reels. All they had to do was upscale any effects and put them in the right places. Though for whatever reason they kept the damned ad bumper placeholder in each episode.

We know Paramount did not do this. All the film was left as raw as it came out the camera.

That's not to say they shouldn't do it. DS9 and Voy in HD now dammit!

[cavedoctor]

Originally Posted by oddbox83

Finally? That happens once, mate.

I agree with some of what you say, disagree with others.


What you haven't taken into account is that shows like B5 have had cut negatives for the live action, which was seemingly normal for Warner. So it was easier and cheaper to scan episodes when they were already conformed rather than from bits over dozens of reels. All they had to do was upscale any effects and put them in the right places. Though for whatever reason they kept the damned ad bumper placeholder in each episode.

We know Paramount did not do this. All the film was left as raw as it came out the camera.

That's not to say they shouldn't do it. DS9 and Voy in HD now dammit!

XD, Finally only happens once, but I was done with the past, it wasn't done with me.
Like a bad Paul WS Anderson film, Resident Evil the final end.
Babylon 5 may not have had a cut negative.
JMS said it did, but I doubt it would have taken 6 years to remaster if they had cut negatives.
There are some others critical of the cut negative thing and JMS, but I'm not naming anyone who told me about that.
That started in 2014 and ended in 2020.
B5 is interesting for a multitude of other reasons.
They should have at least recomped space window shots, and VFX assets for B5 also survive to this day and have been rendered in 4k.
That's another thing I can demonstrate for you.

[cavedoctor]

One more thing to keep in mind on these projects.
I think they just got pummelled over and over again.

I think it kinda got pummelled 3x since 2018.
First there was the CBS/Paramount merger into Viacom/Paramount Global.
Talks started for DS9 in 2013, and several people built assets for those that eventually got used in STnline
Then there was the Pandemic, which left two rumors of a remastering project.
Then there is the second buyout from Skydance, which was on no one's radar in 2023, when major headway was made for DS9's remaster, which took a pause a year later.
The last 7 years have been a bit of a shit show.
From what my investigation has shown, these two shows have been very DEFIANT to corporate apocalypses, despite all the naysaying "it'll never happen" BS.
Finally, I found this last night...
Okay, in 2023, Netflix published these numbers.
Based on a handful of semi official pre listings and tweets.
The VFX team and the execs had disagreements over AI tools.
Kurtzman via Vulcan Reporter wanted AI FX work in 2021.
That didn't fly, as these talks started when Mojo demonstrated what could be done with assets from "Sacrifice of Angels" in 2013.
This same sequence played in "What We Left Behind".
In mid 2023, the first pause happened.
Major headway was made by December 2023. Which means the VFX team resolved things with Paramount and likely got their way.
The project was then frozen in December 2024.
I suspect based on what I've seen and documented they were being scanned together.

Star Trek: Enterprise: Season 1 - 7,200,000
Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season 1 - 7,200,000
Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season 3 - 6,000,000
Star Trek: Voyager: Season 4 - 5,900,000
Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season 4 - 5,800,000
Star Trek: Voyager: Season 2 - 5,700,000
Star Trek: Voyager: Season 5 - 5,600,000
Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season 5 - 5,400,000
Star Trek: Voyager: Season 3 - 5,400,000
Star Trek: Enterprise: Season 2 - 5,300,000
Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season 2 - 5,200,000
Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season 6 - 5,200,000
Star Trek: Season 1 - 5,100,000
Star Trek: Voyager: Season 6 - 5,000,000
Star Trek: Voyager: Season 7 - 5,000,000
Star Trek: The Next Generation: Season 7 - 4,900,000
Star Trek: Voyager: Season 1 - 4,700,000
Star Trek: Enterprise: Season 3 - 4,500,000
Star Trek: Enterprise: Season 4 - 3,900,000
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season 2 - 3,600,000
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season 1 - 3,500,000
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season 3 - 3,500,000
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season 4 - 3,400,000
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season 5 - 3,400,000
Star Trek: Season 2 - 3,300,000
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season 6 - 3,300,000
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: Season 7 - 3,100,000
__________________________________________________ __
Star Trek: Season 3 - 2,600,000
Star Trek Beyond - 1,400,000
Star Trek Into Darkness - 300,000
Star Trek: The Animated Series: Season 1 - 200,000
Star Trek (2009) - 100,000
Star Trek: The Animated Series: Season 2 - 100,000

[cavedoctor]

Starfleet Academy, Sisko? Jem Hadar Instructor? Doctor?
I think I get what's going on here.