These are the Continuing Voyages...
My Star Trek TOS phase continues. My birthday has produced LOOT! Loot in abundance! I have the Original Series AND the Animated Series on DVD, blueprints for the K-7 Space Station and Enterprise Bridge to add to the last lot, two different editions (no less) of the Star Trek Officer's Manual (an early second printing and a much later one) and the Star Trek Maps, first printed in 1980. These are great, two huge double-sided poster sized maps of Federation space, with loads of extra detail (including the guest appearance of other authors planets, see that Tran-ky-ky from Alan Dean Foster's "Icerigger" series is in there) and a navigation technical manual that is insanely technical. I mean, for smeg's sake, it goes into vector calculus! You could seriously pilot a starship with this stuff. I also picked up the issue of the Star Trek Starship Collector's magazine that included the small model of the Antares-type starship, which is a beautiful bit of work, love that little ship.
I have also discovered the two fan franchises of "Star Trek The New Voyages" (now "Phase II") and "Star Trek Continues", which are wonderful, seriously, the first can be found here- http://www.stnv.de/en/index.php and the second here- http://www.startrekcontinues.com/, go take a look, these are the work of the true Trekkie. They were rivals for a while before the whole "Battle of Axanar" debacle caused Paramount and CBS to go tactical nuclear lawyer on all fan-made productions (look up "Prelude to Axanar" on Youtube, it's stunning) and both have currently ceased production. "New Voyages" is the longer running of the two and has some great guest appearances from some old Trek stars, but "Continues" does have James Doohan's son reprising his father's role as Scotty and their own slew of actors from the franchise appearing, of particular note being the Romulan Commander from the Original "Enterprise Incident" played by Joanne Linville reappearing in in the "Continues" episode "To Boldly Go" played by her daughter, Amy Rydell, and the resemblance is incredible. On balance I think I prefer "Continues", the writing and acting is better, the visual effects on "NV" are better but that almost works against them, Original Trek didn't have snazzy effects. Mind you "NV" does finally answer the question of what an Original Series Miranda-Class light cruiser looks like. This is the USS Reliant from the "Wrath of Khan" film and any amount of speculation has been raised over the years as to what the pre-refit version would have looked like, with numerous candidates put forward in the Coventry-class, Vindicator-class and Surya-class ships.
There was always something about these that never rang true to me, didn't like the aft shuttlebays in the primary hull. Works well for the refit version, but TOS? No, not quite. "New Voyages" gives us the USS Copernicus (http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/star-trek-ships/images/6248542/title/uss-copernicus-ncc-1893-wallpaper), with the two warp nacelles under the angled-off (but still minimalist) primary hull and a small secondary hull above with the main deflector and a small shuttlebay. A beautiful design blending the clean lines of the original series starships and the Miranda-class look. This feels right and is the design which I think is the best candidate for the "official" Original Series Miranda.
No, don't roll your eyes, this stuff is important...
PS- Oops, got the wrong link for "Star Trek Continues". Fixed now.
I have also discovered the two fan franchises of "Star Trek The New Voyages" (now "Phase II") and "Star Trek Continues", which are wonderful, seriously, the first can be found here- http://www.stnv.de/en/index.php and the second here- http://www.startrekcontinues.com/, go take a look, these are the work of the true Trekkie. They were rivals for a while before the whole "Battle of Axanar" debacle caused Paramount and CBS to go tactical nuclear lawyer on all fan-made productions (look up "Prelude to Axanar" on Youtube, it's stunning) and both have currently ceased production. "New Voyages" is the longer running of the two and has some great guest appearances from some old Trek stars, but "Continues" does have James Doohan's son reprising his father's role as Scotty and their own slew of actors from the franchise appearing, of particular note being the Romulan Commander from the Original "Enterprise Incident" played by Joanne Linville reappearing in in the "Continues" episode "To Boldly Go" played by her daughter, Amy Rydell, and the resemblance is incredible. On balance I think I prefer "Continues", the writing and acting is better, the visual effects on "NV" are better but that almost works against them, Original Trek didn't have snazzy effects. Mind you "NV" does finally answer the question of what an Original Series Miranda-Class light cruiser looks like. This is the USS Reliant from the "Wrath of Khan" film and any amount of speculation has been raised over the years as to what the pre-refit version would have looked like, with numerous candidates put forward in the Coventry-class, Vindicator-class and Surya-class ships.
There was always something about these that never rang true to me, didn't like the aft shuttlebays in the primary hull. Works well for the refit version, but TOS? No, not quite. "New Voyages" gives us the USS Copernicus (http://www.fanpop.com/clubs/star-trek-ships/images/6248542/title/uss-copernicus-ncc-1893-wallpaper), with the two warp nacelles under the angled-off (but still minimalist) primary hull and a small secondary hull above with the main deflector and a small shuttlebay. A beautiful design blending the clean lines of the original series starships and the Miranda-class look. This feels right and is the design which I think is the best candidate for the "official" Original Series Miranda.
No, don't roll your eyes, this stuff is important...
PS- Oops, got the wrong link for "Star Trek Continues". Fixed now.