You might have to stare at this one a bit to wrap your head around it, but it’s well worth it.
This is a classic Star Trek “collision” shot, where everyone gets thrown around the bridge and the camera shakes and rotates. But in this example, the shot is reverse engineered, reversing all the effects to stabilize the shot.
What you end up with is what the director saw: A well-choreographed dance, one that was likely repeated a few times until it felt just right. [Via ParisLemon]
Shatner and Nichols were the only ones to defy physics and fall in a different direction than the rest.
Slowed down, yes. Reverse engineered, not really.
And it was a common move in those days to slow act such scenes to try to lessen actors getting hurt (because it generally was the actors and not doubles).
Amusing part is that the reverse is more true today. We speed up scenes so that you can’t tell it’s a double. Or much of anything else.
The shot isn’t slowed down at all, the person just undid the shaking of the camera. Hence the “reverse engineering” (which may not be accurate, technically, but it’s a lot more applicable than “slowed down”).
I always thought the future of space travel would be better with bolted down chairs and seat belts 😀
Of course you know that Shatner would say he and Nichols were the only ones complying with physics. The rest, especially that Takei character, were the ones defying gravity.
Shatner would say almost anything if a camera was running and a check was being written.
If only they’d had the budget for such things.
Nichols was defying physics on a regular basis as far as dresses went…
That wasn’t Nichols. That was costume designer William Ware Theiss.