Our sincere thanks to our friends at Axanar for spreading the word!
I’m really hoping these guys can get over the line. I’ve fallen a little out of love with sci fi over the years but I think that this would be the sort of thing to drag me back in :)
That first blackboard you see, before the second one slides down and covers it, has a cool diagram. At first I thought it showed some event from early in the mission, but after looking more closely I think it actually shows the end of the mission. There’s the destination exoplanet, labeled “X”, with Overture in orbit and a shuttle descending to it, fueling “in situ” (i.e., on the planet), then rejoining Overture.
I like von Braun using his slide rule as a pointer. I was born a smidgeon too late to actually use one in school, but I used to play with my dad’s when I was a kid.
Another cool period reference: Dana and I’m-not-sure-who toasting with Tab. It kind of looks like they’re opening modern-style stay-tab openers rather than the ring-pull openers I would have expected; Wikipedia is a little ambiguous on exactly when that transition would have happened, and I don’t quite remember, other than a vague sense that it happened somewhere around the late 70s/early 80s. Of course this is an AU; maybe along with spaceflight the evolution of soda can openers was similarly accelerated in the PS universe.
Showing a nuke blast to introduce Overture was SO COOL. I was expecting a fly-by, and when that burst of light came I knew exactly what it was and got embarrassingly excited. A+ for micro-budget SFX showmanship.
The drive plate was cool. Seeing the antenna peaking around the edge of it was cool. Seeing the front end of the ship reveal itself as we swung by the drive plate was cool. Basically it was all cool.
It’s kind of a silly thing, but I loved getting the answer to something I’d wondered: which way the ship rotates. The answer: clockwise as you face forward. Which means that for crew standing at the windows, the sky will perpetually appear to be rotating slowly counter-clockwise as they look forward.
The ship appears to be rotating a little faster than I expected. I thought it would rotate once every 30 seconds, so as to provide 1 g of artificial gravity at the radius of the outer (lower) deck in the big donut’s pods. In the trailer, though, the ship appears to complete a rotation in about 21 seconds. (And the camera appears to also be circling the ship slowly in the same clockwise-looking-forward direction, which I’d expect would make the ship appear to rotate more slowly, rather than more quickly.) So maybe I made an incorrect assumption or a math error when figuring the ship’s rate of spin. Or maybe it just looked cooler spinning a little faster, and they (sensibly) decided that was more important than hyper-technical realism.
I was thrilled to finally get a good view of the antenna. I’d been confused about its structure; in some previous views I’d thought its sections looked big and boxy. Now, though, I realize that the individual sections are relatively thin. But they’re staggered with respect to each other. I wonder if that’s to let the connecting struts be arranged at the same 45-degree angle that the supports connecting the big donut and the small donut are. If so, I think it might be for the same reason in each case: The struts need to be able to handle forces from two different directions: The rearward force generated by the Orion drive, and the outward force generated by the ship’s spin. By putting the struts at a 45-degree angle they can handle forces from both directions equally well.
I was very interested in the red coloring. What I previously thought might be residue of an accidental hull breach now clearly appears to be a reflection that shifts as the ship rotates. It’s hard to tell exactly where the reflected light originates; it looks like maybe it’s coming from somewhere on the inner edge of either the big or the small donut somewhere around the part of the ship that has the antenna attached to it. I haven’t been able to think of anything that would cause that. Maybe a nuclear reactor located in one of the smaller donut pods produces the light as a side-effect of its operation? Or maybe it’s not meant to represent anything in particular, but is just a red highlight applied to the rendering to add visual interest. If so it definitely worked in my case. :-)
I thought the rulebook floating by was cute. I’m assuming it’s meant as a visual gag referencing how the crew or the people at Actaeon or whomever have “thrown the rulebook out the window.”
Do you love diverse webseries, sci fi and Sean Persaud? And have money you are not in need of? Go check it out now. They’re in their final days! Don’t put it off like I did!
NB: I did not design this badge. It is an edit. Please don’t think I designed it. I don’t know who did, but it was someone from the Personal Space team and not me.
“An epileptic scientist and a neurotic widow learn to accept their personal tragedies”
There’s also a dinner party during a hurricane during which Reagan has to be talked out of suicide.
Featuring Ronald Reagan, Broderick Crawford (playing against type as a artist–while All the King’s Men was still in theatres), and directed by Don Siegel.
Bizarre 1949 film based on a novel by Philip Wylie–who coined the mother-hating idea of “Momism.“ Ponderous. Note the ten minute difference between preview and release times–not a good indication. Ugly misogynistic tenor, even with Kathryn Scola script
Wait, what? He told us that Personal Space would launch his acting career!
“Actually, notwithstanding its pretensions to profundity, the story unfolds on a note of romance and emotion rather than of genuine intellectuality. It is, essentially, a woman’s picture.”
I don’t think Charles L. Franke wants to start a debate about pretentiousness. Also, dude, tag your spoilers. (Directing that at Franke, not the OP.)
Maybe it’s because of I’m of a certain age, yet have spent a fair amount of time lately hanging out with twentysomethings on Tumblr, but I find the concept of the shift handoffs on Overture compelling. These people presumably trained together on Earth before they went into cryo. Shiftmates no doubt trained together a lot, but those in the same discipline would have done extensive discipline-specific training as well. So they would have known each other, probably formed friendships. Then they get frozen, and when they wake up there’s their friend, only now the friend is 25 years older.
I relate to the older side of that interaction. I know the show probably focuses on the younger characters’ stories; webseries skew toward younger actors for obvious reasons. But I’m excited that this show also plans to explore the inter-generational drama of its premise, and that in turn makes me happy for a chance to learn more about First Shift’s backstory.
Overture has come a long way. On top is our current model. Below is our original concept art model, from October 2014. If our Kickstarter reaches its goal, this is the kind of dedication to detail and improvement you can expect from the Personal Space team.
