Observations in TNG: "Lonely Among Us"

A joint project with TrekCore, by Jörg Hillebrand and Bernd Schneider

Here are some observations about sets, props and visual effects in TNG: "Lonely Among Us" without a specific theme, and a comparison of the original TV release (TNG) with the remastered episode (TNG-R).


"Lonely Among Us" HD Screencaps @ TrekCore

Description TNG Other caps Comparison TNG to TNG-R Description TNG-R
The Selay homeworld was previously seen in blue as Delphi Ardu IV in "The Last Outpost" and reappeared in several later TNG episodes, namely as Persephone V in "Too Short a Season", Antede III in "Manhunt" and Krios in "The Perfect Mate".
Re-Used Planets in TNG

"The Last Outpost"

"The Last Outpost" HD
The planet still is an all-green world in TNG-R, but has been visibly redesigned. It is essentially the same as Delphi Ardu IV still in HD.
The 24th century dress uniform makes its debut in this episode. The version worn by Picard, Riker and Yar is only seen once more. Picard can be seen in it in "Coming of Age", before the uniform is redesigned for Season 2. Also, Q can be seen with what seems to be an admiral dress uniform of the same style in "Hide and Q".
"Hide and Q"
The HD version reveals that all three uniforms have different metal braids. Picard's is wider than Riker's and more ornate but both are golden. Yar's is as wide and plain as Riker's but it's silver.
After "Lonely Among Us", the Selay appeared in two more TNG episodes, namely in "Ménage à Troi" and in "Tapestry".
"Ménage à Troi"

"Tapestry"
The skin color of the Selay is much more intense than we remember it, as are their costumes.
For some reason, the upper port turbolift door on the bridge features a black stripe on the bottom on the door in this episode. All the other bridge doors are normal. The stripe is neither visible in the preceding episode ("Where No One Has Gone Before") nor in the following one ("The Last Outpost"). No changes
The 24th century PADDs, designed by Rick Sternbach, debut in this episode. Geordi is holding the first ever modern era Star Trek PADD seen on the show. In previous episodes, thin plexiglass PADDs, very similar to those used in the first four Star Trek films, were seen in use by the crew. Both types of PADDs would continue to appear on TNG. A look at the PADD in HD.

The sensor maintenance room is a redress of one section of main engineering. The part leading to the corridor with the big MSD is hidden behind a new, largely featureless wall. The pool table would normally be located where the central console is standing now. The door that Doctor Crusher and a medic use to enter the sensor maintenance room is usually hidden behind two wall panels (the doors were previously visible in "The Naked Now"). Opposite to this door, the main corridor begins.

Both Geordi and Worf are using touchpens to operate the PADDs and the panels in this scene.


"Where No One Has Gone Before"

"Cost of Living"

The redressed set in HD.

It looks like the touchpens are 20th century Copic marker pens.


"The Naked Now"

"Where No One Has Gone Before"

"The Naked Now"

"The Naked Now"
The central console Worf and Geordi are working on appeared several times on TNG. One early re-use is in "The Outrageous Okona" on the bridge of the Straleb vessel.
Re-Used Props - Stationary Consoles

"The Outrageous Okona"
In HD, we can clearly see that the upper and lower LCARS displays have different color schemes. Building the displays, gels of the same color were glued to the back of the black/white transparencies. The difference is only due to the lighting.
The two horizontal, slightly slanted monitors that are part of the central console of the sensor maintenance room, reappear again in several episodes, usually attached to a wall. They are seen again in "Home Soil", for example.
"Home Soil"
Several shots of the USS Enterprise-D that up until now only appeared as part of the opening credits first show up in an actual episode in "Lonely Among Us". This shot is one of them. The effects shot in HD.
Here, Geordi uses one of the thin, original TNG PADDs that were based on the display devices seen in the first four Star Trek feature films. A close-up of the prop in HD.

Crusher's medkit with an assortment of new medical tools makes its first appearance in this episode. This was Dr. Crusher's main medkit until a newly designed medical case appeared in "I, Borg". The illuminated LCARS display and the separate blinking lights on the case can be seen only in "Lonely Among Us". In all later episodes, these areas are pitch black.

Rick Sternbach: "Nope, didn't design this one, because it was a store-bought audio cassette case that we modified. Okuda and company did the tape striping, and I imagine our fearless prop master arranged for the cut foam insert."

A close-up of the prop in HD.
The Anticans later appeared in several more TNG and early DS9 episodes, namely "The Measure of a Man", "Captain's Holiday", "Unification II", "Tapestry" (standing peacefully next to a Selay!), DS9: "Battle Lines", "The Siege", "Melora" and "The Alternate".
"Unification II"

"The Alternate"
The skin color of the Anticans too is more intense than we used to assume.
The Antican guest quarters are a redress of the junior officers' quarters. The set was originally created for "Star Trek: The Motion Picture", where it represented Kirk's and Ilia's quarters. A shot from "The Naked Now" shows what the set looked like when it appeared as S.S. Tsiolkovsky quarters.
"The Naked Now"
No changes

Crusher's medical headset only appears in this one episode. Another medical device, which Crusher used a few seconds earlier on Worf, is lying on the biobed. This prop reappeared in many TNG episodes. Both props were designed by Rick Sternbach.

Rick Sternbach: "Crusher's headset was probably one of those things that was in the script, the producers approved it (with modifications like the cloth cap), and then decided they didn't like it. It happens. The injector thingie is actually a sample extractor, sort of a hypo in reverse."

Mike Okuda: "Gates specifically asked for this, so the producers asked for it to be made. Rick designed the prop and Bill Theiss had it made for her. I remember working with a local milliner, at Bill's request, to supervise the construction. It was a clever idea, but I guess they didn't like the finished product."

The two props can be seen much better in HD.

The PADD used by Dr. Crusher and her son here is different from the one used by Geordi earlier in the episode. While Geordi's PADD was flat, this PADD features an enlarged area behind the small display. It seems the display is lit as well, so this larger area possibly houses batteries or the light source for the display screen.

Rick Sternbach: "Very early attempt at lighting up a PADD, and not wholly successful, unfortunately. In the days before white LEDs, we were still stuck with small incandescent bulbs that gave off heat. I don't know who built this one. The bit that stuck out the back was probably there to keep the bulbs from melting the screen. That's about all I can remember."

Mike Okuda: "This particular prop was originally built with the thought that the thinner, non-illuminated prop would be used when seen from behind, while the illuminated prop would only be used when the prop was seen head-on, so that the bump for the light bulbs wouldn't be seen. Unfortunately, this got confused during shooting, so the illuminated prop was seen from behind in your frame capture."

A close-up of the prop in HD.
The chairs that previously appeared in the transporter room where Uhura worked in "Star Trek III: The Search for Spock" can be seen in Crusher's quarters again. They also show up in Riker's quarters later in the episode.
Re-Used Props - Furniture

"Star Trek III"
No changes
Something seems to be wrong with Data's eyes in this shot. The pupil of his left eyes seems much larger than the pupil of his right eye. Maybe different contact lenses were used in this shot. Data's eyes are still different sizes in TNG-R.
Another USS Enterprise-D sequence originally created for the opening credits first appears in this episode. It is the famous scene of the ship that shows tiny people walk inside the observation lounge. Here, this sequence is shown backwards, as the camera slowly approaches the observation lounge windows. No changes
In this shot, showing the observation lounge from the outside, the ceiling of the set is visible. The set border is still visible in TNG-R.
The weapon used by the Anticans later appeared as a coil spanner in the Voyager episode "Meld". In later Voyager episodes ("Living Witness", "Drive", "Lineage"), this device was called a hyperspanner. It was also used by Gosheven to stun Data in "The Ensigns of Command".
The Ensigns of Command"

VOY: "Meld"
The prop in HD.

VOY: "Drive"
The wall concealing the short corridor and door in main engineering is back in place. The wall was removed when the set doubled as the sensor maintenance room earlier in the episode, exposing a door.
Earlier in the episode
No changes

Doctor Crusher reads from a large PADD in this scene. There seems to be a battery slot on the back of the PADD. It's first seen closed and then opened a few seconds later.

Mike Okuda: "Putting batteries and light bulbs in a thin padd in the pre-LED days was always problematic. Real bulbs almost always forced the prop to be thicker than we wanted. Most ultra-thin lighting was dimmer than needed. Sometimes we ended up just gluing a paper print onto the screen."

In the HD version of the episode, small red cables can even be seen in the battery slot.
This scene with the dead Mr. Singh (the first death in the series) were filmed from the rarely seen lowest level of main engineering. No changes
A fossil ammonite can be spotted on a small shelf behind Doctor Crusher. It was also seen in her office in "11001001" and "We'll Always Have Paris". Crusher's ammonite began appearing in Picard's ready room in "The Best of Both Worlds II", replacing a different fossil from the first three seasons. Crusher's ammonite remained in Picard's ready room until the end of the series.
"The Best of Both Worlds II"
A close-up of the ammonite in HD.

The hypnosis device used by Counselor Troi later appeared as a drug dispenser in the DS9 episode "Honor Among Thieves".

Rick Sternbach: "The hypnosis device just that, a story-specific device. Not much else to tell. The re-use of props is, of course, something with which we're all familiar."


DS9: "Honor Among Thieves"
The prop in HD.
Picard's new ammonite can be glimpsed behind the captain here. It would appear in his ready room until the beginning of the third season. During most of the third season, Picard keeps a nautilus shell at that spot behind his chair. Beginning in the fourth season, Crusher's ammonite replaces the nautilus shell, as already mentioned. A close-up of the ammonite in HD.
The energy lifeform appears in the form of blue lightnings. All energy ripples had to be redone for the remastered episode. When the lifeform invades Picard, the ripples were made more pronounced than in the original episode so they more closely match the ripples seen in the rest of the episode.
After Picard has set course back to the Beta Renner cloud, several shots of the Enterprise appear that show the ship flying from right to left, underlining the fact that the ship is returning to its previous position. Regular stock footage of the USS Enterprise-D originally from "Encounter at Farpoint" was mirrored to achieve this effect. The writing on the hull (the "D" on the nacelle strut), however, appears mirrored as well, as can be seen in this shot.
"Encounter at Farpoint"

"Encounter at Farpoint" HD

The lettering "NCC-1701-D" was fixed for TNG-R.

As the original material was not available, a CGI model by Tobias Richter was used for TNG-R: "Encounter at Farpoint". The remastered version of "Lonely Among Us" and "11001001" use HD scans of the original film.

The Selay delegates are housed in what would later appear as the medical lab. This is the first time we get a look at the location behind this door. The door behind Ssestar leads to Doctor Crusher's sickbay office. No changes

The miniature of the Class-F shuttle behind Troi is the original shooting model of the shuttle from TOS. More about the history of the model can be found at Memory Alpha.
Visual TOS References in Modern Star Trek

On the very left, we can see someone's shadow from behind the camera.

The model in HD.
The silver model of a Constitution class ship appears again in Riker's quarters after "Haven". This model would later adorn Picard's ready room for a few season 1 episodes. Even in HD, the depth of field limits what we can recognize of the model.
The horn statue behind Crusher was seen again in several more episodes. It appeared in Quark's quarters in "Melora" and was one of Nog's possessions he tried to sell before enrolling in Starfleet Academy in "Little Green Men". It was later seen in Martok's quarters on DS9 in "Once More Unto the Breach".
DS9: "Melora"

DS9: "Little Green Men"
No changes

DS9: "Once More Unto the Breach"

When Dr. Crusher is giving the results of the exams she has run on her and the other commanding officers to Picard, she uses a rarely seen transparent chip (called a record tape in the script) as a storage device. This data chip is seen again in a number of episodes, like "The Measure of a Man", "The Icarus Factor" and "Ensign Ro".

Rick Sternbach: "This was just a different type of non-volatile storage medium than a regular isolinear chip. I suspect it has a built-in Bluetooth sort of component to send data to a PADD or tricorder or desktop monitor. The round brass disk is the actual storage medium. I designed this one, as well as yet another 'non-standard' chip, the recording of Wesley's dad. I guess there's lots of different formats in Starfleet. :)"


"The Measure of a Man"

"The Icarus Factor"
The chip in an HD close-up.
The Beta Renner cloud. The Beta Renner cloud must have existed on film and was scanned in HD for TNG-R. It looks exactly like it did before and only appears much clearer now.
Mirrored footage appears again, this time, the mirrored "NCC 1701-D" on the saucer underside is clearly legible. In this scene the lettering is still reversed in TNG-R.
Once again, the energy lifeform appears in the form of blue ripples. In HD the energy pattern of the ripples matches the original as closely as possible.
We can see part of a tripod on the left edge of the frame. The reframing removed the visible equipment in TNG-R.
The graphic seen on the right side of the transporter console is a re-use of the map of the Ligonian Centerplace from "Code of Honor".
"Code of Honor"
Close-ups of the console in HD.
Two flashing LCARS displays can be seen behind Worf. The displays had to be redone. The original animation wasn't used, however. Instead, the animation seen a little later in the episode (see below) was used. That is why the "P" (for Picard) appears briefly as well, something it didn't do in the old animation.
Picard signals a "P" from within the cloud to let the crew know he is still alive. The animation of the "P" appears just like it did 25 years ago.

 

Credits

Michael Minnick spotted the equipment in the scene when Picard zaps the bridge (which is also shown in the documentary "Energized: Taking the Next Generation to the Next Level" as an example why 4:3 was chosen for HD). Ronan O'Flaherty found the door with the black stripe and Twitter user @mematron identified the marker pens.

 


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