Babylon 5’ Reboot in Development

[prometheus]

I don't see the Vorlon ships? I thought those to be quite interesting as well.

All ships' designs look outdated to a lesser or greater degree. None were truly iconic designs, unlike the ones from earlier Scifi shows such as Star Trek, Space 1999 or even Buck Rogers or the original BSG. I recall seeing the flying saucer design of one of the elder races at the time, and thinking "wow, that's rushed and unoriginal" .

The Star Fury design is in my opinion the strongest design, although I felt it was copied from The Last Starfigher. The White Star was quite nice, as were the Vorlon ships.

In short, I loved watching the series at the time, with interesting characters and storyline(s). The ship designs were good, but never thought most of them that interesting. Those were functional designs, and the story was great fun to watch.

I am looking forward to the reboot!

Vorlon ships? not sure but there is a similar ship down the right corner, the blue one but not exactly the same.
I may have picked an image that doesn´t properly showcase the actual ones.
Vorlon ship was also interesting though I prefered the minbari cruisers the best of all I think, but also that Star Fury Design being up there.
I can´t recall last starfighter, must have seen it..but just can´t recall it, other stuff like Battle Beyond the stars I do recall much better.

I liked how Babylon 5 had a sense of having a camera in space, most likely due to the over use of lensflare´s.
It had some decent intro music, and the story was a bit fascinating about ancient species more advanced, but long gone and hidden..so mysterious and mythological, and then the conflict between races trying to get along but failing most of the times when they all have different cultures and languages, which of course is a reflection on our own societies issues still today and a thing that goes back to ancient history on how we fail to build utopia sort of due to different languages "god" provided so we couldn´t build a tower to reach the heavens.


At the time the type of texture the ships had was a bit different and daring, trying to get some sort of alien style, but I think it fails today..and looking at it now it just kind of disrupts the geometric flow of any spaceship vessel, sometimes I feel like it´s just a display of how you could procedurally texture in Lightwave.

 

[Rayek]

Because the more experienced we get in 3D techniques, the more we see the flaws in older work.

 

[Ma3rk]

Hmmm. Ya. Well...

Let's see: We're talking about TV show with a Sci-Fi setting of the <mumblieth>century, originally done in the 1990's.

You folks do realize that Producers at that time were were just slathering to do anything of that genre in a cost effective manner? The audience acceptance of what was on TV at that time (pre HD mind you) was, ... ummm, let's say pretty loose. We were all hungry for ANY Sci-Fi in our living rooms, even in SD.

Television has ALWAYS tried to incorporate from every any & every source possible, generally anything out of copyright limits was a BIG plus of course as you might imagine.

I'm really not quite sure what J. Michael Straczynski has in mind, as the only thing still left to the series is the name if you think about it. Much of the cast is gone; those left certainly aren't what they were 20+ years ago. Also, why would you hang onto set designs (i.e. ships mostly) that were largely dictated by software limitations of the time?

But, who knows? Go for it Mr. S.! I'll at least watch the premiere, so don't get me wrong on that.

Oh BTW, I had friends who were regular crew (so I even got a few days in) on the original show. A really drab warehouse out in the San Fernando valley.

Hey, it was work, ya know?

 

[prometheus]

Hmmm. Ya. Well...

Let's see: We're talking about TV show with a Sci-Fi setting of the <mumblieth>century, originally done in the 1990's.

You folks do realize that Producers at that time were were just slathering to do anything of that genre in a cost effective manner? The audience acceptance of what was on TV at that time (pre HD mind you) was, ... ummm, let's say pretty loose. We were all hungry for ANY Sci-Fi in our living rooms, even in SD.

Television has ALWAYS tried to incorporate from every any & every source possible, generally anything out of copyright limits was a BIG plus of course as you might imagine.

I'm really not quite sure what J. Michael Straczynski has in mind, as the only thing still left to the series is the name if you think about it. Much of the cast is gone; those left certainly aren't what they were 20+ years ago. Also, why would you hang onto set designs (i.e. ships mostly) that were largely dictated by software limitations of the time?

But, who knows? Go for it Mr. S.! I'll at least watch the premiere, so don't get me wrong on that.

Oh BTW, I had friends who were regular crew (so I even got a few days in) on the original show. A really drab warehouse out in the San Fernando valley.

Hey, it was work, ya know?

Of course..I do, but I still think texturing it different was more a matter of design taste and not a cost decision, they had other ships in there better textured.
I recall some beautiful airbrush art in some magazine, done by a few guys and just covering spaceships, they had very alien look to them and were kind of very colorful often with a certain pattern on the hull, I am not surprized if that was the trend there and then, but it didn´t reach the level of quality as to those in that art book.

Can´t recall the book magazine or artists though, have to do a seach, John Berkey was a popular one, but it´s not those designs mainly I am thinking of.
Seems utterly hard to find, and also to search separate from everything since then.

 

[prometheus]

Could have been Chris Foss, recalling that now from some images, but can´t for sure say those magazines was all his work, I think it was a mixture with other artists.

 

[djlithium]

For all nostalgics:
Warner Bros. Television will produce a reboot of Babylon 5.
You can read more about it here (variety.com).

ciao
Thomas

It's a cartoon series.

 

[Markc]

That was my initial thought....

 

[skycgi]

I saw babylon5 video clips from youtube. the effects are too outdated. the effects were cool during the 90s. but looking at them now, they didn't age well. I wish J. michael strazynski will avoid making game of thrones in space. there's a trend right now where they make the shows appear like game of thrones. babylon5 should be a fun exciting shooting war in space. I like to see spaceships go pew pew pew. I don't like the heavy drama of picard or foundation. picard and foundation are boring.

 

[prometheus]

I saw babylon5 video clips from youtube. the effects are too outdated. the effects were cool during the 90s. but looking at them now, they didn't age well. I wish J. michael strazynski will avoid making game of thrones in space. there's a trend right now where they make the shows appear like game of thrones. babylon5 should be a fun exciting shooting war in space. I like to see spaceships go pew pew pew. I don't like the heavy drama of picard or foundation. picard and foundation are boring.

True..they didn´t age well.

Heck ..starwars, alien etc, those miniature and film copy overlays aged better.

But a cartoon series? rule me out from watching it anyway, but who knows what kids would like.

I doubt it will be successful though, had it even been aimed towards a fancy clashy remake with "realism" in mind and advanced effects, with reference to effects and design.
Then the actual story plot will probably not hold up once again, if not rewritten in to something new.

 

[Markc]

#skycgi
Everyone has their preferences.
Personally I love watching retro shows from my youth......

People are spoilt these days, and expect Hollywood level FX in everything.

 

[prometheus]

#skycgi
Everyone has there preferences.
Personally I love watching retro shows from my youth......

People are spoilt these days, and expect Hollywood level FX in everything.

Yep, I am having a hard time watching star trek old aired tv series.
that said, I may want to watch space 1999 once again,(over here renamed to "moonbase Alpha") and that is because it´s almost never aired after I saw it the first time, I recalling being around 10-13 I think, having to go to my sisters place for that show, she just bought a color tv, while our father stubbornly and sneaky hizzed, why would we need a color tv

No base on the moon without a lifeline please

Edit..yeah, it aired over here first time 1976, so I was 11 years old.

 

[Shabazzy]

..I like to see spaceships go pew pew pew.

I like when they go pzzzzzsshhzzzzzeewwww!

 

[prometheus]

I like them to carry magnificent species,
Alien, Predator, The thing

 

[Shabazzy]

I came across this video a couple of days ago and felt a little bit more optimistic about it.

 

[Shloime]

Well, the words of JMS sound promising...

 

[KeystoneMike]

Unless they change the concept behind the Babylon 5 station (O'Neill Cylinder) I would expect the rebooted station to look somewhat similar. I would say its look is iconic and something that identifies the show. Certainly the detailing on all ships can be updated since the technology has advanced greatly over the nearly 30 years that has passed. There's no chance WB is gonna call vizrt/NewTek about LightWave. They could care less what software is used and probably have only heard of the big names anyways. Unless they go with some low budget fly-by-night CG house (always a possibility) I think the updated visuals should look great although we are certainly a jaded bunch by now. Story will always be king. The visuals at the time were iconic I think because the technology for producing affordable CG for television was fairly new. With any property that's iconic I think the visuals will walk a fine line. If they are vastly different from what fans are used to they will complain. If they look terrible everyone will complain!
Lastly, the Minbari texture was in painted image map. It was not a procedural texture.