Fanvid: "Grapevine Fires" (Star Trek)

[skywaterblue]

I couldn't think, of anywhere I would have rather been, to watch it all, burn away...

Fandom: pan-Star Trek (movies, 24th Century Prime timeline)
Characters: Spock, Kirk, Picard, Sisko, Janeway...
Song: "Grapevine Fires" by Death Cab for Cutie
Length: 4:19
Downloads: 60.6 mbs in .mpg / 76 mbs in .avi (best)

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Star Trek - death, rebirth, death again.

It took almost nine months to make, though I did scrap a first draft when I switched from Premier Pro to Sony Vegas. I could have made a human being in that time. Special thanks to sarken who I forced to watch, cheerlead, and suggest Voyager clips where my knowledge ran dry. Couldn't have done it without her.

This video may seem like I'm deeply ambivalent about the new canon - I am not. Overall I appreciate the effort made by the Supreme Court of Bad Robot to ensure that the Trek I grew up with still 'happened' and matters. That said, I feel a deep sense of finality and regret about the movie: in redefining Star Trek to only be about the original crew, we're both saying goodbye to all the other characters and their journeys, and in some ways limiting the palette of what Star Trek can be about to the mass audience.

Here's to the journey, though! The Undiscovered Country! There really is no place I would have rather been, to watch it all burn away.

Comments

[stellar_dust]

Oh my goodness, that was just lovely. ♥

[skywaterblue]

Thank you so much. *beams*

[sabaceanbabe]

This really is an excellent video, all of it, but when Spock shows Kirk all that exists for him but will never be for this version of Kirk, I cheered and cried at the same time. Beautifully done.

By the way, in case you're wondering why I'm here, it's from a rec on Live Journal by inlovewithnight.

[skywaterblue]

Thanks so very much - I'm glad you got an emotional response from the flashbacks, as it is very much the crux of why I made this video. Also, thanks for letting me know about the rec so I can go thank her. :)

[viciouswishes]

That was awesome. *sniff*

[skywaterblue]

Thank you! *tissue*

[serrico]

...oh. That is bittersweet and lovely.

And *bittersweet*.

[skywaterblue]

I'm glad it moved you. Thanks so much for the comment.

tehlime @ lj

[(Anonymous)]

Uhm. I am maybe in love with this video right now.

First of all. A Death Cab vid! !!! Perfect song choice, really. Uhm. Second. You did a jaw dropping job of incorporating a universe of canon into one video. More than that, into one "flash" if you will. And framing it with the mindmeld is just perfect. I didn't read the description very carefully, because I only saw the part about it being a Star Trek vid, and so when the characters from the various shows appeared, I was surprised and delighted. It works very well. The narrative of the video is very sound, even without the mindmeld sequence. You interwove the old and the new footage together in a seemless, yet new way. I love how it starts with both of them, and then moves to the new footage, and then lingers for a while with the old... I don't know quite how to describe it, but it's very much unlike an previous old/new Star Trek video I've seen. And I mean that in a good way.

Anyway, enough rambling. Fantastic job, I'm saving this to go back to, because I know I'm going to end up watching this multiple times! :)

Re: tehlime @ lj

[skywaterblue]

Hey there, don't know if you'll stop back to see this response. I'm glad you liked the song choice! I admit to being a bit of an indie snob, so from time to time I would look up from the work and be like, 'OMG a Death Cab song, really?' But it is such a good song, and such an appropriate choice, I had to run with it.

I debated if I should spoil their appearance or not - finally decided to do it because it's the reason I made this vid and you might as well advertise that up front. Glad you didn't read too carefully and it came as a surprise though! :D I'm also glad you think the narrative stands on its own without the flashback. I'm always very concerned with strong narrative on the rare occasion I make a vid.

If you watch it again, definitely download the .avi version as I think it has the best picture clarity.

And thank you again for such effusive praise. It warms my soul.

[settiai]

Oh, wow. This was absolutely gorgeous.

[skywaterblue]

Thank you. :)

[fenellaevangela]

This was very touching, I think is the word I'm looking for. I, too, came out of the new movie with a lot of thoughts on how it impacted all the canon that came before it, and this vid captured that feeling while still allowing for a "Here's to the journey!" at the end, so. Brava!

[skywaterblue]

That's what I wanted it to say to people, and so it's always really gratifying to have people getting your intended reading. Star Trek is dead, long live Star Trek.

Also, LOL, your icon.

[some_stars]

I love, love, love the formatting of this--the mind melds opening up this whole amazing universe that we only see in flashes as it's disappearing. That is just an amazing inspired idea and it's totally almost making me cry.

[skywaterblue]

Well, first, thank you so much for the compliments.

Obviously I thought it was a clever enough conceit that it deserved a video - I was really terrified as the video took longer, and longer to make, that someone would get to this idea first and do it better. Fortunately while I've seen some people do the mind-meld to travel back to Prime!Kirk and Spock's relationship, and one which used it as a bridge to show the fanlove, no one ever got around to Kirk-Spock-PICARD.

What I found myself wishing as I placed the last clips in the montage was that the song was longer, or that I was a better editor. There's so much about the Prime Trekverse that I didn't have time to fit in - I wanted a clip of O'Brien and his family, of Guinan's adventures, of Neelix and Kes, of Quark's bar and Vic Fontaine and all of it...

[stultiloquentia]

This is very beautiful.

[skywaterblue]

Thank you. LOL at your icon. :D

[sixbeforelunch]

This is just fantastic. I actually am ambivalent about the new canon, but that's because I grew up on TNG/DS9, so this really hit home as to why I left the theater more than a little sad. Very well done. Thank you!

[skywaterblue]

Thanks. I made this video for people like you and I. I just can't quite believe that we'll never ever see any of them again, but I am slowly coming to terms with it.

[skieswideopen]

Oh, this is gorgeous! I love the framing of the mind meld, and the array of scenes from the other shows, and just, oh wow. And fantastic choice of song.

[skywaterblue]

Thank you! :) I'm especially glad so many people think the song was an appropriate choice.

[redbrickrose]

Oh. That's just gorgeous. I loved the flashback sequence - perfectly done.

[skywaterblue]

*claps hands over heart* Thank you. "Gorgeous!" Thank you.

[dragojustine]

This is amazing. There really has been so much Trek with so much emotional resonance for so many people, and even as I absolutely adored coming full circle, the idea that this new Kirk lives in a world where these people will never be- at least not quite like that- that the only one to remember them and love them the way we do is... well, Spock Prime and us- wow. Nicely done.

The cut to the mind meld with Picard? PERFECTLY chosen. I really did not expect it.

Oh- and I don't know enough about vidding tech to know how you did it, but you made the very different production values/look-and-feels of the different shows/movies really *feel* like they belonged on a screen together, where in other vids the differences can seem jarring.

[skywaterblue]

Yeah. Like I said, I appreciate that the new guys went to SO much effort to preserve as much of the continuity as they could. I think it was clever, and thoughtful of them.

Even though I've known for a really long time we'd never see Sisko on screen again, it still wounds me to think that the 24th Century of the new Trek won't be MY 24th Century. No Khitomer treaty with Curzon drinking it up with Klingons, no Dominion War at Bajor's back, no Picard assimilated and then traumatized by the Borg. It still exists, of course, but only in the memory, sleeping.

The cut to the mind meld with Picard? PERFECTLY chosen. I really did not expect it.

I CANNOT BELIEVE I was the first person to do it. I held my breath every time someone posted a pan-Trek vid for nine months because I was just so sure someone else would get there and do it better.

Oh- and I don't know enough about vidding tech to know how you did it, but you made the very different production values/look-and-feels of the different shows/movies really *feel* like they belonged on a screen together, where in other vids the differences can seem jarring.

DVD-quality rips. It turns out that if you get proper rips of the original films, they're basically already in the same aspect ratio of the new movie - with some tiny fudging. Getting the TV series-es to look that good was a slightly more involved prospect that basically involved doing the math on the ratio and then individual cropping and adjusting on each scene.

Which was all technically easier for me in Sony as it uses .avi as a native format rather than Premier, which has an .avi antipathy. Though I still have NO idea how to do anything more advanced than this in Sony Vegas, alas.

Also fortunate is the fact that Paramount has always filmed Star Trek ON FILM and not on upgraded television stock tapes. This means that they've remastered all the really scuzzy looking TNG episodes recently - though chronologically, the video doesn't actually use many clips from the worst seasons. As the worst seasons are also not very good.

[selenak]

You make me sniffle in a most unbecoming fashion, going "oh Spock (Prime)! Oh everyone!" The transitions from New Amanda's death to Spock Prime's death and rebirth to the TOS family was expected, but oh, when you then widened it via the mindmeld with Picard to the Trekverse at large, our Star Trek which in the Altverse just won't happen in that same way, the sense of love and loss was overwhelming. Wonderfully done.

[skywaterblue]

Yay, you liked it! I thought you would, but I had this fear for a long while that you and the other 'usual suspects' might be the only people to watch it. Not that I would have minded much, but the comments above from complete fandom strangers have been a real balm to my fannish soul.

I think it would be polite and truthful to say that I made it for myself, but once I committed to the idea of it, you would be surprised how much I wanted to be fair in the montage. Especially to Voyager fans. I rewatched quite a few episodes. I felt like I couldn't do it unless I found good things to say about Voyager, and I think I did. If nothing else I came away with a renewed appreciation for the episodes on Voyager I thought were successful.

The montage was the BANE of my existence because I would have to watch an episode to select maybe three seconds of it for the video. Making it a really slow process, and halfway through I loathed that I had bit all of it off. Except that by the end I was really sad that I had such limited time in the bridge of the song - I wanted Vic Fontaine, and Nog's Leg. I wanted Guinan in her time traveling days, and Beverly and Wesley aren't in it let alone Pulaski, and the O'Brien family picnic, and Neelix and Kes...

Odo and Kira are only in it once, even! There's no crazy eyed Gowron, or Dukat, or Weyoun. I cut a bit with Seska and Chakotay.

So yeah. It broke my heart a number of times to make it, especially playing triage with the montage. I wish there could be so much more.

[scrollgirl]

That was incredible! I don't interpret the AU of the Reboot movie the way you do, but I love what you've done here to tie the previous series into the Reboot-verse via Spock. Gorgeous vid :)

[skywaterblue]

I'm glad you enjoyed it despite differing interpretations! :)

[dualbunny.livejournal.com]

This is so lovely! And so moving. It's so full of appreciation and love for the stories that came first, but doesn't shy away from the loss that comes along with the new canon.

It's a phoenix in vid form, for me. Thank you very much for sharing it. :}

[skywaterblue]

How flattering! Thank you. As a big fan of TNG/DS9, I wanted it to be full of love for those stories, so I'm glad it worked for you.

[purple_smurf]

I really, really, really cannot wait to download this in half an hour. I keep telling myself to be careful of m bandwidth, but oh I wants it.

[skywaterblue]

You could have streamed it first! Though yes, I do think the fatass avi file is best. I do hope you enjoyed it.

[shinyjenni]

This is lovely, and moving. I love how you've blended footage from the shows and the new movie. Beautiful!

[skywaterblue]

Thank you very much. I'm glad you enjoyed it. :)

[mymatedave.livejournal.com]

Delightful.

[skywaterblue]

Thank you. :)

[elisi]

I loved this, and I say that as someone with only the barest knowledge of the old show. Beautifully, beautifully done. (Here on a rec from selenak btw.)

[skywaterblue]

I'm so glad it worked for you even with a scant knowledge of the old canon, since I never ever made it considering y'all newbies. It was always a love letter to the old canon - but hearing people unfamiliar with it being just as moved makes me feel flush with success. Thank you.

[(Anonymous)]

Here from a rec, this was an awesome vid, great song, great clips, I love that most of it took place within the mind meld. I've downloaded it.

[skywaterblue]

Don't know if you'll see this, anon, but I am pleased you loved it. :)

[(Anonymous)]

over here from LJ, someone recced this video and now I know why. This is probably the best video I've seen in Trek fandom, especially with regards to capturing both old and new. absolutely stunning; great clip choice and placement with the song. I don't have enough adjectives to describe how much I liked this.

[skywaterblue]

I don't know if you'll see this anon, but I am so terribly flattered by your compliments. Thank you. It makes me happy to see other people getting stuff out of it.

[tearful-eye.livejournal.com]

aww, that's so pretty!
i especially love the melancholy in this, ♥

[skywaterblue]

Thank you! :D

[meddow]

Oh, this is amazing. Just the wonderful mix of the new TOS crew with the old had me. But when the TNG, DS9 and Voyager crew come involved, that's when it both floored me and broke my heart. I've been looking for this vid since XI came out, one that beautifully reminds viewers of Picard, Sisko and Janeway and their crews and their adventures and how they fit in, because watching XI, I couldn't help but feel sad about their stories being effectively erased. I'm so glad you've made it.

Superb vid!

[skywaterblue]

Belated response, I'm so sorry: Thank you! I'm glad you enjoyed it, and that it worked for you the same way it worked for me.

[harpers_child]

lovely. i really appreciate vids that make the effort to tie the new cannon to the old.

[skywaterblue]

I'm glad, thank you for the feedback. :)