March 22, 2013: The Destiny Bridge!

In Stargate: Universe’s second season, the crew finally discovers Destiny’s bridge.  From a creative standpoint, holding off the discovery until then allowed for some great drama: Rush’s attempts to hide it from the rest of the crew, the subsequent attempts to control the ship, etc.  Also, waiting until season two permitted us to give it a truly worthy. singular reveal rather than lumping it in with the rest of the ship.  From a production standpoint, holding it off the discovery made even more sense.  The portions of the Destiny built for season one cost several millions and we simply couldn’t afford to include a massively expense bridge as well.  And so, rather than settle for something simple, we waited a year until we had the money to do it right. And, boy, did it we ever.  It was, simply put, a thing of beauty:

Destiny Bridge and adjoining corridor

Under construction.  

Early season two.  The finishing touches in place.

The bridge was located in Stage 5 on and what made it all the more impressive was the fact that it was a raised, massive second level structure.  Directly below it stood the mess and shuttle.

David Blue (aka Eli Wallace) getting a feel for the place.

James Robbins did a terrific job designing the bridge, and our construction department went above and beyond the call to build it. But the work didn’t stop there.  It had to be properly lit and, of course, we needed the Playback Department to work their magic.  ”What’s the Playback Department?”you ask.  Well, whenever you see an onscreen image be it a holographic map or computer data or scrolling alien script, you can thank the Playback Department.  On the surface, it seems like such a small thing but, in reality, those incredible, painstakingly detailed graphics go such a long way toward setting the mood.  Some of the stuff they come up with was downright incredible.

The Captain’s chair.

Commander Carl Binder

Carl makes it go

To give you an idea of the great work of our Playback Department, check out the designs for the onscreen visuals – then check out the finished product…

Bridge chair (left arm)

Bridge chair (right arm)

Bridge standard text

Ship Systems (left)

Ship systems (right)

Patrick Gilmore (aka Dale Volker) took a crash course in weapons and nav systems.

Navigation Systems (left)

Navigation Systems (right)

Sorry.  Couldn’t track this one down.  You’ll just have to take my word for it.

Weapons Systems (far right)

Weapons systems (standard)

Pretty amazing, no?

Tagged: science fiction, Science Fiction Television, scifi, scifi television, SF, SF television, SGU, SGU bridge designs, Stargate, Stargate Universe, Stargate Universe bridge