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| Gender = Male
  
| Gender = Male
 
| Date of birth = {{d|6|July|1951}}
  
| Date of birth = {{d|6|July|1951}}
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| Place of birth = Bridgeport, Connecticut
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| Place of birth = Bridgeport, Connecticut, USA
 
| Date of death =
 
| Date of death =
 
| Place of death =
 
| Place of death =
 
| Awards for Trek =
 
| Awards for Trek =
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| Roles = [[:Category:Art department|(Senior) Illustrator, Technical Consultant and Scenic Artist]], [[:Category:Star Trek authors|''Star Trek'' author]]
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| Roles = [[:Category:Art department|(Senior) Illustrator, Technical Consultant and Scenic Artist]], [[:Category:Star Trek authors|''Star Trek'' author]], [[:Category:Star Trek publication artists|Publication Artist]]
 
| image2 = Michael Okuda and Rick Sternbach.jpg
  
| image2 = Michael Okuda and Rick Sternbach.jpg
 
| imagecap2 = Sternbach and [[Michael Okuda]]
  
| imagecap2 = Sternbach and [[Michael Okuda]]
 
}}
  
}}
 
{{disambiguation|the [[Memory Alpha:Point of view#In-universe|in-universe]] article on the illustrator for ''Incredible Tales''|Rick Sternbach (artist)}}
  
{{disambiguation|the [[Memory Alpha:Point of view#In-universe|in-universe]] article on the illustrator for ''Incredible Tales''|Rick Sternbach (artist)}}
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'''Richard "Rick" Michael Sternbach''' {{born|6|July|1951}} was the (senior) production illustrator/designer for {{film|1}}, ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'', the first two seasons of ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine]]'', and ''[[Star Trek: Voyager]]''. He was also the scenic artist for {{film|10}}, providing designs for everything from the [[Argo (shuttlecraft)|Argo shuttle]] to a [[Romulan]] {{type|Valdore}} sculpture.
+
'''Richard "Rick" Michael Sternbach''' {{born|6|July|1951}} was the (senior) production illustrator/designer for {{film|1}}, ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'', the first two seasons of ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine]]'', and ''[[Star Trek: Voyager]]''. He was also the scenic artist for {{film|10}}, providing designs for everything from the [[Argo (shuttlecraft)|Argo shuttle]] to a [[Romulan]] {{type|Valdore}} sculpture. Sternbach's most recognized work by far, have been the designs of the [[PADD]], [[Deep Space 9]] and the {{USS|Voyager}}.
   
−
Rick Sternbach was offered his illustrator position in the art department on ''Star Trek: The Motion Picture'' in April 1978. Working alongside [[Mike Minor]], he designed control panel layouts and signage for the starship sets, and for which he co-authored the updated internal instruction manual, ''[["Enterprise" Flight Manual]]''. Besides this, he also helped to create the animated [[asteroid]] [[wormhole]] sequence and helped to obtain source material from NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), that was used in the design of [[V'Ger]]. [http://www.trekplace.com/ricksternbach.html]
 +
Rick Sternbach was offered his, otherwise uncredited, illustrator position in the art department on ''Star Trek: The Motion Picture'' in April 1978. Working alongside such colleagues as [[Lee Cole]] and [[Mike Minor]], he designed control panel layouts and signage for the starship sets, and for which he co-authored the updated internal instruction manual, ''[["Enterprise" Flight Manual]]''. Besides this, he also helped to create the animated [[asteroid]] [[wormhole]] sequence and helped to obtain source material from NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), that was used in the design of ''[[V'ger]]''. [http://www.trekplace.com/ricksternbach.html] Sternbach was actually slated for an "Illustrator"'s credit, but for reasons unknown this did not come to fruition. (''[[The Making of Star Trek: The Motion Picture]]'', p. 218)
   
−
Recalling how he was hired for the television franchise, Rick Sternbach has reminisced, "''The story I usually tell is that late in 1986, when Paramount announced TNG, I heard it over the radio while driving on the freeway, pulled off to a pay phone, and talked to [[Susan Sackett]], [[Gene Roddenberry|Gene]]'s assistant, all within about 25 seconds. I had a few meetings with [[Bob Justman]], Gene, [[Dorothy Fontana]], and [[David Gerrold]], left my portfolio, and was officially hired on in January of 1987. [[Andy Probert]] and I were the first two artists brought in, even before an art director, and for the first few months we worked up a foamcore model of the bridge and hundreds of sketches of all the things a good Star Trek production should have. We initially worked up generic items, but eventually we got into story-specific sets and props for {{e|Encounter at Farpoint}}.''" [http://www.trekplace.com/ricksternbach.html] For the the television shows, Rick Sternbach, after he succeeded Probert as senior illustrator when the latter left the franchise upon the conclusion of ''The Next Generation''{{'}} [[TNG Season 1|first season]], has designed a multitude of [[starship]]s and [[space station]]s. He also was responsible for the design of hundreds of props and set pieces, including the mural painting of the ''Enterprise''-D in Picard's [[ready room]], which was painted by Probert. He also developed weaponry, [[PADD]]s, [[tricorder]]s and [[communicator]]s for [[Starfleet]], [[Klingon]], [[Romulan]], [[Cardassian]], [[Bajoran]], [[Kazon]], [[Ferengi]], and other races. As a big fan of Japanese animation, anime references are often secretly placed in his designs, notably "[[the Egg]]", a design borrowed from the ''Dirty Pair''.
 +
Recalling how he was hired for the television franchise, Rick Sternbach has reminisced, "''The story I usually tell is that late in 1986, when Paramount announced TNG, I heard it over the radio while driving on the freeway, pulled off to a pay phone, and talked to [[Susan Sackett]], [[Gene Roddenberry|Gene]]'s assistant, all within about 25 seconds. I had a few meetings with [[Bob Justman]], Gene, [[Dorothy Fontana]], and [[David Gerrold]], left my portfolio, and was officially hired on in January of 1987. [[Andy Probert]] and I were the first two artists brought in, even before an art director, and for the first few months we worked up a foamcore model of the bridge and hundreds of sketches of all the things a good Star Trek production should have. We initially worked up generic items, but eventually we got into story-specific sets and props for {{e|Encounter at Farpoint}}.''" [http://www.trekplace.com/ricksternbach.html] For the television shows, Rick Sternbach, after he succeeded Probert as senior illustrator when the latter left the franchise upon the conclusion of ''The Next Generation''{{'}} [[TNG Season 1|first season]], has designed a multitude of [[starship]]s and [[space station]]s. He also was responsible for the design of hundreds of props and set pieces, including the mural painting of the ''Enterprise''-D in Picard's [[ready room]], which was painted by Probert. He also developed weaponry, PADDs, [[tricorder]]s and [[communicator]]s for [[Starfleet]], [[Klingon]], [[Romulan]], [[Cardassian]], [[Bajoran]], [[Kazon]], [[Ferengi]], and other races. As a big fan of Japanese animation, anime references are often secretly placed in his designs, notably "[[the Egg]]", a design borrowed from the ''Dirty Pair''.
   
−
Together with [[Michael Okuda]], he served as a technical consultant to the script staff, maintaining technical and chronological continuity and inventing scientific terms and [[technobabble]], resulting in internal documents as ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation Writers' Technical Manual]]'' and ''[[Star Trek: Voyager Technical Manual]]''. In 1980 he created several illustrations for the ''[[Star Trek Spaceflight Chronology]]'' by [[Stanley Goldstein|Stanley]] and [[Fred Goldstein]]. He has also co-written the ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual]]'', ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Technical Manual]]'', ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D Blueprints]]'' as well as the "[[Starfleet Technical Database]]" articles in ''[[Star Trek: The Magazine]]''.
 +
Together with [[Michael Okuda]], he served as a technical consultant to the script staff, maintaining technical and chronological continuity and inventing scientific terms and [[technobabble]], resulting in internal documents as ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation Writers' Technical Manual]]'' and ''[[Star Trek: Voyager Technical Manual]]''. In 1980 he created several illustrations for the ''[[Star Trek Spaceflight Chronology]]'' by [[Stanley Goldstein|Stanley]] and [[Fred Goldstein]]. He has also co-written the ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual]]'', ''[[Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Technical Manual]]'', ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D Blueprints]]'' as well as the "[[Starfleet Technical Database]]" articles for {{STTM}}.
   
−
Sternbach started out making his designs the traditional way, that is in paper and pencil, but acquired skills in [[CGI|computer generated imagery]] (CGI) modeling as well (skills he picked up while working in 1983 on the science fiction movie ''The Last Starfighter''), turning in design concepts at a later stage both in paper and pencil and rudimentary CGI models. (''[[Star Trek: The Magazine Volume 3, Issue 12]]'', pp. 94-97)
 +
Sternbach started out making his designs the traditional way, that is in paper and pencil, but acquired skills in [[CGI|computer generated imagery]] (CGI) modeling as well (skills he picked up while working in 1983 on the science fiction movie ''The Last Starfighter''), turning in design concepts at a later stage both in paper and pencil and rudimentary CGI models. ({{STTM|3|12}}, pp. 94-97) Sternbach constructed his CGI model concepts in the Macromedia Extreme 3D software initially, before switching over to {{w|Autodesk Maya}} and unlike the visual effects houses who ultimately only utilized the {{w|LightWave 3D}} exclusively for the live-action production CGI models. As a result, Sternbach's CGI builds were never intended to serve otherwise than as concepts only, though he, "''(...)found that putting together a model with this basic level of detail, minus the textures, got all the main design elements across, and I could even email the files to the CG facilities so they could do their magic.''" [http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10151602482473398&set=a.47431298397.56091.645473397&type=3&theater]
   
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He has been critical of the Production Design of the 2009 film {{film|11}}, specifically that of the design of the {{USS|Enterprise|alternate reality}}. He criticized the apparent lack of line of sight for the nacelles to open space, proportions of various sections, and an overall lack of knowledge of how Star Trek technology works. "Perhaps the designers didn't know exactly how the different hardware bits worked". [http://trekmovie.com/2008/11/12/big-reaction-to-new-enterprise-new-designer-responds/]
 +
He has been critical of the Production Design of the 2009 film {{film|11}}, specifically that of the design of the {{USS|Enterprise|alternate reality}}. He criticized the apparent lack of line of sight for the nacelles to open space, proportions of various sections, and an overall lack of knowledge of how Star Trek technology works. "Perhaps the designers didn't know exactly how the different hardware bits worked". {{TrekMovie.com|2008/11/12/big-reaction-to-new-enterprise-new-designer-responds/}}
   
−
While no longer working on ''Star Trek'', Sternbach continues to create futuristic designs for sci-fi productions. He also actively maintained contact with the ''Star Trek'' fan-base through Internet blogs like "[http://www.trekbbs.com/ Trekbbs]" and more recently the "{{DrexFiles}}" by answering questions and explaining his thought processes on his work for ''Star Trek''. Sternbach is also operating a webshop, "intrep74656", through eBay, selling commercialized editions of his work.
 +
While no longer working on ''Star Trek'', Sternbach continues to create futuristic designs for sci-fi productions. He also actively maintained contact with the ''Star Trek'' fan-base through Internet blogs like "[http://www.trekbbs.com/ Trekbbs]" and more recently the "{{DrexFiles}}" by answering questions and explaining his thought processes on his work for ''Star Trek''. Currently, Sternbach has opted to maintain contact with the fan-base through his personal [http://www.facebook.com/rick.sternbach?fref=photo Facebook]-page.
   
  +
However, in November 2014 Sternbach again returned to the ''Star Trek'' franchise when he was invited to become a part as consultant of a team of experts – including a host of former ''Star Trek'' alumni – to oversee a new restoration of the original [[Constitution class model (original)#Eleven-foot model|eleven-foot ''Enterprise'' studio model]], residing at the [[Smithsonian Institution|Smithsonian]]'s {{w|National Air and Space Museum}} (NASM), for its 50th anniversary. {{trekcore|blog/2014/12/smithsonian-enterprise-update}} Having accepted the prestigious assignment, Starnbach was flown in in May 2015 for the team's first work meeting on 13 May. {{trekcore|blog/2015/05/smithsonian-update-the-experts-have-arrived}}
⚫
==Work outside ''Star Trek''==
  
⚫
An Connecticut native, Rick Sternbach enrolled in that state's university in 1972 with an art major, but switching after a couple of years to marine biology. [http://www.trekplace.com/ricksternbach.html] Nevertheless, he became a book and magazine illustrator upon graduation, among others for the ''Galaxy Science Fiction'' and ''Analog'' magazines, having for example provided the cover and interior art for [[Starlog Press]]' ''[[Starlog (magazine)|Future Life]]'' issue 17 of 1980. During this time he helped found he helped found the Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists (ASFA), an organization which aim it was to tender legal advice to science fiction and fantasy artists on contracts and copyrights.
  
   
  ⚫
==Career outside ''Star Trek''==
⚫
Inspired by artist [[Ralph McQuarrie]]'s example, who left the aerospace industry to work for George Lucas on ''[[Star Wars]]'', Sternbach made the decision as well to move to California in order to seek illustration work in the motion picture industry. After some work for Disney and [[PBS]], the latter of which he did preliminary work for on [[Carl Sagan]]'s television series ''Cosmos'', he was offered the position in the art department for ''The Motion Picture''. Around the same time he had worked for JPL, where had collaborated with Charley Kohlhase and Jim Blinn on the real world Voyager 1 Jupiter flyby movie, creating textures for the Galilean satellites. That flyby movie became the primary inspiration source for [[Alvy Ray Smith]] (at the time a co-worker of Sternbach at JPL) and [[Loren Carpenter]] at the [[Pixar|Graphics Group]], when they designed the very first fully textured [[CGI]] effect seen by the general public, the "[[Project Genesis|Genesis Demo]]", for {{film|2}}.
  
  ⚫
An Connecticut native, Rick Sternbach enrolled in that state's university in 1972 with an art major, but switching after a couple of years to marine biology. [http://www.trekplace.com/ricksternbach.html] Nevertheless, he became a book and magazine illustrator upon graduation, among others for the ''Galaxy Science Fiction'' and ''Analog'' magazines, having for example provided the cover and interior art for [[Starlog Press]]' ''[[Starlog (magazine)|Future Life]]'' issue 17 of 1980. During this time he helped found the Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists (ASFA), an organization which aim it was to tender legal advice to science fiction and fantasy artists on contracts and copyrights.
   
  ⚫
Inspired by artist [[Ralph McQuarrie]]'s example, who left the aerospace industry to work for George Lucas on ''[[Star Wars]]'', Sternbach made the decision as well to move to California in order to seek illustration work in the motion picture industry. After some work for Disney and [[PBS]], the latter of which he did preliminary work for on [[Carl Sagan]]'s television series ''Cosmos'', he was offered the position in the art department for ''The Motion Picture''. Around the same time he had worked for JPL, where he collaborated with Charley Kohlhase and Jim Blinn on the real world Voyager 1 Jupiter flyby movie, creating textures for the Galilean satellites. That flyby movie became the primary inspiration source for [[Alvy Ray Smith]] (at the time a co-worker of Sternbach at JPL) and [[Loren Carpenter]] at the [[Pixar|Graphics Group]], when they designed the very first fully textured [[CGI]] effect seen by the general public, the "[[Project Genesis|Genesis Demo]]", for {{film|2}}.
⚫
After his tenure on ''The Motion Picture'' he returned to PBS to resume work on ''Cosmos'', which he continued to do for the entire run of the series. Despite Sternbach's noticeable visual contributions to the ''Star Trek'' universe, his work has never been acknowledged with an [[Emmy Award]] nomination, yet he did receive one in 1981 for his work on the ''Cosmos'' episode, "The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean".
  
  +
  ⚫
After his tenure on ''The Motion Picture'' he returned to PBS to resume work on ''Cosmos'', which he continued to do for the entire run of the series. Despite Sternbach's noticeable visual contributions to the ''Star Trek'' universe, his work has never been acknowledged with an [[Emmy Award]] nomination, yet he did receive, and won, one in 1981 for his work on the ''Cosmos'' episode, "The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean".
   
 
Other motion picture projects he has worked on, predominantly as illustrator/graphic artist were, ''Rich and Famous'' (1981, uncredited), the documentary ''Future Flight'' (1987), ''The Last Starfighter'' (1983, for which he also story-boarded visual effects sequences and developed texture maps for CGI space scenes), and the remake of the science movie ''Solaris'' (2002)
  
Other motion picture projects he has worked on, predominantly as illustrator/graphic artist were, ''Rich and Famous'' (1981, uncredited), the documentary ''Future Flight'' (1987), ''The Last Starfighter'' (1983, for which he also story-boarded visual effects sequences and developed texture maps for CGI space scenes), and the remake of the science movie ''Solaris'' (2002)
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** {{type|McKinley}}
  
** {{type|McKinley}}
 
** [[MIDAS array]]
  
** [[MIDAS array]]
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</div>
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==Commercial availability==
  +
In May 2000, Rick Sternbach established on internet retail and auction site eBay his own webstore, appropriately called "'''[http://www.ebay.com/usr/intrep74656?_trksid=p2047675.l2559 intrep74656]'''" &ndash; a contraction of USS ''Voyager''{{'}}s class, and [[registry]] designations. Through his webstore, Sternbach intermittently sells commercialized reproduction editions of his (design) work as on-order-only publications, and which are not distributed to the general public through other channels. Most of his original design, and artwork, Sternbach has sold in various prior [[Profiles in History]] and [[Propworx]] [[Star Trek auctions|''Star Trek'' auctions]].
  +
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===Publications===
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:''note: this list is currently incomplete''
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<div class="appear">
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*[[Reference works]]
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**''[["Enterprise" Flight Manual|U.S.S. Enterprise NCC-1701 Constitution Class Refit Flight Control Familiarization Manual]]'', 2000s
 
</div>
  
</div>
   
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== ''Star Trek'' interviews ==
  
== ''Star Trek'' interviews ==
  +
<div class="appear">
⚫
* "Designing the ''Enterprise''", ''[[The Official Star Trek: The Next Generation Magazine, Issue 4]]'', April 1988, pp. 29-37, interviewed by Dennis Fischer
  
  +
*''Star Trek'' [[DVD]] and [[Blu-ray]] special features:
⚫
* "Rick Sternbach: Senior Illustrator", ''The Official Star Trek: The Next Generation Magazine'', issue 15, June 1991, pp. 14-19, interviewed by Bill Warren
  
  ⚫
**[[TNG Season 1 DVD]]-special feature, "The Making of a Legend" ("Artistic Design")
⚫
* ''[[Journey's End: The Saga of Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'' (1994)
  
−
* [[TNG Season 1 DVD]] special feature "The Making of a Legend" ("Artistic Design")
 +
**[[TNG Season 3 DVD]]-special feature, "Departmental Briefing Year Three" ("[[Greg Jein]]: Modelmaker"), interviewed on {{d|27|November|2001}}
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* [[TNG Season 3 DVD]] special feature "Departmental Briefing Year Three" ("[[Greg Jein]]: Modelmaker"), interviewed on {{d|27|November|2001}}
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**[[TNG Season 4 DVD]]-special feature, "Select Historical Data" ("A New Ship Debuts"), interviewed on 27 November 2001
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* [[TNG Season 4 DVD]] special feature "Select Historical Data" ("A New Ship Debuts"), interviewed on 27 November 2001
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**[[TNG Season 6 DVD]]-special feature, "Mission Overview Year Six" ("Resolving the Cliffhanger"), interviewed on 27 November 2001
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* [[TNG Season 6 DVD]] special feature "Mission Overview Year Six" ("Resolving the Cliffhanger"), interviewed on 27 November 2001
 +
**[[DS9 Season 1 DVD]]-special feature, "Deep Space Nine: A Bold Beginning" (interview from {{d|7|October|2002}})
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* [[DS9 Season 1 DVD]] special feature "Deep Space Nine: A Bold Beginning" (interview from {{d|7|October|2002}})
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**DS9 Season 1 DVD-special feature, "Deep Space Nine Sketchbook" (interview from 7 October 2002)
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* DS9 Season 1 DVD special feature "Deep Space Nine Sketchbook" (interview from 7 October 2002)
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**[[DS9 Season 2 DVD]]-special feature, "Deep Space Nine Sketchbook: Season Two" (interview from 7 October 2002)
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* [[DS9 Season 2 DVD]] special feature "Deep Space Nine Sketchbook: Season Two" (interview from 7 October 2002)
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**DS9 Season 2 DVD-special feature, "New Station, New Ships" (interview from 7 October 2002)
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* DS9 Season 2 DVD special feature "New Station, New Ships" (interview from 7 October 2002)
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**[[VOY Season 2 DVD]]-special feature, "Designing the USS ''Voyager''" (interview from {{d|6|October|2003}})
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* [[VOY Season 2 DVD]] special feature "Designing the USS ''Voyager''" (interview from {{d|6|October|2003}}, only on limited bonus-disc for region 1 DVD, standard for region 2)
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**[[VOY Season 5 DVD]]-special feature, "Ships of the [[Delta Quadrant]]" (interview from 6 October 2003}})
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* [[VOY Season 5 DVD]] special feature "Ships of the [[Delta Quadrant]]" (interview from {{d|6|October|2003}})
 +
**[[TNG Season 1 Blu-ray]]-special feature, "Stardate Revisited, Part 3: The Continuing Mission" (2012)
  ⚫
**[[TNG Season 4 Blu-ray]]-special feature, "In Conversation: The Star Trek Art Department" (2013)
⚫
* "Rick Sternbach: Designing the Future", ''[[Star Trek auctions#The official STAR TREK prop and costume auction|''The official STAR TREK prop and costume auction catalog]]'', 2010, pp. 28-29, interviewed by [[Alec Peters]]
  
  +
*Print publications:
⚫
* [[TNG Season 1 Blu-ray]] special feature, "Stardate Revisited, Part 3: The Continuing Mission" (2012)
  
  ⚫
**"Designing the ''Enterprise''", [[Dennis Fischer]], ''[[The Official Star Trek: The Next Generation Magazine, Issue 4]]'', April 1988, pp. 29-37
⚫
* [[TNG Season 4 Blu-ray]] special feature, "In Conversation: The Star Trek Art Department" (2013)
  
  ⚫
**"Rick Sternbach: Senior Illustrator", Bill Warren, ''The Official Star Trek: The Next Generation Magazine'', issue 15, June 1991, pp. 14-19
  ⚫
**"Designing the {{USS|Equinox}}", [[Larry Nemecek]], {{STTM|1|14}}, June 2000, pp. 18-21
  ⚫
**"Designing the [[Vor'cha class|Vor'cha]]", Larry Nemecek, {{STTM|1|15}}, July 2000, pp. 70-73
  ⚫
**"Rick Sternbach: Star Trek Illustrator", Larry Nemecek, {{STTM|2|6}}, October 2001, pp. 82-88
  ⚫
**"Teaching a legend to fly; Tell [[Montgomery Scott|Scotty]] What To Do!", {{STTM|2|8}}, December 2001, p. 112
  ⚫
**"Imagining the Future", {{STTM|2|12}}, Larry Nemecek, April 2002, pp. 42-49
  ⚫
**"Keeping the [[Type 15 shuttlepod|shuttlepod]] simple", Larry Nemecek, {{STTM|3|2}}, June 2002, p. 122.
  ⚫
**"Production Design: The Worlds of [[TNG Season 3|Season Three]]", Larry Nemecek, {{STTM|3|4}}, August 2002, pp. 42-47
  ⚫
**"Rick Sternbach: Designing the Future", [[Alec Peters]], ''[[The official STAR TREK prop and costume auction]] catalog'', 2010, pp. 28-29
  +
*[[Star Trek documentaries|''Star Trek'' documentaries]]:
  ⚫
**''[[Journey's End: The Saga of Star Trek: The Next Generation]]'' (1994)
  +
**''[[How William Shatner Changed the World]]'' (2005)
  +
</div>
   
−
==Further reading==
 +
== Appendices ==
  +
=== Further reading ===
⚫
* "Designing the {{USS|Equinox}}", {{STTM|1|14}}, June 2000, pp. 18-21
  
  +
*"''Ars Gratia Artis''", Chapter 8, ''[[The Making of Star Trek: The Motion Picture]]'', pp. 83-95, 1980
⚫
* "Designing the [[Vor'cha class|Vor'cha]]", {{STTM|1|15}}, July 2000, pp. 70-73
  
  +
*''[[The Making of Deep Space Nine]]'', 1994
⚫
* "Rick Sternbach: Star Trek Illustrator", {{STTM|2|6}}, October 2001, pp. 82-88
  
  +
*''[[The Art of Star Trek]]'', 1995
⚫
* "Teaching a legend to fly; Tell [[Montgomery Scott|Scotty]] What To Do!", {{STTM|2|8}}, December 2001, p. 112
  
  ⚫
*''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Continuing Mission]]'', 1997
⚫
* "Imagining the Future", {{STTM|2|12}}, April 2002, pp. 42-49
  
  +
*''[[Star Trek: Voyager - A Vision of the Future]]'', 1998
⚫
* "Keeping the [[Type 15 shuttlepod|shuttlepod]] simple", {{STTM|3|2}}, June 2002, p. 122.
  
⚫
* "Production Design: The Worlds of [[TNG Season 3|Season Three]]", {{STTM|3|4}}, August 2002, pp. 42-47
  
⚫
* ''[[Star Trek: The Next Generation - The Continuing Mission]]'', 1997
  
   
−
== External links ==
 +
=== External links ===
 
* [http://www.ricksternbach.com RickSternbach.com] - official site
  
* [http://www.ricksternbach.com RickSternbach.com] - official site
 
* {{Wikipedia}}
 
* {{Wikipedia}}
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* [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?Rick_Sternbach Rick Sternbach] at [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/index.cgi The Internet Speculative Fiction Database]
  
* [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/ea.cgi?Rick_Sternbach Rick Sternbach] at [http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/index.cgi The Internet Speculative Fiction Database]
 
* [http://www.trekplace.com/ricksternbach.html 2001 Interview with Rick Sternbach] at [http://www.trekplace.com/index.html TrekPlace.com]
  
* [http://www.trekplace.com/ricksternbach.html 2001 Interview with Rick Sternbach] at [http://www.trekplace.com/index.html TrekPlace.com]
−
* [http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/misc/sternbach-interview.htm 2001 Interview with Rick Sternbach] at [http://www.ex-astris-scientia.org/index.htm Ex Astris Scientia]
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* {{eas|misc/sternbach-interview.htm|2001 Rick Sternbach interview|external}}
−
* [http://trekweb.com/stories.php?aid=FWG5kgNctasKk 2002 Interview with Rick Sternbach] at [http://trekweb.com/ Trekweb.com]
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* {{TrekWeb.com|stories.php?aid{{=}}FWG5kgNctasKk|2002 Rick Sternbach interview|external}}
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* [http://www.ottens.co.uk/forgottentrek/ds9_4.php 2005 Interview with Rick Sternbach] at [http://www.ottens.co.uk/forgottentrek/ Forgotten Trek]
 +
* {{brokenlink|http://www.ottens.co.uk/forgottentrek/ds9_4.php|2005 Rick Sternbach interview}} at {{Forgotten Trek}} (archived version, no longer featured at new version)
−
* [http://www.ufpcroatia.com/clanak.php?subaction=showfull&id=1147993343&archive=&start_from=&ucat=1& 2006 Interview with Rick Sternbach] at [http://www.ufpcroatia.com/ UFP Croatia.com]
 +
* [http://www.ufpcroatia.com/clanak.php?subaction=showfull&id=1147993343&archive=&start_from=&ucat=1& 2006 Rick Sternbach interview] at [http://www.ufpcroatia.com/ UFP Croatia.com]
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* [http://www.ottens.co.uk/forgottentrek/tng_10.php 2007 Interview with Rick Sternbach] at [http://www.ottens.co.uk/forgottentrek/ Forgotten Trek]
 +
* {{brokenlink|http://www.ottens.co.uk/forgottentrek/tng_10.php|2007 Rick Sternbach interview}} at {{Forgotten Trek}} (archived version, no longer featured at new version)
−
* [http://tektrekgamer.wordpress.com/2007/03/03/rick-sternbach-senior-illustrator-for-star-trek-tng-ds9-and-voyager-speaks-to-sebrtcom/ 2007 Interview with Rick Sternbach] at [http://tektrekgamer.wordpress.com/ Seb's Web Archive]
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* [http://tektrekgamer.wordpress.com/2007/03/03/rick-sternbach-senior-illustrator-for-star-trek-tng-ds9-and-voyager-speaks-to-sebrtcom/ 2007 Rick Sternbach interview] at [http://tektrekgamer.wordpress.com/ Seb's Web Archive]
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* [http://startrekauction.blogspot.nl/2009/04/interview-with-star-trek-legend-rick.html 2009 Interview with Rick Sternbach, Part 1] and [http://startrekauction.blogspot.nl/2009/04/interview-with-star-trek-legend-rick_26.html Part 2] at [http://startrekauction.blogspot.nl/ Star Trek Prop, Costume & Auction Blog]
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* [http://startrekauction.blogspot.nl/2009/04/interview-with-star-trek-legend-rick.html 2009 Rick Sternbach interview, Part 1] and [http://startrekauction.blogspot.nl/2009/04/interview-with-star-trek-legend-rick_26.html Part 2] at [http://startrekauction.blogspot.nl/ Star Trek Prop, Costume & Auction Blog]
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* {{st.com|illustrator-designer-rick-sternbach-recalls-his-trek-days-part-1|2011 Rick Sternbach interview, Part 1|article}} and {{startrek.com|illustrator-designer-rick-sternbach-recalls-his-trek-days-part-2|Part 2|article}}
   
 
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Revision as of 16:37, 3 February 2016

Template:Realworld

For the in-universe article on the illustrator for Incredible Tales, please see Rick Sternbach (artist).

Richard "Rick" Michael Sternbach (born 6 July 1951; age 72) was the (senior) production illustrator/designer for Star Trek: The Motion Picture, Star Trek: The Next Generation, the first two seasons of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and Star Trek: Voyager. He was also the scenic artist for Star Trek Nemesis, providing designs for everything from the Argo shuttle to a Romulan Valdore-type sculpture. Sternbach's most recognized work by far, have been the designs of the PADD, Deep Space 9 and the USS Voyager.

Rick Sternbach was offered his, otherwise uncredited, illustrator position in the art department on Star Trek: The Motion Picture in April 1978. Working alongside such colleagues as Lee Cole and Mike Minor, he designed control panel layouts and signage for the starship sets, and for which he co-authored the updated internal instruction manual, "Enterprise" Flight Manual. Besides this, he also helped to create the animated asteroid wormhole sequence and helped to obtain source material from NASA/Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), that was used in the design of V'ger. [1] Sternbach was actually slated for an "Illustrator"'s credit, but for reasons unknown this did not come to fruition. (The Making of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, p. 218)

Recalling how he was hired for the television franchise, Rick Sternbach has reminisced, "The story I usually tell is that late in 1986, when Paramount announced TNG, I heard it over the radio while driving on the freeway, pulled off to a pay phone, and talked to Susan Sackett, Gene's assistant, all within about 25 seconds. I had a few meetings with Bob Justman, Gene, Dorothy Fontana, and David Gerrold, left my portfolio, and was officially hired on in January of 1987. Andy Probert and I were the first two artists brought in, even before an art director, and for the first few months we worked up a foamcore model of the bridge and hundreds of sketches of all the things a good Star Trek production should have. We initially worked up generic items, but eventually we got into story-specific sets and props for "Encounter at Farpoint"." [2] For the television shows, Rick Sternbach, after he succeeded Probert as senior illustrator when the latter left the franchise upon the conclusion of The Next Generation' first season, has designed a multitude of starships and space stations. He also was responsible for the design of hundreds of props and set pieces, including the mural painting of the Enterprise-D in Picard's ready room, which was painted by Probert. He also developed weaponry, PADDs, tricorders and communicators for Starfleet, Klingon, Romulan, Cardassian, Bajoran, Kazon, Ferengi, and other races. As a big fan of Japanese animation, anime references are often secretly placed in his designs, notably "the Egg", a design borrowed from the Dirty Pair.

Together with Michael Okuda, he served as a technical consultant to the script staff, maintaining technical and chronological continuity and inventing scientific terms and technobabble, resulting in internal documents as Star Trek: The Next Generation Writers' Technical Manual and Star Trek: Voyager Technical Manual. In 1980 he created several illustrations for the Star Trek Spaceflight Chronology by Stanley and Fred Goldstein. He has also co-written the Star Trek: The Next Generation Technical Manual, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Technical Manual, Star Trek: The Next Generation USS Enterprise NCC-1701-D Blueprints as well as the "Starfleet Technical Database" articles for Star Trek: The Magazine.

Sternbach started out making his designs the traditional way, that is in paper and pencil, but acquired skills in computer generated imagery (CGI) modeling as well (skills he picked up while working in 1983 on the science fiction movie The Last Starfighter), turning in design concepts at a later stage both in paper and pencil and rudimentary CGI models. (Star Trek: The Magazine Volume 3, Issue 12, pp. 94-97) Sternbach constructed his CGI model concepts in the Macromedia Extreme 3D software initially, before switching over to Autodesk Maya and unlike the visual effects houses who ultimately only utilized the LightWave 3D exclusively for the live-action production CGI models. As a result, Sternbach's CGI builds were never intended to serve otherwise than as concepts only, though he, "(...)found that putting together a model with this basic level of detail, minus the textures, got all the main design elements across, and I could even email the files to the CG facilities so they could do their magic." [3]

He has been critical of the Production Design of the 2009 film Star Trek, specifically that of the design of the USS Enterprise. He criticized the apparent lack of line of sight for the nacelles to open space, proportions of various sections, and an overall lack of knowledge of how Star Trek technology works. "Perhaps the designers didn't know exactly how the different hardware bits worked". [4]

While no longer working on Star Trek, Sternbach continues to create futuristic designs for sci-fi productions. He also actively maintained contact with the Star Trek fan-base through Internet blogs like "Trekbbs" and more recently the "DrexFiles(X)" by answering questions and explaining his thought processes on his work for Star Trek. Currently, Sternbach has opted to maintain contact with the fan-base through his personal Facebook-page.

However, in November 2014 Sternbach again returned to the Star Trek franchise when he was invited to become a part as consultant of a team of experts – including a host of former Star Trek alumni – to oversee a new restoration of the original eleven-foot Enterprise studio model, residing at the Smithsonian's National Air and Space Museum (NASM), for its 50th anniversary. [5] Having accepted the prestigious assignment, Starnbach was flown in in May 2015 for the team's first work meeting on 13 May. [6]

Career outside Star Trek

An Connecticut native, Rick Sternbach enrolled in that state's university in 1972 with an art major, but switching after a couple of years to marine biology. [7] Nevertheless, he became a book and magazine illustrator upon graduation, among others for the Galaxy Science Fiction and Analog magazines, having for example provided the cover and interior art for Starlog Press' Future Life issue 17 of 1980. During this time he helped found the Association of Science Fiction and Fantasy Artists (ASFA), an organization which aim it was to tender legal advice to science fiction and fantasy artists on contracts and copyrights.

Inspired by artist Ralph McQuarrie's example, who left the aerospace industry to work for George Lucas on Star Wars, Sternbach made the decision as well to move to California in order to seek illustration work in the motion picture industry. After some work for Disney and PBS, the latter of which he did preliminary work for on Carl Sagan's television series Cosmos, he was offered the position in the art department for The Motion Picture. Around the same time he had worked for JPL, where he collaborated with Charley Kohlhase and Jim Blinn on the real world Voyager 1 Jupiter flyby movie, creating textures for the Galilean satellites. That flyby movie became the primary inspiration source for Alvy Ray Smith (at the time a co-worker of Sternbach at JPL) and Loren Carpenter at the Graphics Group, when they designed the very first fully textured CGI effect seen by the general public, the "Genesis Demo", for Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan.

After his tenure on The Motion Picture he returned to PBS to resume work on Cosmos, which he continued to do for the entire run of the series. Despite Sternbach's noticeable visual contributions to the Star Trek universe, his work has never been acknowledged with an Emmy Award nomination, yet he did receive, and won, one in 1981 for his work on the Cosmos episode, "The Shores of the Cosmic Ocean".

Other motion picture projects he has worked on, predominantly as illustrator/graphic artist were, Rich and Famous (1981, uncredited), the documentary Future Flight (1987), The Last Starfighter (1983, for which he also story-boarded visual effects sequences and developed texture maps for CGI space scenes), and the remake of the science movie Solaris (2002)

Outside his Emmy Award, Rick Sternbach's illustration work in the 1970s has garnered him two consecutive Hugo Awards for "Best Professional Artist" in 1977 and 1978. Considered by the usenet newsgroup sci.space.history as a leading expert on the various paint schemes used on the Saturn V booster, Sternbach has until recently, through his official website, "Space Model Systems", sold accurate decals for model kits of the Saturn V, as well as the Apollo Command Module.

Starship and Space Station designs for Star Trek

Rick Sternbach's designs for several new studio models, including:

Commercial availability

In May 2000, Rick Sternbach established on internet retail and auction site eBay his own webstore, appropriately called "intrep74656" – a contraction of USS Voyager's class, and registry designations. Through his webstore, Sternbach intermittently sells commercialized reproduction editions of his (design) work as on-order-only publications, and which are not distributed to the general public through other channels. Most of his original design, and artwork, Sternbach has sold in various prior Profiles in History and Propworx Star Trek auctions.

Publications

note: this list is currently incomplete

Star Trek credits

Bibliography

Star Trek interviews

Appendices

Further reading

External links

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