I've screenshotted every actual switch, dial and lever that's been clearly featured on the 13th Doctor's console so far, but it's still down to them filming close-up shots in the end.

Thats a nice shot...

Its still a terrible Console room though

I feel the same way about this as I do about the New Paradigm Dalek. Nice details but overall too much mixing and just doesn't work for me.

It would be nice if whoever the new set designer is would add some controls - any would do!!!

It's been my gripe from day one, I've got no issue with the look of the room or the console, just the lack of controls, there needs to be a lot more switches, buttons, dials and knobs

BioDoctor900

I read / saw something somewhere that the idea was for it to be more intuitive, Generating controls as and when needed to do specific jobs... Which I like (A bit like the way the same button got used basically always for everything a few times and the tardis must have interpreted what was trying to be done and do that), however the in-story narrative and practical realisation of the concept do not clearly convey the idea... Maybe better when it returns...

To be honest, I rather like this console... Especially the fact that unlike the 9/10th console and smith/Capaldi console, which had lots of little switches, this console is mainly large levers and buttons with a few small smith he's thrown on... and I mean come on, who wouldn't want a TARDIS console that makes custard creams? Also someone needs to figure ou how make a custard cream dispenser. 

Quote from: fridaysgoldfish on May 20, 2019, 04:33 pmGenerating controls as and when needed to do specific jobs...

That's a creative way of covering the whole (that button wasn't there last week) continuity issue of a prop evolving to meet the story needs.   I'm not convinced by it, personally, but they get points for effort.

My least favourite console room, really don't like the crystals and console.

Hey quit with the opinions and go find some imagery - thats what this thread is about

Quote from: davidnagel on May 23, 2019, 10:38 pm
Hey quit with the opinions and go find some imagery - thats what this thread is about

A valid point, for some topics... but in this case, especially, it's likely more easily said than done, I'm afraid.

Certainly, sticking with "just the facts" ( or pictures ) would be preferred if this were an online discussion about rigorous technical issues concerning the practical form and functional design of one commercial product or another. Or, for that matter, if this happened to be a website dedicated to, say, posting pictures of purchasing opportunities for real estate... with all sorts of factual details about houses or apartments that I, at least, can no longer ( ... or never could... ) afford. You either like it or you don't. You either buy it or you don't ( or can't ). And nevermind about the people who used to live there... you may not want to know.

However, although many if not most of the details that we actually need to be concerned with, here, and in this particular case, are technical in nature and are also matters of applying strict design principles, the fact remains that the end product being considered is nothing short of being pure art. Moreover, it's a work of art that both supports and also stands on the shoulders of a much larger collective performance piece that has been going on for more than fifty years, now.

And it's hard not to have opinions about art... especially with such works as these.

But, well... I would also agree, then, that if one is going to say something that is opinionated, then they should provide sufficient descriptive and/or pictorial evidence... so that all the rest of us can all hopefully see that same something.

If you say something, then let us see something!

Ok, then!... I'm currently saying... er... something... at least. And I do have quite a few pics to post. So, I will promise to get around to the latter, in just a little bit. But, first... just a few more opinions:

Quote from: fivefingeredstyre on May 19, 2019, 01:17 pm
Its still a terrible Console room though

To be honest, it's not exactly my "favorite", either, in the terms of what I think should be a practical and functional layout for the construction of an advanced timeship constructed by an alien race.

But... it could be.

First of all, obviously the series has taken a turn into a new direction. Nothing wrong with that... just so long as the point of the whole journey remains the same. Consequently, the Production Design team ( and Chibnall ) may have assumed that this should reflected in the overall look-and-feel of the set design. This is a perfectly reasonable assumption... so the question, then, is: did they succeed? I believe that, at the very least in concept, they did... and rather brilliantly, as well. Why?

Well... one of the small problems with most of the past TARDIS interior room sets was referenced by "Bill", in the Series Ten episode "The Pilot", when she said it was like:

"a kitchen! A really posh kitchen!"




                                                                       " A what!?"

---------------------------------------- And now, for a dangerously tangential aside ---------------------------------------

... Capaldi really should have been accommodated for doing a full season in the missing year between Series 9 & 10. The BBC would be  wise, then, to make up for this grievous error by giving him the opportunity to do what he's also obviously very good at doing: Giving lectures and speeches. Say, by hosting a brand new science series created as a reboot of Jacob Bronowski's "The Ascent of Man" series from 1974. Why not? After all, we reintroduced Carl Sagan's "Cosmos" series, with Neil Degrasse-Tyson. So there is no reason not to do the same thing for Bronowski. Especially given the fact that we now have the very definitions of "knowledge" and/or "certainty" under siege... again.

-------------------Aside Over! You may now resume reading Incoherently Opinionated Ramblings! ----------------------


Meaning that, for an artifact from a entirely-alien-highly-advanced-and-very-old-civilization, the TARDIS interior has typically looked just a little bit too Terrestrial. And, yes, that does include the creaking junk-littered Under-the-Sea "coral" console room of Eccleston/Tennent, as well as Smith's Madcap Funhouse TARDIS. The much more organized Smith/Capaldi console rooms were but one step in the right direction... but were unfortunately also two steps back towards making it look even more Terrestrial again.
   
Then given our current Doctor's possibly slightly reoriented perspectives relative to all of the rest of Space and Time, what was Arwel Wyn Jones to do? There was really nothing else to do except to try and come up with something as different as possible...and yet have it still be oh-so-familiar. An environment which acknowledges that "The Doctor" is supposed to be, after all, an alien entity who only looks human. So although physical/organic forms-and-functions may seemingly need to fit together in certain ways, the truth of such conditions is that life is not always going to behave according to our expectations. Not just exactly so... and certainly not conforming to the way that you might only simply want it to be. Well, maybe it's just like that... in all except a few of the possibly most important ways. Such as, according to what "Doc" Emmett Brown is once supposed to have said:

"... that other Great Mystery of the Universe!... Women!"  

Consequently, a ( finally! ) more alien and organic setting in which to define the current Doctor/TARDIS relationship would seem appropriate as well as obvious. On both accounts it seems to me that Jones has succeeded. Why? What's so great about a shadowy and ill-lit space whose full size and shape can't really be made out, except for the shafts of apparent sunlight coming from somewhere above? Possibly the long evolutionary conditioning of humans as creatures of open savannas whose subsequent moves North necessitated seeking shelter in caves. The deep and dark environments of those places must have seemed far more alien to them than any comparable experiences of today's world. So it would seem that we are genetically predisposed to seek out and explore such places. Else why would spelunkers deliberately risk getting pinned on the head by falling stalactites just for the thrill of discovery?

Well anyway, the place certainly looks like an otherworldly cavern... but organic? There's no "coral", and certainly there's nothing like squishy and sticky Zygon technology. There's just a lot of hexagonal lattices and layered walls. And there's crystals, of course. Got to have big crystals in a place like that! Except that crystals are just shinier and prettier rocks... so it would then seem to depend on what is meant by "organic".

Now, I know that Jones tried to explain it away as fractal patterns in forest tree canopies, or something very nice and green-new-deally like that. And that's all fine... it sounds very simple and pleasant, and not nerdily threatening in any harmful kind of way. In all probability, he simply may not have wanted to try and have to explain his reasons for the cost over-runs to the BBC accountants.

I, on the other hand, have to admit that I very much enjoy trying to understand these constructs in terms of what may have motivated ( and I seem to be imagining that I see a complex series of motivations, here... so explaining this may take a few posts ) the designers to come up with them in the first place. Because what motivates such projects is integral to understanding how they were made. Such an approach possibly fosters a greater appreciation for the outcomes, and therefore a greater understanding of the processes involved, regardless of whether one actually "likes" them or not. And, thus, which also allows credit to be given when it is justly and rightfully due.  

So, what I mean by "organic" is this... take a look at the interior layered wall pattern:





Now, let's take a brief course in Organic Chemistry by considering the following illustrations which show the basic structures of some common carbon-based substances:





Look familiar, don't they?

These are typical of the representational diagrams used in the scientific literature to illustrate a large class of chemical compounds know as Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons ( "PAHs", for short ). And they are indeed just about as organic, in terms of chemistry, as you can get. The problem is that, being largely petroleum derived ( and also what you get when you over-cook your hamburger on the grill ), most of these compounds are also very toxic and carcinogenic. Therefore they're not really a very friendly choice of patterns to put up on your wall-paper.

But there is one type of PAH that has some very interesting properties, and it can be represented as follows:





This stuff is called Graphene, and it's sort of like the ultimate PAH... pure molecular sheets of carbon atoms with edges of indefinite length. Chief among it's potential uses are a whole spectrum of structural applications, given that it is hundreds of times stronger than steel. A sort of Super Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbon, or *PAH!*, if you will. And, therefore, it's obviously the kind of stuff you would want to build your own indestructible timeship out of.

You've got to hand it to her... the old girl knows what she's doing! And, apparently, so did the Production Design crew.

 
------------------------------------------------------------------

... hmm...

... okay... so......

... All Together, Now! :

SU-per Poly-cyclic Aro-matic Hydro-carbon!
IF you say it LOUD enough you'll sound quite... er... Gallifrey-0n!

Ah ha! ha!... um...

Well, anyway... let me... start off, this time, with maybe a few more comments about the overall design... then add just a dash and a sprinkling of my usual presumptive speculation. So... finally, then, we can get on with the real business of identifying components. And, lastly... but even more importantly... initiate the compilation of an extrapolation to the current design into a community wish list for suggesting some minor changes and subtle refinements ( the sorts of little finishing touches that can turn a basically good idea into a really great one ) for when the series ( hopefully ) returns in... what?... 2020?!

After all, the BBC... or someone... does watch these forums in order to gauge audience reactions and ideas, don't they? Sure they do!... or, hopefully they do... because, otherwise, I am beginning to get the sinking feeling that I've likely got nothing else to really look forward to, happening-wise... in that year.

Quote from: danielc on May 23, 2019, 02:40 pm
My least favourite console room, really don't like the crystals and console.

Well... so what I'm at least hoping to do, here, is to try and offer an argument ( continuing from the last post ) that there really seems to have been a lot of thought that went into this console room, such that there is consequently a whole lot of potential to be found in it's current basic design. Though, I have to say that I was also somewhat disappointed by it's appearance... initially. First of all, as I think had been made clear over in my own build-thread, awhile back, I have nothing against the use of big crystal formations in the console room. Even for constructing the larger-part of ( though, perhaps, not the entirety of ) the central column. For me, the problem, specifically, was that they didn't exactly match what we had seen in some of the concept-art renderings, as were posted earlier in this thread:





In these we can see the use of, what appears to be, a more luminous and amber-like material ( as opposed to the rather coarse, opaque, and granular-looking stuff that resulted ) that is not entirely unlike that of the artificially-created-and-suspended-animation-inducing "Amber" of the Fox Network "Fringe" series, from a few years back:





And then there is natural amber... known, of course, for trapping ancient biting bugs ( prehistoric fleas, ticks, and mosquitoes ) that can be used to bring long extinct dinosaurs back to life. Sure. Sure they can.




So that, alone, was enough to give the impression ( for me, at least ) that perhaps there might have been some sort of a very clever story brewing up around such a layout. Because, obviously, there is one particularly notable set of associations dealing with large crystals inside of expansive cave-like structures, and those are concerned with the "Crystal Cave of Merlin" ( the Mary Stewart novels, as well as the myriad number of other variants on the legend ). At the very least, an adaptation of this theme towards designing the console room is definitely not a bad idea to start out with. Also, if you're familiar with the "Fringe-Amber" scenario, or have only heard of what actual amber does to trapped insects and other specimens, then the next question ( at least possibly... given the apparent interest in dressing the TARDIS up in a manner that might be required for the occasion ) could be:
 
Who is "trapped" inside the TARDIS's crystalline caverns?
 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
And now, a pictorial bit about caves and crystal cave structures!



An actual crystal cave located at the Naica Mines in Mexico's Chihuahua Desert . And also what I would like to see used as a basic template for the TARDIS's current deep interior infrastructure.



Wouldn't a nice, cool, colorful, and mysterious interior grotto be preferable to the usual plain-old TARDIS Olympic-sized swimming pool? Of course it would! Because no man-made building or architectural set-design can compare to them!



Even more eerie and alien are ice-caves. In places like this, the sub-zero temperature walls cause water-vapor to condense directly into solid, forming clusters of hexagonal ice-crystals, such as in the picture below:
 


So... does this look familiar?



How about now?

-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Well, then, we do already know at least part of the answer to the question above. And it was first illustrated, beautifully, by Wonderwig ( partially shown below ), over at the DeviantArt site, a long while back. So... I've also basically been waiting for a continuation of that story since having first viewed Matt Smith's "The Doctor's Wife"  episode, which has been... what?... oh, six or seven years ago, now?





Unfortunately, the current muted appearance of the crystal column and the "flying" buttress supports ( since my having seen them all moving together, the whole affair now reminds me, every time, of the vicious crystal-shard-cave-creatures from the "Dungeon Siege" games ) has somehow made them seem less important in terms of being any sort of a central element to such a story.

On the other hand, we do have till at least 2020... and there are a few of the design elements that do, nevertheless, give one hope. Such as these details from the console:




Also, there is this:




And, finally, this:




What seems to be most apparent, in these and other instances, is the attention-to-detail. They had taken the trouble to have custom faceplates made up for the dial-box, and even the gauges, which clearly matches the ( presumably Gallifreyan ) script as seen on the wall-displays. So what this sort of finessing says (... again, to me, at least... please feel free to disagree! ) is that they may actually have initially had some sort of an overall, purposeful, "Grand Vision", or a major story arc in mind, requiring an appropriate stage to set it up on.

But... as with the gap between the rich-and-spoiled and the poor-but-resourceful, so there also exists the bottomless chasm between the all-business-mind and the artist's vision. So unfortunately, with the likely time and budgetary restrictions placed by the BBC upon the Production Design Team, circumstances would've been bound to have taken a toll on the final product. Thus, clearly leaving the dramatic vision of an almost "magically" powerful crystalline console ( albeit one quirkily controlled by anachronistic pneumatic valve logic ) and it's equally imposing interior environment at least partially unfulfilled.

The project would therefore have unavoidably appeared to us to be less-than-it-could-have-been... in a state of being ( as has been noted above ) an open-design, "generating controls as and when needed to do specific jobs...", as an unending-work-In-progress, or simply unfinished. I think that there are, perhaps, just a few folks, here, who can probably empathize with those latter sorts of situations, aren't there?

Well... hopefully, then... perhaps a bit more hopefully if given the support of our community... by the next season, the full extent of the Grand Vision will have been given a better chance for full materialization... and we will have the opportunity to witness the continuation of an Epic TARDIS Tale!

---------------------------------------------

I appreciate the depth of this argument, and it certainly makes me consider aspects of the new set I hadn't considered before. But at the same time the intent behind the current crystal design is rather let down by the execution, which just looks like a pastiche on the coral console room to me. Consider: both are dome-shaped. Both have inexplicable space-filling buttresses. Both have similar tiered flooring. Both have consoles towards the more impractical end of the usability spectrum. The coral room had warm orange lighting on the walls and cool blue on the console; the crystal room just inverts this, with warm orange lighting on the console and cool blue on the walls. It feels lazy.

Then again, maybe it's just too many thematic echoes of the coral set, which I didn't like in the first place. If it looked more classically TARDIS-y - white walls and roundels, for example - I'd be all over that, and that's hardly an original concept either

I've rewatched some of Series 11 but the interior seems to be both too dark and too light at the same time for me to get truly acquainted and orientated.