ALL SCI-FI

[Bud Brewster]

[orzel-w]

[orzel-w]

I would take your "Klaatuized" design one degree further, Bud.


_________________
...or not...

WayneO
-----------

[Bud Brewster]

________________________________

Sweet! A nice variation on my altered version!

I actually pictured the area that you gave the slope to as being a bit recessed below the visible outer lip and the inner boundary, rather than level with it — like this.



So the slope is a significant and interesting variation.

I kind of miss the additional layer you removed to make the slope work, so it's hard to like either one more than the other — which is fine, 'cause we've got both!

Here's a side-by-side (sort of) comparison.





_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[orzel-w]

[Bud Brewster]

________________________________

Hey, that's funny! I had the same thought.

But that might be good thing! Water can be separated into hydrogen (a highly efficient fuel source) and oxygen (which is also very useful).

So, the saucers have a built-in cistern!

Damn, I'm really good at this science stuff!
_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Bud Brewster]

________________________________

My God, these alien saucers are landing all over the place!




Here's a better look at this newest version of my Invaders saucer re-design.



Meanwhile, the Air Force is preparing to use captured saucers with enhanced weaponry in the coming battle.



_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Randy]

[Robert (Butch) Day]

I'd be more concerned when the Cups, Creamers, Sugar Bowl, Tea Pot and Tray decide to join the Saucers!
_________________
Common Sense ISN'T Common

[Bud Brewster]

________________________________

And how, you may ask, did I make the masterpiece above? Well, I'll tell ya!

I took this picture —





— and expanded it with a reversed duplicate —





— then I painted out the planes and modified both the clouds and the taxiway so they wouldn't be just mirror images of each side —





— and then I added the saucers and painted the shadows under them.





Finally I decided to trim the left side to make the picture less wide so that it could fill the display a bit more, vertically.





But I realized that it was still so wide, relative to it's height, that it needed a bit more sky. So, I painted that in, too!





Oh, I forgot to mention that I made the saucer using this.





_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Bud Brewster]

________________________________

Here's a nice video in which Roy Thinnes talks about fans of the show and how nice they've been to him.

________________________________

__The Invaders Roy Thinnes talks about 67th Birthday Party


_____________
_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[orzel-w]

Okay, I checked out the "Beachhead" pilot and instantly (that's really quickly) recognized the filming location. The town of Kinney in that episode was actually Temecula, CA, the town that shares city limits with the town where I live.

Temecula was used for depictions of small, remote towns and for period pieces up until the later 1970s, when it began to outgrow its small quaintness. (For example, it was used about seven years after this episode of The Invaders in Big Bad Mama (1974 - Angie Dickinson, William Shatner, Tom Skerritt), a movie influenced by the success of Bonnie and Clyde.)

I cracked open Google Maps to grab some quick shots of scenes from this Invaders episode to show how the town looks now. Google uses a wide angle lens for their street views, so everything in the distance is going to appear farther away than in the TV images. The opening shots of David Vincent arriving in Kinney, followed by a view from Google Maps in approximately the same location (you can't be too choosy with Google Maps), looking in the same general direction...





Some of the buildings seen in the episode are still recognizable. One landmark for orientation is the two-story boxy building identified as "The Bank" in the modern photos. It's seen on the far right-hand corner in the two images above. It was originally built as a bank, but is now a restaurant. The bank vault is still in there.







Above: The big brown wood-clad building above with the white side wall now stands where the old brick gas station was. I included The Bank in the Google image for reference.





Above: Reverse angle as David parks his car. The street going up the hill behind him is the street he supposedly drove into town on from the main highway (I caught the image when a semi with a white cab and gray trailer was passing by). That street actually dead ended without connecting to the highway. Pardon the delivery trucks in the Google image.



Above: Here's where the director pulled a switcheroo. David is looking around for the local residents. He goes to the middle of the main intersection (The Bank on the left) and looks down the street. Point-of-view shot showing that he sees a hotel down thataway...



Now go back to the close-up of David and notice the white building out of focus in the distance just over his shoulder. That's the actual location of the hotel. Now the Google views... In the close-up of David, he would have been standing about where the street lamp and stop sign are.



As for the hotel, some things don't change much!



The bridge below seen in the episode has been completely replaced. This was a view looking back toward "downtown".





This last TV image is a three-frame panorama of the end of the episode when David is leaving town. The white guard rail of the bridge from the shot above is barely visible over the rear deck of David's car. The new bridge can also be seen in the Google image.




_________________
...or not...

WayneO
-----------

[Bud Brewster]

________________________________

Wayne, what a magnificent post! Thanks for sharing all this with us.
_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)

[Pow]

The Invaders Trivia } The show debuted on January 10,1967.

It was on opposite The Red Skelton Hour (CBS), the first half hour of The NBC Tuesday Night Movie.

So TI wasn't given much of a chance to succeed against the competition.

Uber television producer Quinn Martin was not that excited about his Invaders series. He felt it was too close to his other show The Fugitive.

Famed writer Harlan Ellison almost wrote for the show. Ellison got involved in a huge argument with QM's assistant, Adrian Samish, & ended up leaping over a table & socking Samish.

Pity, Harlan is a brilliant writer & would have contributed top-notch scripts for the series.

The show's creator, Larry Cohen, came up with the idea of the aliens having an extended finger as a subtle commentary about 1960s gays in Hollywood.

Almost no one working on the series felt it was a good idea & found the concept silly.

As with many television shows from the 60s & 70s The Invaders never created a story bible for the series. That lead to some episodes taking a long time to shoot due to halting the show in order to have lengthy story conferences in order to resolve problems regarding the alien's saucer capabilities, biological background, alien tech.

The producers wanted the star of the show, Roy Thinnes, to make his David Vincent character more likable & warmer for the viewing audience.

Thinnes felt that his angry man approach was more realistic.

Roy's reasoning was that Vincent was forced out of his successful career (his partner was killed by the aliens in the pilot) in order to stop the threat of the alien invasion.
People treated him as a nutcase, his life was in danger, he was seeing humans killed by the aliens, he was unsure if it was too late to defeat the invaders.

Roy did not think that Vincent would be Mr.Rogers after suffering all of those ongoing threats & challenges.

Lynn Loring, Roy's real life wife, was a guest star on the episode ''Panic."

Art director George Chan created the alien saucer & regeneration chambers along with many other alien gadgets.

Transporting the huge spaceship to various locales was a headache for the production staff.

They were required to get permits whenever they went anyplace off the studio back lot.

Weather factors like rain & mud made things difficult. People did not want the film crew shooting near them. And it took the crew time to travel, set up the saucer, load it back on to the truck & go back to the studio.

Time is a precious commodity for a television show.

According to QM productions, they received more calls from the public over TI than any other QM TV series.

[Bud Brewster]

________________________________

Pow, that is one terrific post!

I didn't know 99% of the info you provided, even though I'm a big fan of the series and I own the box set. Thanks for sharing it with us.
_________________
____________
Is there no man on Earth who has the wisdom and innocence of a child?
~ The Space Children (1958)