$100,000 an episode, even in 1978/'79/'80 when Battlestar Galactica and Galactica 1980 were on television, was not a lot of money relative to the cost of shooting. It may have been the most ever for a television show at that time, but you have to consider what other shows were on prime time in 1978-80: Mork & Mindy, Three's Company, WKRP in Cincinnati, Fantasy Island, Happy Days, Laverne & Shirley, Taxi, Diff'rent Strokes, CHiPS, the Love Boat, Dallas, etc. How many of those shows had high production expenses? With Three's Company, 95% of the show was shot in the the kids' apartment, or the Ropers'/Furley's apartment, with the occasional shot at the "Regal Beagle". Dallas? Southfork Ranch was built in 1970, so there was no production expense for building it, just a contract which allowed them to use the residence for external shots. Diff'rent Strokes? Most of the show existed in Phillip Drummond's house. The other shows I listed had an apartment, a house, or a squad room or something similar where much of principle shooting took place. Battlestar Galactica was not like that. Models had to be made. Effects had to be shot. Life size replicas of the vipers had to be created. Glen A. Larson and his production team had to create a whole new world far more advanced than anything ever shown on television before, including the original Star Trek. If you watch the extra disc that comes with the Star Wars original trilogy set, it shows in great detail how George Lucas and his special effects team had to create what they needed to shoot the movie on the fly. The original release for Star Wars was pushed back substantially because though principle shooting had all but been completed, the special effects team had only come up with one or two shots that Lucas considered even acceptable. Battlestar Galactica was using the same technology. It was new, and very expensive.
As Samclyde2 alluded, Battlestar had one of the best special effects artists to ever work in Hollywood in John Dykstra. However, as talented as he was back then (and still is), he had to make sacrifices, hence the reuse of shots in battle sequences that the original poster alluded to. And if you know anything about the original Battlestar Galactica series, you already know that the episodes were shot at a breakneck pace. The actors would get the script or rewrites the same day as the shoot, and the episodes would be on air in a couple of days. To quote Chip Douglas' review of Remembering Battlestar Galactica:
We learn that Glen Larson originally intended Battlestar Galactica as a mini-series and did not want to rush into production, but that's exactly what ABC ordered them to do as soon as the heavily hyped tree hour pilot episode's ratings were in. So during the production of the 24 episode season, rewrites were arriving every day (sometimes after the previous version had already been shot), different episodes were being shot at the same time and (although this goes unmentioned) guest stars like Anne Lockhart (Sheba) became part of the regular cast while others like Maren Jensen (Athena) were unceremoniously phased out. Richard Hatch (Apollo), who is clearly the most knowledgeable and committed cast member erroneously mentions that John Dykstra did the effects for the entire series while in fact he only worked on the pilot and the next four episodes (though it's true that these shots were reused up until the final episode). Dirk Benedict (Starbuck) and Herb Jefferson Jr. (Boomer) join Hatch in explaining the difficulties of filming scenes in the Viper cockpits, having to line up their dialog to the back projection of Dykstra's effects work.
It sounds to me like the original poster is holding
Galactica to an impossible standard. Why did
Star Trek: The Next Generation, with a similar budget looks "so much better" in your opinion just ten years later? I'll use an analogy here. How much do you pay for the internet today? How much speed do you get for that money? If you were to go back 10 years, you'd likely spend about the same amount for internet service. But instead of the spectacular connection speed that you get today, you'd get dialup. Well, special effects are much the same.
Star Trek: the Next Generation benefited from a decade's worth of special effects development, including CGI (which
TNG did use). Instead of creating technology for the first time, they were using established procedures, and machines. Production costs would have been lower comparatively for that show.
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guycorhuo
9 years ago
Brilliant!!! One of the best explained answers in Imdb threads ever. Thnx for the references also.
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ScottM2753
9 years ago
As a VFX Artist who has struggled with trying to explain to others exactly what we do, and at times how difficult it is to do, and then to have your name nowhere in the credits due to studio/productions agreements I salute you for this well thought out and accurate explanation! Thank you!
I wanted to be a stand-up comedian, but I prefer sitting...
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Psilio
9 years ago
I can't believe I've forgotten to say thank you for this excellent reply until now. I'm very sorry for the delay, and thanks so much again for taking the time to post this excellent and clarifying reply!
What we do in life echoes in eternity Russell Crowe as General Maximus in Gladiator (2000)
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