Each standard issue included a (roughly) six to ten inch-long (150 to 240 mm-long) hand-painted [2]scaled replica of a starship from the Star Trek: Discovery series. Cast in ABS and die-cast metal, a number of starship designs have been reproduced here (as miniatures) for the first time by any manufacturer. Available separately, larger Special Edition starship models, metallic resin dedication plaques, dedicated magazine binders, and a figurine have been produced. Gift premiums have also been released to subscribers.
Ben Robinson, the project's senior manager, and his team, under the supervision of John Ainsworth, utilized the original CGIstudio models provided by Pixomondo for reference, once they had been approved by CBS Studios and Secret Hideout, the show's primary production companies, and the visual effects (|VFX) team. [13][14][15][16]
Robinson and Ainsworth had their longtime Official Starships Collection associate Fabio Passaro convert these models into LightWave 3D, Eaglemoss' software package of choice, as the production-used models were created in Autodesk Maya and had to be re-texturized, rescaled, and modified for 3D printing. Passaro then converts these 3D models into CAD files. [17][18][3]
At the Holinail Group, Eaglemoss' manufacturing partner in China, [19] these files were converted into the CAD format used by the factory for tooling masters creation. Two-dimensional renders of the ships were frequently used for the publication's illustrations by its editors in the UK, and each sixteen-page A5 format magazine (measuring 168 × 217 mm, [4] half the size of those of the preceding Official Starships Collection) fitted within the printed cardboard boxes that the models are presented in.
The magazines were co-authored and co-edited by Ben Robinson, Marcus Riley, and Matt McAllister. Production stills, concept art, and newly-created orthographic views were utilized extensively, and new interviews with DIS starship designers including William Budge, Goran Delic, Ryan Dening, JD Dickenson, John Eaves, Sam Michlap, Thomas Pringle, and Scott Schneider were conducted.
Transition to the Star Trek Universe: The Official Starships Collection
In July 2020, the company announced that this product line (and subscriptions) would be suspended after the release of (numbered) issue 33, due to production delays with the third season of the show and the resulting lack of new CG assets.
In October 2020, Eaglemoss further reported that it had plans to release more starship models from DIS in a future starships line, combined with ships from Star Trek: Picard and Star Trek: Strange New Worlds.
Until July 2022, larger "XL Edition" models featuring starships from Discovery continued to be released within the originating Star Trek: The Official Starships Collection. In 2018, the Discovery version of the USS Enterprise actually debuted in that side collection as the very first ship from the new show.
The USS Glenn, the line's sole convention-exclusive registry variant model, was produced in a limited edition of 500 units (worldwide)[16] and was available for purchase at the 2018 Official Star Trek Convention, New York Comic Con, and the Destination Star Trek Birmingham convention. Later in the year, a small number were also briefly made available to the public by Eaglemoss' UK and US webshops. Each ship was retailed with the USS Discovery's magazine and stand.
Initially available exclusively as a subscriber gift premium, the ISS Shenzhou, a registry variant of the USS Shenzhou model, later became available as a retail product from Eaglemoss' webshops. Contrary to the first bonus issue, a magazine was not included with this model.
Considerably larger than the standard releases, Special Editions are also available to the general public from company webshops and other retailers, and are not automatically sent to subscribers.
Before it was released as a 215 mm-long model with issue 12 of this partwork (see above), a 259 mm-long "XL Edition" model of the USS Enterprise (as it was seen in DIS) debuted in the first starship collection. Larger XL Edition models of the USS Discovery and the USS Shenzhou were also released in that collection, and a refitted XL USS Discovery-A is planned.
"Mini-binders" (measuring 167 × 244 × 45 mm) store ten of the magazines and were made available to US subscribers but had not been retailed to the general public through the company's webshops, despite the company's stated plans to do so at the partwork's debut.
One binder however, was provided as a free bonus gift with the third shipment to early subscribers, following the below-mentioned unexpected delays with the release of the first few starships and gift premiums. An accompanying letter made it crystal-clear to subscribers that the binder was solely meant as delay compensation, and that it had never been earmarked as part of the original gift premium line-up, making it a veritable bonus indeed.
After the October 2020 announcement of this line's conclusion and its transition into the Star Trek Universe collection, some European subscribers started to receive binders from issue 30 onward. The automatic shipping of the binders to these subscribers was viewed as somewhat questionable as they were unlike the compensation bonus not free of charge with costs automatically deducted from subscriber accounts that had given Eaglemoss permission to do so during sign-up. Still, and even while some subscribers received binders they had not ordered, it was likely that few would have objected as the binders had never been offered for sale in the webshops at all, despite the company's stated intent to do so in 2018-19. It was not until June 2022 – long after the collection had been suspended – that the binder became available for general sale on the webshop sites, albeit for a very short time only as Eaglemoss went bankrupt less than two months later. Left-over binder stock was subsequently sold from September 2023 until stock depletion by (new) Master Replicas, who was commissioned to liquidate all of Eaglemoss' remainder stock in the 2023-24 period. [24]
Dedication plaques
Scaled replicas of starship dedication plaque are cast from metallic resin and were previously distributed as subscriber gift premiums.
Originally released as a subscriber gift premium in February 2019, the company also distributes this scaled figure through its international webshops and other retailers.
Gift premiums were provided to subscribers at specific subscription milestones, and the models did not include companion magazines. As seen above, a number of these products also became available to the general public from Eaglemoss/Hero Collector webshops and other retailers. The enamel pins were previously released by FanSets.
No.
Box/Package
Premium
Model
Size
Scale
(1A)
USS Shenzhou enamel pin (June to October 2018)
57 mm ø
(1B)
USS Discovery enamel pin (2019)
57 mm ø
(2)
Scale chart poster × 2
594 × 420 mm × 2
(3)
USS Shenzhou NCC-1227 Dedication Plaque
222 mm
(4)
USS Discovery NCC-1031 Dedication Plaque
222 mm
(5)
Tardigrade
120 mm l × 90 mm h
(6)
ISS Shenzhou NCC-1227
200 mm
1:2115
Scaling, size, and contents info, cover scans, and some graphics courtesy of Wixiban's Star Trek Collectables Portal[25] *Starship length as measured from bow to stern, where applicable.
Background information
A collector's display of releases from the first two Starships Collections
Determined to bring the collection to market while Discovery's first season was being streamed for the first time (and managing to do so with issue 1), the company faced challenges due to "(...)delays in receiving assets from the licensor and the subsequent impact on production schedules," according to the letter that early subscribers received with the second issue, informing them of a temporary suspension. Robinson tweeted on 19 February 2018, "Shenzhous are almost all shipped. It’s been a huge push to get them out this quickly. Discos will follow. Then a little break. We just couldn’t get them made any faster." [26] As stated above, the third issue came with a free binder as appeasement for the delay. The binder had not been part of the subscriber gift premiums lineup.
Translations of some Klingon languagestarship names appeared on a poster that was sent to subscribers: bortaS bir (Cold Revenge), Chargh (Conquer), 'etlh (Blade), Jach (Scream), Qaw' (Destroy), Qoj (War), Qugh (Disaster), Sech (Torch), and Veqlargh (Demon).
USS Gagarin
USS Yeager
A render of the USS Gagarin appeared on the poster but was replaced in the collection by the USS Kerala, another Shepard-class ship. Robinson and Eaves had not been able to confirm whether further intended modifications to the original studio model had been made, prior to its on-screen appearance as the Gagarin. [27]
On After Trek, the DIS companion series, prototype models of the collection's USS Discovery and USS Shenzhou were displayed as set decorations behind host Matt Mira, among other Star Trek memorabilia. [28]
In 2018, Eaglemoss first partnered with Simon & Schuster for a US contest to cross-promote the Collection and the first three Discovery novels. [29](X)
Unused/cancelled Klingon designs
Appearing in promotional materials, six more Klingon starship designs were identified as upcoming models but were in the end not released as issues of this partwork. Regarding the prospective and eventual release of these ships in the Star Trek Universe: The Official Starships Collection followup partwork, Ben Robinson revealed, "The plan is definitely to do more. To be honest, these Klingon ships don’t sell brilliantly so we’ll work our way through the Picard, Disco and SNW ships first. Starfleet and lead ships sell better so are always the priority but with any luck we’ll circle back round."[30]
This actually reflected the criticism classic Trekdom had leveled against the total re-imagining of Klingon culture by the Discovery showrunners, which included the complete abandonment of adherence to established classic Klingon starship lineage design. Incidentally, the intense fan criticism forced the showrunners to dine on ashes by backtracking on their ill-conceived intents (see here in this regard) which resulted among others in the unplanned yet speedy introduction of a D7-class battlecruiser, redesigned along more traditional lines, which quickly received its own outing in the Collection as issue 26. Early in Discovery, the D7-class was a differently configured vessel and was renamed to Sech-class for intended inclusion in the Collection, only to became one of the cancelled issues instead.
Still, and while not in the Collection itself, all these designs did find their way into Eaglemoss' in-universe Star Trek: Shipyards - Klingon Fleetreference book, an indication that much of the editorial work for the planned accompanying magazines had already been completed.
Anthony Rapp with the tardigrade model at the 2018 Las Vegas con
Jayne Brook with the USS Enterprise model at the 2019 Las Vegas con
Eaglemoss' Ben Robinson giving away ships at a 2019 con
Ryan Dening with a prototype of the Stealth Ship model at the 2019 DST Birmingham con
A collector's display of 308 Eaglemoss/Hero Collector starship releases (12/2020)
Appendices
Footnotes
↑Contrary to the preceding Official Starships Collection, non-British EU customers were allowed to take out a subscription through the UK website, if a local official website was not available to them in their home countries, which had been the case with countries like the Netherlands, Belgium and Denmark, among others.
↑The models were painted freehand and with the use of paint masks (templates), alongside pad and tampo printing processes. The earliest prototypes were 3D printed in resin and, once approved by Eaglemoss and CBS, were manufactured using a variety of injection, vacuum, and compression molding techniques. [1]
↑Pixomondo-created CG models that Fabio Passaro's Meshweaver Productions has converted and re-texturized for the Collection, as identified online, include issue 1-19, issue SP1, and the Tardigrade figurine. [2][3][4] Featured on his website in the Summer/Autumn of 2019, [5](X) in late 2019 Passaro opted (for unknown reasons) to delete all renders of his Discovery work from his website's "Eaglemoss: Trek Little Ships", pages 5, 6, and 7, and replace them with his later work for the Official Starships Collection.
↑The concurrently running "Battlestar Galactica: The Official Ships Collection" utilized this size for the magazine component of its partwork as well.
↑A larger "XL Edition" model of the USS Discovery was also released in the first starship collection in 2020.
↑The sticker on the base of the Qoj class model's stand has "Klingon Veqlargh Class" printed on it, and this had apparently been the intended class name in production circles, as Pixomondo's production CGI model, built by Victoria Passariello, was actually endowed with the designation. [6]
↑A larger (259 mm-long) version of the DIS USS Enterprise model was released in the first starship partwork in late 2018 with a different magazine.
↑The dimensions of the "real" Festoon are not given in the magazine so the model's scale is based on an length of 388.26 meters, as provided by (the ship's designer) Ryan Dening to Wixiban's Star Trek Collectables Portal in October 2019. [7]
↑Both of the Klingon Raider's "wings" are stored separately within the box that the model is shipped in, and fit into slots on the model's fuselage for display. When placed on its stand, the assembled model is 180 mm tall. As of August 2019, it is the first ship model from either Starships Collection to have a small hole made in it to accommodate its stand.
↑The length of the "real" Klingon Raider is not stated in the magazine so scale was based on an estimate of 11 meters.
Hiawatha hull with registry and Starfleet Medical logo
In a social media post, Ben Robinson attested that the hull USS Hiawatha as seen in the episode, did not have a registry rendered onto it by its creators. [8] In this he was mistaken as registry markings were actually seen onscreen alongside a Starfleet Medical logo, in a mirrored image of the ship. But even though the registry markings were added on the Eaglemoss model, the Starfleet Medical logo was not.
↑The length of the "real" USS Hiawatha is not printed in the magazine, but was established as 599.5 meters, as provided by the ship's designer, Ryan Dening to Wixiban's Star Trek Collectables Portal in October 2019. [9]
↑The length of the "real" Beacon of Kahless' length is not stated in the magazine and was estimated at 120 meters.
↑The dimensions of the Landing Pod reflect the ship as displayed with its struts extended, and stands 145 mm tall. The ship measures 145 mm long × 90 mm high without the struts attached.
↑The Federation tugs seen onscreen in DIS did not have registries or names rendered onto their hulls. Alex Kurtzman assigned the "USS Zimmerman" name and NCC-1616 registry for the Eaglemoss model, following a request by CBS' John Van Citters and Ben Robinson. [10] Unlike the magazine's title, the model's box is labeled USS Zimmerman NCC-1616.
↑Eight units of the limited edition USS Glenn model were damaged at the warehouse and were deemed unfit for release to the last eight customers who had ordered them from the UK's online shop. Besides providing a full refund, an I.O.U. for a free future convention-exclusive starship, and a handwritten apology, the company sent (at least) one unpainted production prototype of an earlier starship model to each of the affected customers.
↑The ISS Charon model features internal electronic lighting that replicates the ship's super-mycelial reactor, and is powered by a CR927 coin cell battery that is not included with the issue.
