Some of you may have wondered how the William Shatner School of Toupological Studies funds its operations - so we thought we'd explain: The majority of our finances come from transferring technologies to the wider market that we initially developed to study William Shatner's toupee . For example, back in the 1970s, we were frustrated that we couldn't more easily view William Shatner's various film and television performances, so we developed two competing home video technologies: Toupomax and ToupHS (Toupological Home System). Within two years, these were then licensed and introduced to the wider market as Betamax and VHS.
But we were still unhappy at the resolution at which the toupee was being resolved, leading to DTP (Digital Toupological Disc), which was then introduced to the market as DVD. Yet we knew that there was still more resolution available in Bill Shatner's performances shot on 35mm film. Which brings us to our latest technology: Toup Ray, which has since been introduced to the market as Blu-ray.
Click on images for full resolution.The website Trekcore.com has recently been undertaking important toupological work, providing high definition frame-grabs of the remastered Star Trek series (enabled by our technology). While the site is ostensibly set up to study all of Star Trek, the aforementioned work is clearly central to its purpose. In the remastered high-definition Trek, lace lines are visible as never before, while ruffles and other toupological manifestations resolve with remarkable clarity.
We've posted some of these images in this post. But if any of our you feel like trawling through the hundreds of images on the site and alerting us to any other particularly notable ones, then we'll certainly be very grateful. Amateur toupology is hard work, but certainly rewarding! On another note, ever wondered how Bill Shatner feels about the Blu-ray Star Trek releases? - when the series was filmed, no-one could have expected the series would ever be viewed as this resolution.
Images in this post via Trekcore.com from the episodes "Amok Time" and "The Savage Curtain".
UPDATE: Reader "Anonymous" points to some pretty visible (click images for full resolution) lace lines in "Assignment: Earth":
Check out the HD stills of 'Assignment: Earth' and particularly these stills where you can clearly see the lace line:
ReplyDeletehttp://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/2x26hd/assignmentearthhd0129.jpg and http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/2x26hd/assignmentearthhd0150.jpg
Here's one from This Side of Paradise:
ReplyDeletehttp://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/1x24hd/thissideofparadisehd143.jpg
Sorry to nitpick, but STOS was first released in HD on HD-DVD, folks:
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_The_Original_Series#Remastered_series
http://www.tvshowsondvd.com/graphics/news3/ST_TOS_HDDVD_S1_CloseUp.jpg
Keep up the good work though, your site is a daily must for me, and I've recommended you all over the place!
http://tos.trekcore.com/hd/albums/1x14hd/balanceofterrorhd058.jpg
ReplyDeleteThis one has been posted before...
He looked like such a slob in some of those 3rd season episodes. Camera crew wasn't doing him any favors
ReplyDeleteWhat on Earth is going on in that third shot down? The front lace piece clearly has a life of its own but is the rest of it combed and glued down?!
ReplyDeleteThe lace line can be pretty blatant - he went out in public like this?
I coudn't see it on my tiny B&W TV set back in the early seventies...
ReplyDeleteIt really is amazing how shlumpy Shatner looked in Trek Season 3 compared to his matinee-idol good looks in seasons 1 and 2. Much of it is toupological - you can see lace lines in Seasons 1 and 2, but not a lot of toup askew-ness. But I think his expanding waistline was the bigger culprit.
ReplyDeleteI think there's a very strong case for a full toupological analysis on season 3 and what went wrong... How about it ShatToupBlog?
ReplyDeleteI am pretty sure that the scientists at WSSTS have already figured out the equation for the third season taking into account the inverse relation between shat's deteriorating toup-line and the series budget cuts.I am also pretty sure that took into account the relationship between shat's increasing savings and his increasing waistline.After all these guys are incredible,being able to pick up slight Freudian nuances from Shat's life.
ReplyDeleteI think the toupees are longer and shaggier in Season 3 because much more of Shatner's head rqeuired covering. That coupled with hippie movement finally making it's way to TV, meant everyone's hair was a bit longer.
ReplyDeleteAnd the sideburns too.
On the topic of bluray, I was watching Star Trek Three, on bluray, and went into the "extras", interviews section. In one of the documentaries, they are interviewing several people that made the film. In the scenes where Shatner gives his "two cents", the ridge of his toupee on his temples is clearly obvious and visible. It is reminiscent of the piece that appears on his book cover. Especially on his left side. He is sporting his Denny Craig hair.
ReplyDeleteAs in this pic, there are seams visible on the sides. Even the Katz toupees aren't infallible.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.rightcelebrity.com/?pp_album=main&pp_cat=&pp_image=william_shatner4.jpg
wow in toup-ray, it's very easy, to see things like lace lines, and slightly flipped or ruffled, hair which is then easy to tell, is no part of his head, the lace toupee was a good one, but one look at these and shat, would wish that toup-ray was never born.
ReplyDeletewhat had happend to shat? By the 3rd season, the fresh-faced young shat, was begining to look like, the bloated elvis! And he was quickly looking very middle-age, at just 37. In the shots from the enterpise incident, on trekcore.com, some close-up shots, show his hair (toup) was starting to gray! In these shots, you can see, if i'm right, that the toup, maybe a two-piece unit. I may have got these facts wrong, but the trekcore.com website, shows the rug for what it was. Please keep up your fantastic work, on shatners toupee.
ReplyDeleteOf all the loopy ideas this blog has had, the two-toupee theory had to be the most far-out. Yes, he wore one toupee for the front and a different one for the back. Right.
ReplyDelete