Warp drive visual effects In the history of " Star Trek " , there have been numerous visual effects used to portray warp drive . " Star Trek : The Original Series " . Originally , Gene Roddenberry wanted the effect of the engaging warp drive to cause the starship to become transparent . This effect was abandoned , however . ( " The Star Trek Compendium " , 4th ed . , p . 38 ) TOS movies . For , an unused concept for portraying warp was inspired by suggestions from the film ' s science adviser , Jesco von Puttkamer . Early concept art depicted the " Enterprise " encased in a warp bubble that refracted a color - spectrum - shifted starfield around it . However , this idea was discarded in the final version of the movie because a more straightforward shutter - open streaking was chosen instead . Most of the later instances of warp drive visual effects in the TOS films were achieved by Industrial Light & Magic . ILM Visual Effects Supervisor Scott Farrar commented that , for the TOS films , the effect of showing warp drive streaks in space was " " very complicated to do , to figure out . Lots of it we just did manually ; I ' d have a start and an end mark , and I ' d just measure out and go , ' Okay , next frame . Open up . Run down . Close it down . ' Problems would be things like , ' Oh , we see a wobble in the track . ' We would shoot the shot . It would take hours and hours and hours . It would take all day . And then we ' d go , ' There ' s a bump in the track , ' so somebody comes in with hammers and wrenches and fixes the track , and we ' d do it again . " " ( " Industrial Light & Magic : The Visual Effects of " Star Trek " " , " " special features ) The warp visual from the TOS movies wasn ' t popular with all production staffers . Doug Drexler noted , " " I never liked what they did in the movies with the flashy red , white , and blue . I hated that . " " ( " " , p . 70 ) Robert Justman agreed . " " I didn ' t like the warp speed effect in the features , " " he said . " " I thought it looked animated , it looked cartoony – it didn ' t look real " [ . . . ] " Having those lines , those broad lines coming back – it looked so fake to me . But that ' s the best they could come up with , creatively speaking . " " " Star Trek : The Next Generation " . A new visual effect was thought up by Robert Justman for TNG . It was inspired by cartoons he had seen , many years previously , in which a character would start to run fast and then be caught up by other characters . " " I said , what we need is a rubber - band effect , " " Justman remembered , " " so when the ship takes off to go into warp speed , the effect should be – and I described this to the people that were going to make it – that the front end takes off and the ship stretches out and then it snaps back to itself like a rubber band as it ' s going forward . I said , that ' s the effect that I want . " " The TNG visual effects artists initially didn ' t know how to achieve the effect Justman had asked them for . They finally realized how to accomplish it , but Justman remained unsure how it was done . Even so , the reconceived effect was included in the show . Doug Drexler enthused , " " I love the rubber - band snap " [ . . . ] " I thought the rubber - band thing was very clever . " " ( " " , p . 70 ) " Star Trek : Enterprise " . In the script for , the visual effect of a particular unnamed starship suddenly activating warp drive was described thus ; " " It jumps to warp with a strange optical effect . " " " Star Trek Nemesis " . In , a trail of smoke briefly appears behind the nacelles of the when the ship accelerates to warp speed . The effect has not been used in any other " Star Trek " production . " Star Trek Into Darkness " . In , an effect called warp contrail was used for the first time . This name was originally suggested by J . J . Abrams but was also used by Damon Lindelof . Conceptually , the ' s warp contrails were intended to be a new addition made to the ship between and " Star Trek Into Darkness " . Regarding the addition of the contrails , Lindelof explained , " " That was driven by a few things . One was to show the audience that Scotty has made modifications to the " Enterprise " between the two films [ . . . ] since Scotty is now the [ chief ] engineer . " " The filmmakers were mindful that , in adding the warp contrails , they didn ' t deviate from canon too much , such as if they had added a cloaking device to the " Enterprise " s systems instead . The warp contrails were depicted with CGI . Said Lindelof , " " Roger Guyett , our visual effects supervisor , took J . J . ' s phrase ' warp contrails ' and ran with it [ . . . ] Roger tried a few tests , some of which felt a bit too radical , but it was basically us [ . . . ] saying ' wow , that looks cool . ' And we went with it . " " " Star Trek Beyond " . The warp drive visual effects were re - envisioned for . The new warp effect , depicted in a view of the " Enterprise " called a " bullet shot " by Director Justin Lin , resulted from discussions between Lin and Visual Effects Supervisor Peter Chiang . " " As we were exploring , early on , I wanted to kind of present the warp with a different visual , " " recalled Lin , " " and we looked at all these different iterations , and the bullet time was something that caught my eye , and was something we developed , and " [ . . . ] " it came early on , in trying to hopefully kind of contribute a new aesthetic to " Trek . " ( enhanced commentary , " Star Trek Beyond " ( iTunes ) ) For his part , Chiang stated , " " In the past films , there was always a kind of light - driven way they had for showing the streak to warp speed . In reevaluating our options , this gave us a chance to take inspiration from real physics for our warp effect . " " Chiang ' s research inspired him to propose the idea of depicting the warp bubble as seeing space fold around the ship . " " Right from the outset , I was presenting Justin with ideas on how this could look , " " he continued . " " We did studies on how light is bent by gravitational lensing , then looked at high - speed shooting of 3000 to 4000 fps to see how bullets create a wake as they travel through water . We also scrutinized images of planes and their vapor trails as they go beyond the sound barrier . I imagined multiple shock waves building up and stacking on one another , forming this layer ahead of the vessel . That tells us we ' re traveling at high speed and gives a dimensional quality to it . " " According to Chiang , the effect was only achievable thanks to Double Negative having transitioned , in recent years , to ray - traced rendering , which he described as providing " extremely realistic lighting simulations . " Both Justin Lin and Peter Chiang were extremely happy with how their reimagined warp drive visual effect ultimately looked . Lin noted , " " It ' s something I ' m very proud of . " " ( enhanced commentary , " Star Trek Beyond " ( iTunes ) ) Enthused Chiang , " " We ' ve been able to capture such an extraordinary look for this lensing bubble effect . " "