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00:00Geordi LaForge from Star Trek The Next Generation was born without eyesight,
00:04but thanks to Starfleet medical science, he was able to see even better than those with normal human vision,
00:09using his signature visor, which stood for visual instrument and sensory organ replacement.
00:14Geordi received his first visor shortly after turning five.
00:17It basically gave him superhuman abilities, as he could see things that would be invisible for others,
00:22but the device wasn't without its issues.
00:24Throughout his Starfleet career, it caused Geordi a fair amount of trouble,
00:28and made the job a lot harder for LeVar Burton,
00:30who had to play the character with his eyes almost completely covered.
00:33The visor has also become greatly iconic in pop culture,
00:37and has inspired a lot of real-world creations.
00:40But there are plenty of facts about Geordi's visor that fans may have missed or forgotten over the years.
00:45Remember, the visor was so much more than just a fashion statement.
00:49So with that in mind then, I'm Ellie with Trek Culture,
00:51here with 10 things you didn't know about Geordi's visor.
00:55Number 10. What Geordi can see
00:58The colours that humans see are actually just different wavelengths of electromagnetic radiation,
01:03with red being the longest and violet the shortest.
01:06However, visual light is only a small segment of the electromagnetic spectrum.
01:10Longer wavelengths contain types of radiation like infrared light, microwaves and radio waves,
01:16and shorter wavelengths contain types like ultraviolet light, x-rays and gamma rays.
01:21With his visor, Geordi was able to see much more of the electromagnetic spectrum,
01:25meaning he could detect heat by looking at infrared light,
01:28and sometimes see through objects or clouds that would appear opaque for anyone else.
01:33He also saw the world in much more detail than the average person.
01:36He could detect tiny details in people's heart rates and perspiration,
01:40which sometimes even allowed him to tell if someone was lying.
01:43There have been several scenes that have given us representations of Geordi's way of seeing,
01:47but with ordinary human eyes, it's actually physically impossible
01:51to even comprehend what it would be like to see anything other than visible light.
01:55Number 9. How it affected LeVar Burton's acting
01:59In an interview with the Television Academy Foundation,
02:02LeVar Burton discussed the difficulty of playing a character
02:05who was supposed to have such enhanced vision,
02:08while in reality he had about 85% of his view completely blocked off by the visor.
02:13Apparently at the beginning of The Next Generation, Burton was constantly knocking into things,
02:17able only to see what was directly in front of him.
02:20Over time, he got better by learning new ways to navigate the sets with the visor on,
02:24like using light stands and other points of reference that stood out.
02:28Burton was nearly completely blinded during filming, which made his job a lot harder.
02:32Beyond that, with a large part of his face covered,
02:35Burton also had to try way harder to convey emotion with just his mouth and body language.
02:39Despite all of these limitations though,
02:41Burton was able to pull the whole thing off brilliantly for seven whole seasons
02:45before Geordi finally got his upgrade after Star Trek Generations.
02:50Number 8. Why Geordi stopped using his visor
02:53We first saw Geordi's ocular implants in The Next Generation finale, All Good Things.
02:58After the timeline was changed in that episode,
03:00he ended up getting this new tech shortly after Star Trek Generations,
03:04but they were actually invented far earlier.
03:06In the episode Loud as a Whisper,
03:08Dr. Pulaski revealed that she had actually done several surgeries to install these kinds
03:13of implants and offered to replace Geordi's visor with them.
03:16Geordi decided not to go through with the procedure because he believed that the technology
03:19of ocular implants was not yet on the same level as the visor.
03:23He would have basically been sacrificing visual range for a bit of added comfort and a more natural
03:27look.
03:28But apparently, by the time of first contact,
03:30either those devices had advanced far enough,
03:33or Geordi simply decided that aesthetics and comfort were more important to him.
03:37Though the ocular implants still did cause him headaches from time to time.
03:40Of course, LeVar Burton often argued to have his visor replaced with something more natural,
03:45but it wasn't until after The Next Generation ended that he finally got what he wanted.
03:50Number 7. Why Geordi declined treatment
03:52Geordi's visor actually caused him a lot of discomfort.
03:56He would often get headaches and become overwhelmed by all of the information his brain was receiving.
04:00The data from the sensors was transmitted into the brain through short pulses,
04:04rather than all at once, which made it a bit easier to process,
04:08but he still experienced constant pain in his day-to-day life.
04:10In Encounter at Farpoint, Dr. Crusher offered to either give him painkillers
04:14or a surgery to numb the affected parts of his brain.
04:17But he declined both options,
04:19because he believed that they would cause the visor to be less effective.
04:22Keeping the visor at peak performance was really important to Geordi.
04:26He used his advanced sight in his engineering work constantly.
04:29Hopefully, Geordi will have found an effective way to treat these symptoms
04:32when we see him in the third season of Star Trek Picard, though.
04:35Number 6. Other visors in Star Trek
04:38Geordi wasn't the only character in Star Trek history with a visor,
04:42nor was he actually the first.
04:44In fact, in the Discovery episode Brothers,
04:46we saw a Starfleet officer from about 100 years before The Next Generation
04:50wearing an earlier model of the same device.
04:53This retro visor looked much bulkier and wrapped around the entire head instead of just the eyes,
04:58probably to more easily reach different parts of the brain.
05:01We also saw two officers with visors in the Lower Decks episode Second Contact.
05:05The first could be seen when Tendi went aboard the shuttlecraft on the Cerritos,
05:09and the second appeared as a member of the landing party visiting the Galadonians.
05:14Later, we got a visor wearing teddy bear in the episode Cupid's Errant Arrow as well.
05:18Ocular implants were probably a more common technology than visors,
05:22because they worked as well as normal eyes and felt far more natural.
05:25But for those who wanted a bit of an upgrade, a visor was the way to go.
05:29Number 5. Rihanna's Visor
05:31In 2016, Rihanna developed a new line of sunglasses in collaboration with Dior,
05:37which the pop star said were directly inspired by Geordi's unique style.
05:41I've always been obsessed with his eyewear, Rihanna said, while explaining her design process.
05:46She continued, and when I got to Dior and saw all the materials I could play with,
05:50it all just came together.
05:51It didn't take long for Rihanna's drawings to be translated into a physical prototype,
05:55and the line was released later that year in June.
05:58While her sunglasses are definitely more fashion-focused than Geordi's visor,
06:02you can kinda see the similarities if you really squint.
06:05The connected lenses are really the best giveaway.
06:07Rihanna's always been a big Star Trek fan, something she's mentioned in the past.
06:11She even made a song and music video called Sledgehammer to promote Star Trek Beyond.
06:15It's actually really nice to see her get the opportunities to just nerd out about Star Trek to her fans.
06:21Number 4. Geordi almost gave the visor up for love
06:24We first saw Ensign Sonia Gomez in the Next Generation episode, Cue Who,
06:29when she accidentally spilled her drink on Captain Picard.
06:31She later appeared in the episode, Samaritan Snared,
06:34then years later in the Lower Decks episode, First First Contact as a captain.
06:38However, her role in the show was originally planned to be much bigger.
06:42The writers had plans to make Gomez into a new love interest for La Forge.
06:46They wanted a reason to have Geordi undergo a dangerous surgery to replace his visor with something more natural,
06:51so the idea was that the two would start to get closer, eventually leading to a romance,
06:55and Geordi would decide to go through with the surgery in order to see her beauty through human eyes.
07:00The writers soon decided that Geordi and Sonia were not meant to be,
07:04likely because they gave the actors no indication that the characters were supposed to be into each other,
07:08and so Geordi never had a reason to risk his life to see naturally.
07:12Number 3. Visor live video feeds
07:15Visors could actually be linked to a computer,
07:18which could generate a live video feed of the device's point of view onto a screen.
07:22Now this may seem like a cool ability to have for the Enterprise crew,
07:26but it was actually a major security issue.
07:28In Star Trek Generations and the episode The Mind's Eye,
07:31which we'll talk about again in a moment,
07:33Geordi was captured and unknowingly had his visor linked to his captor's computers.
07:37This allowed the Klingons to learn the Enterprise's shield modulation in Generations,
07:41and helped the Romulans monitor Geordi in The Mind's Eye.
07:44Some fans even theorise that these two events are actually what inspired Geordi
07:48to switch to ocular implants after Generations,
07:50as they had no external interfaces which could be used to hack them like the visor.
07:54Having someone else spy on him through his own eyes on two occasions has got to be pretty traumatic.
08:00Number 2. The Mind Control Powers of the Visor
08:03Geordi LaForge was captured by Romulans while on vacation in the episode The Mind's Eye.
08:08Using the visor's interface with Geordi's brain,
08:11they were able to force him to see horrible images
08:13and eventually conditioned his mind to follow their orders.
08:17Using this mind control method,
08:18the Romulans hoped to get Geordi to assassinate a Klingon named Varg
08:22in order to spark conflict between the Klingon Empire and the Federation,
08:26which they nearly succeeded at.
08:27Luckily, data began detecting strange E-band emissions aboard the ship
08:31and was able to figure out that they were being used to interface with the visor.
08:35It was later discovered that Kel, one of the Klingons visiting the Enterprise,
08:39was actually a Romulan conspirator who was feeding Geordi commands through E-bands.
08:43It's truly terrifying to know that the same technology that allowed Geordi to see
08:48could also be used to command his brain.
08:50Number 1. Real Life Visors
08:52We don't have anything as advanced as Geordi's visor in the present,
08:56but we're getting closer every day.
08:58We already have devices that can see far further than us
09:01and detect parts of the electromagnetic spectrum that we can't see with our eyes.
09:05Add that with the fact that technology that interfaces with your brain
09:08has been getting way more advanced recently,
09:10and it seems like it may not be that long before technology becomes real.
09:14Funnily enough, there actually was a real vision-aiding device released in the late 90s
09:19that was called Geordi, for Joint Optical Reflective Display, in honour of Geordi LaForge.
09:24The Geordi device was based on NASA tech
09:26and used cameras to allow people with limited vision to see further.
09:30It even had a zoom function, but it wasn't directly linked into the brain
09:34and only worked if the person had some level of sight in their eyes.
09:37But still, it's interesting to see Star Trek inspiring real-life innovation,
09:42even if it may be a while before we can see anything like the visor.
09:45And that concludes our list.
09:47If you think we missed something, then do let us know in the comments below.
09:50And while you're there, don't forget to like and subscribe and tap that notification bell.
09:55Also, head over to Twitter and follow us there, and also on Instagram as well.
09:59And I can be found across various social medias just by searching Ellie Littlechild.
10:03I've been Ellie with Trek Culture.
10:05I hope you have a wonderful day, and remember,
10:07to boldly go where no one has gone before.
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