However, already four months later, early January 1978 , the initial VFX commission of Magicam was rescinded after Paramount had decided to upgrade Phase II to the theatrical movie project, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, for which they brought in Robert Abel & Associates (RA&A) at the start of the new year, deemed more capable to handle the VFX requirements for the production of VFX of a big screen production. Yet, Magicam was retained as model company, its model shop headed by Chief Modeler Jim Dow, especially when RA&A's VFX Designer Richard Taylor and the producers decided in the previous month that the models already built or in the process of being built, were unsuitable for big screen requirements. To gain the new commission though, Magicam still had to compete with their now former