 Principal photography commenced on August 15 , 1983 . All but two days of production were filmed on Paramount soundstages , by cinematographer Charles Correll . The Search for Spock was one of the first major feature films to use Eastman <unk> , a color high speed negative film stock . The film allowed Correll latitude in choosing a broad range of exposure indexes . Since The Search for Spock was shot with anamorphic lenses and many theatergoers would see widescreen 70 mm prints , Correll needed to produce a crisp depth of field , a difficult task on many sets . For scenes on the bridge , Correll pushed the exposure index above the Eastman recommendation to keep the image crisp at less than 50 foot @-@ candles . 
