In the pictures of your second post it looks like the light maps are off a bit, as they are causing a ghost image on the model
At first I thought I saw the same error but mistaken all of the pictures as being in one shot at first, but unless if I'm mistaken, I believe you might be seeing a light source that's supposed to be the sun shining at the drydock and the Big E. What I think I've caught was a slight mis-alignment of light maps on the ventral saucer side... I thought that was the problem pointed out, but whether it was or not I actually did miss that. In any case, I really am attached to this retexture because of the prominence of the aztecs yet how it doesn't look out of place at all... Although it's been a while for me watching basically
any Star Trek movie, I believe this was true for the Big E herself; the prominence of the metallic-like aztec patterns on the model.
I'm betting if you show the last picture of the first post (
of the Big E's aft) to anyone who doesn't play games or watch Trek movies too much, I think they seriously could confuse the picture for a picture of the actual studio model. I actually should try that to see if it's true, but I believe it seriously is real enough to feel as such.