MovieChat Forums > Alien (1979) Discussion > How did they design such a great monster...

How did they design such a great monster?

posted 8 years ago by blairbitchproject
17 replies | jump to latest

It's crazy to me that they were able to create a creature as original and terrifying as the "Alien", especially for 1979! This was way before CGI and modern technology could create monsters like this, and they did it with practical effects!

[–] bluersun 8 years ago

H.R. Giger... Google him and his work

[–] prbronx5 8 years ago

Alien was a great creature design. But an earlier monster, that was remains effective to this day, Creature From The Black Lagoon. That suit still looks great to this day.

[–] millsey72 (9760) a year ago

Really? You think that rubber suit holds up today? I don't think it was good in the year 1954

[–] roland-rockerfella 8 years ago

H,R Giger a Swiss artist designers of the creature based on paintings he had done some years earlier. The special effects are the best kind ever to be used, practical, not all this CGI crap they use today.

[–] silver-starlet 8 years ago

I agree! Looked totally real!

[–] Kruleworld 8 years ago

Looked totally real!

Because unlike CGI, it IS real. real enough anyway to be believable, get the correct lighting and have the kind of nuance you just don't get from CG.

That's not to say CG is bad. it's just the way some directors use it nowadays doesn't play to it's strengths.

"He's dusted, busted and disgusted, but he's ok"

[–] svalinanikola 8 years ago

Imagination.

[–] Picnic10 8 years ago

There were precedents for it - I'm not saying these were necessarily influences on Giger but the wide-mouthed disturbance of Francis Bacon, Gerald Scarfe (did artwork for Pink Floyd's The Wall), Edvard Munch, heavy metal artwork and Lovecraft. It is like a perfect meld of these and several animal / insect types.

[–] Snaggelpuss 8 years ago

Plenty of the toy "slime"

[–] Conan-1982 8 years ago

Opium, that's how: unless you are an artist, stay away from that stuff :p

[–] stephenalienkissane 8 years ago

modern cgi is very very hit and miss

you do not punish someone for having big boobs!

[–] shango7200 8 years ago

I swear I cannot stress this enough- the fact that everything was built pretty much from "scratch"--by human hands and not some dorks pressing buttons and tracing over existing footage of actors in motion.....is amazing.
Think about it ......

"In every dimension , there's another YOU!"