a)Assembling ideas
Several artists were brought in to offer their designs of a Predalien,
Farzad Varahramyan,
Michael Broom, and
Justin Murray provided illustrations.
Greg Figiel,
Akihito Ikeda,
Cory Schubert,
Jordu Schell supplied maquette studies, Steve Koch provided photoshop artwork to provide visualisations incorporating such things as Jordu Schell's sculptures or skins from existing alien and predator suits and other pieces left over from the AvP movie. From their works, ADI chose elements which they liked to make their final creation
- Gillis & Woodruff: In Alien vs Predator: Requiem, the Alien/Predator hybrid known becomes a major creature and the directors decide to name this creature the Predalien, an amalgam of the two hybridized concepts. (AVPR: Inside the Monster Shop)
b) Design Criteria of the Predalien
Gillis & Woodruff: Fox executive Alex Young, Producer John Davis and the Strauses were all in agreement that since this new creature was an Alien that had gestated inside a Predator, it may have picked up traits from its host but was fundamentally still an Alien, but this time we all felt that the potent DNA of the host Predator might cause more intermixing traits. This allowed us to play more with the superficial features like dreadlocks, mandibles, and colouration. (AVPR: Inside the Monster Shop)
c) Previsualization of the Predalien
Gillis & Woodruff: About a year before we began production on AVP2 we got a call from Producer John Davis with heads up that the project might be coming our way. As is often the case in Hollywood, you see the plume of smoke long before the train arrives. That said, sometimes enthusiasm takes over and you just have to go where it takes you, so we thought we'd generate a couple of PredAlien designs. Alec had an idea for a Queen-like version and he sculpted a head using castings of teeth from our miniature Queen from AVP. For dreadlocks, he cast multiple tails using molds of the miniature Alien from Fincher's Alien 3, and heat formed them into shape. Artists digitally added mandibles from the Predator at ADI's showroom and gave the creature the appropriate paintscheme.(AVPR: Inside the Monster Shop)
d) Production
Gillis & Woodruff: Due to the tight production schedule, the design meetings were frequent. Starting from a scattershot round of drawings we were able to reduce the concepts down to a series of maquettes. After feedback from the directors and the studio, we boiled down the notes into a single maquette sculpted by veteran Steve Wang. He and our team of other sculptors worked furiously on the full scale sculpture. Artist Chris Ayers produced paint schemes for further comment and eventual approval. A few more design changes were requested while we were sculpting the full-scale creature, and thankfully producer Paul Deason pushed the appearance of the PredAlien to late in the schedule to give us desperately needed time.(AVPR: Inside the Monster Shop)
i. Drawings show experiments with different ideas for heads and mouths, the dreadlocks coming from the head of one creature would seem to grow in length at the back extending into the air like jellyfish tendrils. One example had the spikes transformed into dangling insect limbs with elbows, and in another they would stick horizontally out of the back of the head.
(see Farzad's illustration)
ii. The spines sticking out of the back had become replaced by structures that seemed insect like limbs or reptilian claws, and on other occasions spines like the lower toothy mandibles of the Predator
(see Broom's illustrations)
iii. An eccentric exploratory drawing featured a predalien with humanoid alien face protruding out from between mandibles of a Predator with small spines coming out backwards from the back of the head and shoulders.
(artist unknown, AVP:R DVD)
f) Inspired by Giger
The final creatures body also had elements borrowed from concept paintings by Giger that could only just about be recognised, such as the way the muscles stretch across the shoulders and down the sides of the arm, as well as the humanoid mouth and chin
The sculptor Steve Wang, although one of the top special effects sculptors in the business who worked on the original predators created a form of biomechanics on the creatures body that bore his own style rather than Giger's, and the patterns around the stomach and groin are similar to Giger's concept paintings.
g) Endless Criticisms
Some fans jokingly compared this creature to something from the Guyver films which
Steve Wang had the roles of director and co-director, special makeup effects and the creature effects department for. Some even went as far as to describe it as a new villain for the Power Rangers,
an episode of which was directed by Steve Wang.
Quite frankly the design hasn't been final enough for many fans, many of whom have their own design for a Predalien in their own minds and some preferred Dave Dorman's idea from some years earlier. Had James Cameron and Stan Winston been involved, it certainly would have been a different design completely, as it would have been also had Giger been involved.
h) "Weird Dwarf Alien"
In raw footage of the Predalien costume, it was mansized with a large head, often on a platform.
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| "weird dwarf alien" |
Alec Gillis admitted that in still if you didn't know what the design of the creature was about and you saw its legs, it looked like a dwarf and it was more often than not that you managed to see the costume this way . Tom Woodruff who is a normal sized man, wore the rubber suits for the main alien of the film since Alien 3.
- Alec Gillis: When you see Tom in a suit, it's kind of goofy from head to toe because it's legs look very squat, we're always very concerned that the still photographers will take a picture, somebody that really doesn't know that this thing is mostly meant to be shot from waste up releases a shot to the magazine where it looks like it's a weird dwarf alien and that can cause great concern among the fans. (DVD documentary on the making of the Predalien)
2, Dave Dorman the freelance illustrator talked about how 20th Century Fox/Dark Horse approached him for a design for the Alien/ Predator hybrid and he created a painting around the mid 1990s that wouldn't have been unveiled to the public's attention until a much later date on his internet blog in the months leading up to the movie Alien vs Predator: Requiem
Farzad Varahramyan was hired by ADI to create concept art for the Predalien. We find two sketches and a painting. The mandibles are elongated with long teeth. The sketches feature the creature with a bulbous cranium that is not very elongated in comparison to the ones that we often see, but this creature has long finger like projections coming out of the back instead of the typical spines that hang down the side of the Predator's head like dreadlocks. Farzad also created a painting of the Predalien, the lower mandibles have teeth running along them and what appears to be a tendon running beneath it. He decided to give his version of the creature a long tale with a scorpion's stinger at the end.
The final creatures body also had elements borrowed from concept paintings by Giger that could only just about be recognised, such as the way the muscles stretch across the shoulders and down the sides of the arm, as well as the humanoid mouth and chin
Some fans jokingly compared this creature to something from the Guyver films which Steve Wang had the roles of director and co-director, special makeup effects and the creature effects department for. Some even went as far as to describe it as a new villain for the Power Rangers, an episode of which was directed by Steve Wang.
