Alien: The Laser Placenta

leading from  

Alien : The Derelict

and

Alien: Making the Movie

 

(from Alien Anthology blu-ray)

a) A mysterious film of blue light

In the silo, below the jockey's chamber, there are thousands of spores that must surely be as old as the Jockey's remains.

They are covered over by a film of blue light that is a laserbeam spread like a thin sheet which represented the placenta of the eggs, and there is a sound as the astronaut penetrates the laser beam's field as if a seal was being broken

(from Alien Anthology blu-ray)

(from Alien Anthology blu-ray)

b) Ridley's Storyboard

Ridley storyboard's had Kane going down a long tube and then emerging into this massive chamber through a hole in the ceiling, as if it were a vagina.

Before he does this, at the bottom of this tube he finds a very thin membrane which he cuts through, as if the egg silo were a virgin and a feint breeze drifts upwards as he spookily descends through the slit into the blackness.

Kane can't see anything, so he says "I'm going to light myself up, can you boost me?"

Ridley wanted around ten thousand tiny pea lights stitched into Kane's suit so they could light him up like a Christmas tree and have him hanging there from the roof of this cavern, like a beautiful chandelier.

He thought it would be a marvelous image, but the sequence was cut for budget reasons.

Storyboard - entering the silo shaft

Storyboard - piercing the membrane

Storyboard - entering the silo

Storyboard - lighting the suit up

Storyboard - reaching the ground

c) Seeking a new idea

By now, the egg silo and derelict had been merged into one, so Kane was being arguably lowered into the hold of the ship.

Ridley wanted something to replace the membrane, which he saw as a kind of a biological alarm which triggered a response in the eggs. 

 

Basically, they would all come awake and sit waiting to be touched so that they knew that they could open and someone was there to attach to so perhaps they could go off to another planet or spread by whatever means

 

No one knew how to do it. 

 

They even thought that perhaps they could animate it afterwards,

 

(from Alien Anthology blu-ray)

(from Alien Anthology blu-ray)

d)  The scanning laser

 

 
d.i)  When Roger first saw holograms

 

Previously, Roger had visited Anton in his workshop to see some holograms he was working on using laser technology. Anton wanted to show them to him with an idea of using them in films. 

 

That was the first time Roger had ever seen a hologram live, and it was fascinating because right in front of me was a three-dimensional image. 

 

Anton had developed and designed "The Light Fantastic," a holography show that became the touring light show for the The Who.

 

 

d.ii) Roger is asked by Anton over to see the show lasers

 

As it happens, The Who permanently rented a stage in Shepperton for rehearsing and they were rehearsing there at the time. 

 

One short way to describe what started the trip to see the lasers was that Anton called Roger and said  "We've got these lasers. Do you want to see it?" 

 

But the story would also open up that Roger had seen Anton driving in at the car park and it was one of those innocent conversations where Anton said to Roger "Hi!"

 

Roger would have have replied "Hi how are you doing?"

Anton would have replied "Oh, I'm on the stage with The Who, we're doing lasers and stuff. Come and have a look "

 

At that time Roger much like most people else from that time hadn't seen lasers and so this was new.

 

d.iii) Roger Christian  and Les Dilley see the lasers

Roger went across with Les Dilley the art director  to the The Who's stage.

 

Anton showed us the various laser beams and effects they were pioneering, and being new to Roger and Les, they looked spectacular.  

 

Anton showed them how they fired like bullets into the air in different patterns, or shot out like veined light beams

 

 

d.iv) Roger has an idea about using them for the egg chamber membrane

 

There was a fairly strong scanning laser being 

 

Anton then showed when they fanned it out with smoke that it looked amazing. 

 

Roger asked words to the effect of. “Does this fan out?” or perhaps he even went as far as to say  “These are amazing, can they form a membrane like that when they go around these?" 

 

Anton replied "Yeah" 

He showed them how they could make a kind of layer and spread like a membrane across the stage. 

Roger thought in response “Wow, this is the answer to the eggs. “

Then they knew they had found a solution to a problem, 

 

Roger and Les liked the green and the blue laser beams used in this way.

d.v) Getting Ridley to see this

 

Roger's next thought was that he had to get Ridley around to see this. 

 

He asked Anton "Anton , do you mind, can you ask The Who if they mind if I bring Ridley here?"

 

Roger approached Ridley and said "You'd better come and look at this" 

 

Then he and Les Dilley took Ridley over there to see the laser membrane as a solution for the egg scene

Anton set it up for them and it fanned out.

Ridley would use smoke in everything and every frame of Alien would be filled with smoke.

They watch dust in the studio going into it, it formed membranes and one could put their finger into it.

 

Ridley took one look at them and said “Let’s do this on the set.”

 

 

d.vii) Testing the laser for Alien

The laser was mounted so it would scan just above the eggs and give them this sheet of blue light.

The question being asked is "Will it go on film?" 

Ridley never thought it would photograph, because the light level is very low, though, so everything in there had to be shot absolutely wide open

Somehow, with the wizardry of Derek Vanlint's cinematography, it worked.

 

d.viii) Getting the camera to work with the lasers

 

It operated with a mirror inside oscillating about three thousand cycles per second with a sweeping arc of about fifty or sixty degrees.

If you could stop the mirror you'd get a single point of light, but when it's moving it's not dangerous because you're subjected to the power of the laser for shorts bits of time.

Since the laser's scanning so fast and the camera's only running at twenty four frames per second, there are only a number of scans on one image. 

 

d.ix) Interesting shapes in the lasers

 

They had to use a lot of smoke and dry ice fog; otherwise it wouldn't show up at all because the beam's only bright when it's actually touching something.

 

So when people dropped through it, all of these amazing shapes would form in the membrane like reverse shadow.

 

The tests looked great.

d.x) Only a short amount of time to use it

They could have done a lot more with it, but they didn't have the time.

As it was, they only had about half a day to test it, then another day and a half to shoot the whole sequence.

But Brian Johnson remembered that they shot several different sequences using the laserbeams but only the laser placenta scene was finally used in the film.

 

(from Alien Anthology blu-ray)

e) A protective ray or whatever

Despite the fact that the placenta had now become noticeably like a sheet of laser light which brought people to ask other questions about what it might in terms of something more technological, it remained like a protective skin or a placenta wall in Ridley's mind.

Meanwhile Brian Johnson and Roger Christian could agree that it worked as a weird protective ray but there were limitations to how one could explain what it was, and so Brian wasn't sure what it was supposed to be.

Then if it was a laser, how was this thing being powered by the alien spaceship that's been derelict for perhaps aeons, but then it was an alien space ship after all so those questions couldn't necessarily be answered.

(from Alien Anthology blu-ray)

1. Ridley Scott: My original idea for the sequence was cut for budget reasons. My storyboard had Kane going down a long tube and then emerging into this massive chambers through a hole in the ceiling. Before he does though, at the bottom of this tube he finds a very thin membrane which he cuts through and this feint breeze drifts upwards as he descends into the blackness. But he can't see anything, so he says "I'm going to light myself up' - and what I wanted were thousands of tiny pea lights stitched into his suit so we could light him up like a Christmas tree and have him hanging there from the roof of this cavern, like some beautiful chandelier. I thought it would be a marvelous image. (Cinefex 1, p65 and Alien Special Effects, p37)
2. Ridley Scott: But since the whole approach was out, I wanted something to replace the membrane, which I saw as a kind of a biological alarm which triggered a response in the eggs - they all come awake and sit waiting to be touched, basically. We finally settled on a laser which was mounted so it would scan just above the eggs and give us this sheet of blue light. We could have done a lot more with it, but we didn't have the time. As it was, we only had about half a day to test it and then another day and a half to shoot the whole bloody sequence
   (Cinefex 1, p65 and Alien Special Effects, p37)
3. Brian Johnson: It was a fairly strong scanning laser. It belonged to The Who rock group - they use them in pop concerts and such - and it operated at about three thousand cycles per second with a sweeping arc of about fifty or sixty degrees. Basically what's happening is there's a mirror in there that's oscillating three thousand times a second. If you could stop the mirror you'd get a single point of light, but when it's moving it's not dangerous because you's subjected to the power of the laser for shorts bits of time. Since your laser's scanning so fast and you camera's only running at twenty four frames per second, you get quite a number of scans on one image. The light level is very low, though, so everything in there had to be shot absolutely wide open. And we had to use a lot of smoke; otherwise it doesn't show up at all because the beam's only bright when it doesn't show up at all because the beam's only bright when it's actually touching something. (Cinefex 1, p65-67 and Alien Special Effects, p337-9)
4. Ridley Scott: The sheet as I call it of the laser beam, this is a laser beam spread thin like a thin sheet, but it worked great here and I never thought it would photograph because it's pretty low key, but you know, with the wizardry of, of Derek, we got it. So this is all just handheld lay the sound on as you go through the laser beam, you can here, there's a sound to the laser beam, you can hear it now, like a seal. I always thought of the laser beam as the placenta wall for the, erm, eggs.(Alien 30th Anniversary Edition DVD) 
5. Brian Johnson: We used the laser because Ridley wanted to do something different.  We looked at all sorts of lasers while we were at Shepperton Studios; there is a company there that has lasers for hire. We got one on stage and played with it - puffed smoke and dry ice fog through it. We shot several different sequences using it, but they were all cut out. Only the egg chamber sequence remains. I think it's effective as some sort of weird protective ray or whatever - it's perfect for the situation (Starlog, October 1979, p68)
6. Ridley Scott: But there was an idea which was a nice idea of dropping down through a tube. Kane goes inside and finds a small housing and then goes down through a hole in the floor. I was doing this whole bloody thing as a vagina, going right through. And at the bottom is this membrane. It's like the pyramid is a virgin. I was going to have him slit the membrane and then gas or air or whatever would come wafting out. And he’s got to go through this spooky thing of going through this slit. That went by the way as well when the pyramid and derelict sequences were combined.
   
   That leads to the shape of him coming toward us down this tube. And he hangs in blackness. I was going to have a little pilot light ahead of him which winds down with a faint humming noise. It’s got a little sensor that looks around, so the thing spins, giving off readings.
    
   Fantastic Film: Essentially the same thing as in the helmet? To see what’s below?
   
   Ridley Scott: Oh, sure. Touch ground before he does. Well, he’s hanging there in
   complete darkness. Can’t see a thing. Then he switches on.
   
   Now this is an idea I wanted to do and we never again really got to develop it. But I wanted his suit to become a beacon light, illuminating what’s around him. So I wanted like 10.000 bulbs on the suit. He said, ”1 am going to light myself up. can you boost me?” And he switches on and becomes like a Christmas tree. Would’ve been great. Never got to it. We’ll use that again somewhere else. But it would’ve been really fantastic.
   
   And he then walks around the interior, slips and falls in. He finds he’s in one piece, so he doesn’t panic. But he’s curious about the large, egg-like things that fill the floor of the room he's in.
   
   All the time this is going on. he’s giving a report on his activities. He touches the egg and begins to examine it as it comes to life before him.    (Fantastic Films #11, October 1979)
7. Ridley Scott: So, I don't know how many minutes we are in now but nothing's happened yet. You don't have to start rock' n' roll you know. So here's he's being lowered into the hold really, this would be argued as the hold of the ship. This is a combination of matte painting and er, hard set. I managed to get the use of laser beam, er, which I could spread in a thin blue sheet which just about photographed, and underneath the laser, I've... releasing, ah, er, smoke gently, so that's why it's behaving like that on the surface as it hits the light, the sheet as I call it, of the laserbeam.
   This is a laserbeam spread thin, like a thin sheet. But it worked great here, I never thought it would photograph because it's pretty low key, but you know with the wizardry of Derek, we got it. So this is all just hand held, lay the sound on as you go through the laser beam, you can hear it, there's a sound to the laser beam, you can hear it now.
   Like a seal.
   I always thought of the laserbeam as the placenta wall for the , erm, eggs' So now he's under, underneath, so now he's inside with'em. (20th anniversary dvd commentary)
8. (00:31:00)Ridley Scott: The man running the laserbeams of this particular moment who had been doing rock shows and experimental laserbeams was Anton Furst who later became an art director and actually did films such as Batman, and erm , Anton was a , was great to work with, with his very small team, and I was absolutely literally blown away by the effect of these beams, because you know, we hadn't seen it before really, and I thought this would be very useful to me to create this skin, like a... (34:00) protection. As John says, a layer of mist, and then slips, goes through unharmed, but maybe that's what is like the membrane, or the.. em.. the protecting the eggs. So let's say he's broken the membrane, Maybe he's triggered something, maybe he hasn't. But if they're now sitting there, prewarned, and programmed , like org... organisms to react if touched.  (Alien commentary from Alien quadrilogy)
9. Speaking of which, that smoke had an unusual source of inspiration: the Who. The legendary English band was about to embark on a tour and was rehearsing near the set of Alien, at Shepperton Studios outside London, when Christian had an opportunity to visit. His friend, production designer Anton Furst, had been tinkering with smoke and lasers to vivify the show and invited Christian over to see his work. “I said, ‘We gotta get Ridley in here,’” Christian recalls. “We needed a ‘membrane’ over the top [of the eggs], but no one knew how to do it. They thought maybe we could animate it afterwards…. So this was sheer luck, that I’d gone up to see the Who.” https://ew.com/movies/2019/04/02/alien-eggs-behind-the-scenes-roger-christian/
10. Roger Christian: I knew Anton Furst from the past and he was trying to make holograms at the time and things. The Who rented the stage in Shepperton permanently for rehearsing and they were rehearsing there and Anton had called me and said "We've got these lasers do you want to see it?" I hadn't seen lasers, nobody. So Les Dilley and I went across and then showed when they fanned it out with smoke it looked amazing so we got Ridley. I said "you'd better come and look at this" and that's what he used, that's true , that's where it came from
    
    VHS Podcast: So what is, it's er er, protection to the eggs? What is after all? What does that light doing here
    
    Roger Christian: Yes, it's protection to the eggs. Protection and when that barrier was broken, then the eggs knew to open so there was someone they could attach to and go off to another planet or spread
    
    VHS Podcast: Some kind of recycled energy because they were still working after all those years on the derelict
    
    Roger Christian: Absolutely. It's an alien craft
    
    VHS Podcast: Yes, it has eternal batteries
    
    Roger Christian: Absolutely (VHS Podcast  Review - Alien (1979) + Roger Christian interview // VHS 26 Apr 2017)
11. (20:15) Interviewer: And there is a story that really caught my eye because it was about one of my favourite bands and it was about The Who and they somehow tangentally helped inspire the Alien egg membrane. Can you tell us a little bit about that?
    
    Roger Christian: Yeah, I was er, erm, in Shepperton studios. The Who used to rehearse. They hired one of the stages and rehearsed. I think it was one of their first tours ever and there was a designer called Anton Furst who was a friend of mine and Anton was developing holograms before anybody else and he was starting to get them to work and he was using (21:00) lasers to do it, so I knew Anton and I knew, I'd seen him somewhere driving in at the carpark, it was one of those innocent conversations
    "Hi"
    "Hi how are you doing?"
    He said "Oh, I'm on the stage with The Who, we're doing lasers and stuff. "
    He said "Come and have a look "
    
    Interviewer: (Chuckle)
    
    Roger Christian: So I, I went in the stage and there were laser beams firing. I'd never seen them before. This was new and I said "These are amazing" and then er, and I think, "can they... they form a membrane like that when they go round these?", and he said "yeah", and i said "Anton , do you mind, can you ask The Who if they mind if I bring Ridley here?", so erm, Les Dilley and I took Ridley over there, erm, and showed him the membrane, 'cause we didn't know how to do the egg,
    
    Interviewer: Hmm
    
    Roger Christian: The blue thing over the eggs, because there's no cgi in those days, you know, nowadays it's easy, there was nothing then, you have to kind of rotoscope or do it by hand, (22:00) and there it was, and they, the others thought "will it go on film?" because Antoine, Anton knew film, and so that's how it happened, and the spread that greeny laser in a certain erm, position, it would make a membrane like right across the floor of the set. I mean, Ridley put smoke into it then it really lights up. As soon as you see the smoke then it becomes a solid kind of beam
    
    Interviewer: Hmm
    
    Roger Christian: And that's how it did, and when you get people dropping through it, you know, you get all these amazing shapes that happened on Alien because that, yeah, that's how that came about, it was a pure accident
    
    Interviewer: That's so cool. I love that, I just love knowing, you know, one of my favourite bands was kind of involved with making you know
    
    Roger Christian: Yeah
    
    Interviewer: One of the greatest movies of all time
    
    Roger Christian: Yeah, it's true
    
    Interviewer: (Chuckle)
    
    Roger Christian:Yeah, they were great, The Who, we, we watched them all the time. (23:00)
    
    Interviewer: I'm so jealous, I, I love The Who
    
    (Fangoria podcast episode17: Class of 79: Roger Christian (Alien Series)) 
12. Roger Christian: We now needed to think of a way of creating a membrane across the alien eggs as described in the script. The English band The Who was huge at the time and had a permanent stage booked at Shepperton for rehearsing. Anton Furst was developing the lasers for them that they were experimenting with, and trying out ideas for using them for a coming live tour. These lasers were newly invented at the time, so were really novel. Prior to this I had visited Anton in his workshop to see some holograms he was working on using laser technology. he wanted to show them to me with an idea of using them in films. This was the first time I had ever seen a hologram live, and it was fascinating - right in front of me was a three -dimensional image. Les and I went across to see him about the egg membrane in the alien egg chamber. The who were rehearsing. Anton showed us the various laser beams and effects they were pioneering, and being new to us, they looked spectacular. Anton showed us how they fired like bullets into the air in different patterns, or shot out like veined light beams, We are used to them now, but this was the first time we have ever seen anything like it. We liked the green and blue laser beams when Anton showed us how they could spread like a membrane across the stage, and we knew we had found an answer to another problem, as long as they looked good on film. Ridley took one look at them and approved them. When he added his customary smoke and tested them out they worked better than expected. The bonus is that when someone broke the light beam by standing in it, it created shapes in the membrane like reverse shadows. With the smoke added for atmosphere the tests looked great, another simple and somewhat lucky solution to a problem that we were pioneering. (Cinema Alchemist by Roger Christian)
13. “One day, I heard from him that he was doing stuff with The Who,” Christian said. “They had rented one of the big stages at Shepperton, and he said, ‘Come and have a look, because I’m using the lasers over there.’ He was doing laser projections all over the ceiling, all over the band. I asked him, ‘Does this fan out?’ He showed me how they would make a kind of layer, and I thought ‘Wow, this is the answer to the eggs.’” (https://www.avclub.com/film-trivia-fact-check-alien-the-who-laser-lights?)
14. Christian went back to the Alien set, got Scott and Dilley, and took him to The Who’s stage. “[Furst] set it up for us, and it sprayed out. Ridley used smoke in everything—every frame of Alien is filled with smoke. So watching the dust in the studio going into it, it formed membranes and you could put your finger in it. So Ridley said, ‘Let’s do it on the set.’”(https://www.avclub.com/film-trivia-fact-check-alien-the-who-laser-lights?)

(from Alien  Anthology blu-ray)