Prometheus: Carlos Huante's Babyhead

leading from

Babyhead
and

Carlos Huante

a) Carlos Huante came into the Prometheus as the first creature designer on board the project with a concept for the transformed Fifield with an unused concept from his work for Steven Spielberg's War of the Worlds that came out back in 2005 (see Origins of Carlos Huante's Babyhead).

The original concept was for a relatively small creature with three legs,

This creature concept went by the name of Beluga head since it's head resembled to some degree that of a baby Beluga Whale in some way.

Ridley liked the design so much that he asked Carlos to use it for the film but it never was.

They didn't want the first film to have too many monsters, which was a sentiment that Carlos didn't agree with, but then again it wasn't his movie.

Carlos Huante's War of the Worlds Shwa Babyhead. no1

b) For the Prometheus project, Carlos changed the legs of his creature to become elongated and fawn like, almost reminding one of the legs from Giger's unused Bambi Burster concept for Alien 3. He decided that these grandfather morphs should have completely unhinged mandibles. The pallette and the jaw should be something like a goblin shark mouth or an architeuthis giant squid beak., and he also had the idea that they could, in place of the ejecting tongue, produce and "Acid Ball" that they "spit" at the victims."

Carlos Huante's Babyhead storyboards

c) This seemed to reflect a concept that Ridley already had in mind back at the time of Alien with the alien being like a fawn or young animal that you go up to and it lashes out, as a sort of beauty and the beast type of thing.

Carlos Huante's Prometheus Shwa Babyhead A/ Beluga-head larvae
Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/BQZkohOh6V2/?taken-by=carlos_huante

Carlos Huante's  Prometheus Shwa Babyhead B
Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/BQZkbEshJWN/?taken-by=carlos_huante 

Carlos Huante's Prometheus Shwa Babyhead B alternate angle
Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/BQZkknkh9ju/?taken-by=carlos_huante

 

Carlos Huante's Prometheus Shwa Babyhead mouth concepts / 
Beluga head / Fifeld creature - from benign to rage .  
Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/BQZki36BZUu/?taken-by=carlos_huante

Carlos Huante's Prometheus Shwa Babyhead raising to full height

d) However as Carlos noted in his notebook, Ridley Scott liked the idea very much, and continued to develop the idea futher with the help of Neville Page, but then realised that Carlos' original concept from long before the Prometheus project was always the best.

Belugahead experiment by Carlos Huante

e) However there came a point where he gave up the dream of including this creature and went for a Fifield who was much more humanoid in form.

1. Carlos Huante: I walked into the very first meeting prepared with the Beluga head, which pre-existed the movie.  (Carlos Huante's interview for AVPGalaxy conducted by Jaime Prater/ ThisBethesdaSea, Posted by ThisBethesdaSea on November 11, 2012)    
2. Carlo Huante: The Beluga head.. the creature that was supposed to come from Fifeld. One other note on the beluga head.. I walked onto the movie with this one already done.. I had actually done this for another movie but it wasn't used.. Ridley liked it so much that we went after it..This modification here is the one that the modelers in the Scott free art dept. on the project tried to realize.. but no one could do it .. I was hoping to be able to sculpt this maquette myself but the budget left me off the film.. (Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/BQZkbEshJWN/?taken-by=carlos_huante 
3. Carlos Huante: These grandfather morphs should have completely unhinged mandibles. The pallette and the jaw should be something like a goblin shark mouth/ like an architeuthis beak. I was also thinking that they could, in place of the ejecting tongue, produce and "Acid Ball" that they "spit" at the victims.  (Carlos Huante's notes from video showing his Prometheus portfolio) 
4. carlos_huante For those who don’t know.. the first two images for War of the Worlds are the images that got me hired by Ridley for the Alien/ Prometheus series.. this is what I used as ammo to sell the Albino and beluga whale look for all the characters even the Engineers.. even though the engineers went more marble statue.. I later introduced the idea of the Goblin shark.. back then not too many people had even heard of the animal and for sure no one in production. It was such an empty canvas and thus a lot of fun.. (https://www.instagram.com/p/BfsifhxHrAK/)  
5. galleryanatom @declan6914 the Deacon and the beluga were for a different script. The Deacon should only ever come out of a man...the biomechanical look should have only showed up out of an Engineer.. that’s what i pitched .. my idea for all of them was that they were albinos.. because they were created from albino giants.. which would lightly suggest they had nothing to do with humans as creators.. (https://www.instagram.com/p/BfsifhxHrAK/)  
6. galleryanatom @declan6914 it was supposed to..but the idea for the Space Jockey was modified to be the Engineers.. I personally wish it stayed in the direction of the first film.. i would liked to have seen it all a bit more fantastic and alien.. just my opinion (https://www.instagram.com/p/BfsifhxHrAK/)  
7. declan6914 @galleryanatom I'm curious to know if the "giant albinos" ties in with the very first encountered "Space jockey", from "Alien", considering it's size was so big. The "Bio-mechanical" trait makes sense. (https://www.instagram.com/p/BfsifhxHrAK/)
8. Carlos Huante: "Ridley liked this design so much he asked me to use it but then we never did.. they didn’t want the first film to have too many monsters.. a sentiment I did not agree with.. but of course it wasn’t my movie.. " (https://www.instagram.com/p/B0jxl_sA5q0/ July 31st 2019)