Development of the special effects for Aliens began in May 1985, with John Richardson supervising a 40-person team at Stan Winston Studio.[33][71][72] L.A. Effects Group created miniatures and optical effects. Cameron lacked contacts at the more established special effects studios and avoided using them because he believed his hands-on approach would not be welcomed.[73] He also did not rehire many Alien crew members because he did not want to be restricted by their loyalties to the first film. Those who returned were often given a higher status (such as Crispian Sallis, Alien focus puller and Aliens set decorator).[52][74] Cameron had enjoyed returning artist Ron Cobb's work on Alien,[75] and conceptual artist Syd Mead was recruited because Cameron was a fan of his work on films such as 2010: The Year We Make Contact (1984).[53]
Sets and technology
Mead designed the Sulaco, the marines' spaceship. He conceived it as a large sphere with antennae, but Cameron wanted it to be flatter; the full craft had to pass the camera, and a sphere would not work with the aspect ratio.[33] Mead designed the craft as a commercial freighter carrying a military unit. Its exterior was designed with a row of loading doors, a crane, and large gun fixtures to defend against threats.[76] Mirrors were used as a cost-cutting measure to increase the number of sleeping pods and add a power loader.[50] Cobb designed the dropship, the armored personnel carrier (APC), and exteriors of the colony and its vehicles.[77][78][79] The Sulaco's dropship was designed to be life-size, for use on the Sulaco set,[53] but a smaller replica was used for some shots.[76] The APC was a disguised pushback tug for a Boeing 747.[76] The derelict alien spacecraft used in Aliens had been in historian Bob Burns III's driveway since its appearance in Alien.[31]
Most of the colony, apart from the main entrance used by the marines, was constructed in scale miniature form. The set was about 80-foot (24 m) long to accommodate the sixth-scale APC replica. The set was so large it had to be laid out diagonally across the stage, and forced perspective was used to add in buildings that would otherwise not fit.[80] Cobb used a stylized design for the colony, resembling a western frontier town. It featured a makeshift construction from cargo containers, broken filming equipment, and beer crates.[81] The alien nest scene was one of the earliest filmed; Weaver's participation was delayed by three weeks because of production issues on her previous film Half Moon Street (1986), and the scene was one of the few not involving her. The Acton Power Station location was filled with decaying asbestos and three weeks were spent having it professionally cleaned, during which time the alien hive was fabricated in clay spawning hundreds of fiberglass and vacuum-formed castings that were installed at the station over a further three weeks.[82] Cameron wanted to vertically pan as the marines entered the hive, but disguising the area above the marines would be time-intensive. A hanging miniature, about 12-foot (3.7 m) square, was made from plywood and styrofoam, hung just above the actors' heads, and carefully blended into the larger set. After Remar was replaced, Cameron wanted to reshoot the scene, but the miniature had been destroyed; he was able to edit the scene to conceal Remar.[83]
The marines' smart guns weighed 65 to 70 pounds (29 to 32 kg), and were constructed from German MG 42 machine guns attached to a steadicam and augmented with motorcycle parts.[84][85] Since getting in and out of the smart-gun rig was difficult, the actors kept them on when not filming.[5] The pulse rifle was made from a Thompson submachine gun and a Franchi SPAS-12 pump-action shotgun in a futuristic shell.[86] Weaver was opposed to weapons in general, but Cameron explained weapons were secondary to the core narrative of Ripley bonding with and protecting Newt.[32][33][86] Weaver found using the weapons strange and difficult, due to their weight and her concern about pulling the wrong trigger.[33][86] Automated sentry guns were also constructed for Aliens, although they do not appear in the theatrical cut. Real machine guns were positioned atop remote-controlled hydraulic tripods that allowed them to pivot horizontally or vertically. The guns were capable of firing up to 600 wooden-blank rounds per minute that were shattered into small splinters by baffles in the muzzle and incinerated by the heat generated in the barrel.[87]
A cast was made of Henn's upper body and her stunt double's legs to construct a lightweight dummy for Weaver to hold when carrying a gun; Henn's weight plus a gun would have been too heavy.[33] Goldstein had never handled a gun, and held her weapon incorrectly in closeups, so Hurd stood in for her.[31] The flamethrowers were functional. The art department had covered the sets in an unspecified substance to artificially age them; the flamethrowers vaporized it, causing fire and heavy smoke. Goldstein struggled to breathe and, since improvisation was encouraged, Paxton thought she was acting until he also became breathless.[31][58]
The nuclear explosion of the colony in the finale was created by shining a light bulb through cotton.[31] Reebok designer Taun Le was commissioned to design custom sneakers for Weaver to wear in the film. The only mandate was that they be laceless so one could easily slide off of Weaver's foot during the finale.[40][88]
Creature effects
H. R. Giger, who designed the Alien creature, was reportedly disappointed that he could not be involved in Aliens.[89] According to Hurd, Giger was contractually obligated to Poltergeist II: The Other Side (1986) and Fox was not allowed to negotiate with him.[90] Giger was replaced by special-effects creator Stan Winston. Cameron also contributed to designs but was not as concerned with the warrior aliens because they were on screen only briefly.[89] In redesigning the alien warriors, Cameron remained faithful to Giger's work while building on it. Conscious that the creatures would be seen by audiences as people in costumes, he enhanced the designs by extending their arms and often filmed them hung from wires or from atypical positions to make them appear more inhuman.[52] The aliens were played by dancers and stuntmen in lightweight costumes that allowed them to move quickly. Several 8-foot (2.4 m) mannequins were used for aliens that were contorted into inhuman poses.[33] Although hordes of alien creatures appear to be in the film, there were only 12 alien suits: simple black leotards covered in molded foam were used for faster-moving shots, and detailed models with articulated upper bodies and mouths for closeups.[91] When the aliens were shot and destroyed, puppets were hung up and detonated. The aliens' acidic blood was a combination of titanium tetrachloride, cyclohexylamine, acetic acid and yellow dye.[33]
The facehugger design remained faithful to the original Alien design, but the overall appearance was made to appear more organic, and its eight legs were made more finger-like, enhancing the detail on the knuckles and adding fingernails.[92] Unlike in Alien, which only involved one substantial jumping scene, the facehugger models used in Aliens featured full articulation for their tongue, legs, and tail, allowing for more action set pieces. The tail was also lengthened about 6 in (15 cm) to give it more functions such as a whip-like action.[92] Nine operators were required for the fully articulated facehugger; other less-detailed variants were used for simple actions such as scurrying across the floor. The design team struggled with making it scuttle believably while moving the appendages; they eventually developing a control wire along the floor that activated a gear inside it, causing the appendages to move as it was pulled along. Several rubber facehuggers were made to be thrown or blown up.[93] Manipulating the facehugger inside a water tank was also difficult as the tank had to be watertight, limiting the use of control cables. A method was developed that required fewer cables to move the facehugger around the tank; the tail was fitted with a spring that caused it to snap back and forth.[92] Winston added arms to the chestburster alien form (since the adult form had arms), explaining how it could drag itself out of a host's chest. Two chestburster puppets were used: a reinforced one, and an articulated one for movement. A puppeteer punched the former through a fabricated latex-foam chest; the scene took several takes to film because it could not pierce the clothing.[11][94]
A deleted scene in Alien established a life cycle for the alien creatures in which a lifeform would be cocooned and transformed into an egg that birthed a facehugger.[52][95] Inspired by a beehive-like hierarchy, Cameron believed the vast field of eggs on the derelict alien craft would come from a much larger creature, the queen, with the other alien creatures serving as her drones.[52] Winston described Cameron's initial queen design as a combination of a praying mantis and Tyrannosaurus rex influenced by the alien warrior design.[89][96] Cameron said dinosaur influences were unintentional as he considered them "boring"; his goal was to extrapolate on Giger's warrior designs to create a large and powerful creature that was also swift and overtly female, describing it as "hideous and beautiful at the same time, like a black widow spider". The queen has elongated, large forelimbs, with smaller secondary ones underneath, but Winston redesigned the legs by adding a double joint to make it more inhuman.[96] Cameron and Winston worked on several concepts to vivify the queen, including large puppets, miniatures, and costumes with several people inside. A frame was built large enough to hold two people, covered in black polythene bags, and hung on a crane. The prototype was a success, and Cameron wrote the alien-queen scene.[31][97] The final alien queen was a 14-foot (4.3 m) puppet made of lightweight polyurethane foam.[85] Two people sat inside to control the arms; the legs were controlled by rods connected at the ankles, and a separate person whipped the tail around with fishing line. The head was manipulated with a combination of servomotors and hydraulics controlled by up to four people. The effect was hidden by lighting, steam, slime, and smoke.[31][97] The Stan Winston Studio had not used hydraulics and considered them a learning experience. They were essential for moving larger parts of the queen puppet, including the head, and a foot pedal in the body could hydraulically move the tail up and down.[71] Shane Mahan took several weeks to sculpt the head by sight, based on a maquette; computer technology to scale up the model's design did not yet exist.[98] Two heads were built: a lightweight, fragile one; and another that could survive some damage. Each was articulated with hydraulics and cables to control the queen's mouth and lips.[71]
To create the effect of the queen piercing Bishop's chest with her tail, Tom Woodruff Jr. and Alec Gillis constructed a chestplate for Henriksen with a rubber segment of the queen's tail flattened against it. The tail was pulled forward by wire, apparently exploding through Bishop's torso. A rigid piece of tail, attached to a body harness, was used to show more of the tail moving through Bishop, and Henriksen was levered upward as if he was being lifted by the tail. To complete the effect, a dummy of Bishop was constructed with a spring-loaded mechanism that forcibly separated his upper and lower body, as if the queen had ripped him in half. Once separated, Henriksen's upper body was below the set and a fake torso attached up to his shoulders. The android blood was milk, and after several days of filming, it was sour and foul-smelling.[99]
John Richardson designed the mechanical power loader exosuit, with input from Mead. As with the queen, a prototype was built out of wood and polythene bags stuffed with newspaper to see how the movement would work.[33][53][97] The finished design was so cumbersome that stuntman John Lees, in a black skinsuit, operated it from behind.[33][97] The battle between the queen and power loader was extensively choreographed, as Weaver risked serious injury battling a large, unwieldy animatronic.[97] The camera was sometimes moved to simulate subjects moving faster. The scene of the queen running at Ripley was one of the more difficult shots; the wires and rods had to be concealed, since they could not be removed in post-production.[97] Miniatures were used for parts of the scene with go motion, a version of stop motion with motion blur added.[97]
