ALIEN: COVENANT, Ridley Scott, 2017.
I worked as Concept Artist for the David flashback scene, conceiving and designing it as well as concept artist, art director and supervisor during the production of the scenes in MPC.
Very first concept (for sale on SuperRare:
superrare.com/artwork-v2/alien:-covenant---the-very-first-concept-art-27457)
Here a frame where I designed how the bombs falling over the engineers, inspired by Busby Berkeley choreography.
Busby Berkeley choreography example.
To design the way the bombs fell, also in this case inspired by Busby Berkeley choreography, blending it with a dna helix shape.
As far as the explosion was concerned, I resumed the concept of atomic bomb, which did not explode on the ground, but at 600 meters above it. Regarding the shape of the explosion, I was inspired by an 18th century illustration of the artist and biologist Ernst Haekel.
Scientific Illustration by Ernst Haekel.
The kaleidoscopic shape of falling bombs, is inspired by the phenomenon of Chladni plate.
To design the black goo sloping down, I was inspired by the ink's behavior in water. Evolutions and movements had to look like under the influence of various magnetic fields, as iron dust under the influence of powerful magnetic fields that create shapes as in the picture below. When I showed this concept to Ridley Scott, he called it dearly and rightly, a tree of death in the atmosphere of a Victorian painting.
Iron dust under the influence of powerful magnetic fields.
At some point, during our conversation, Sir Ridley Scott tells me: "Alessandro, I do not want Metachaos, but I want it to be inspired by Metachaos."
Metachaos, that inspired Ridley Scott for several film concepts.
As for the neomorph, I have dealt with his behavior, such as posture, the way he walks, the unpredictable and unstable character, etc.
This is the make-of by MPC (Moving Picture Company) of "Alien: Covenant" Flashback sequence.
Another MPC Alien Covenant VFX breakdown. There are also some scenes that I created as concept artist, from minute 01: 35 to 02: 45
From interview to Charlie Henley, production VFX supervisor.
"During the post an unconfirmed scene where David recalls the genocide of the engineers as a flashback was given the green light and MPC London put together a great team who I'd just worked with on THE JUNGLE BOOK, including DFX supervisor Audrey Ferrara, CG supervisor Ben Jones and Compositing supervisor David Griffiths. They took on the challenge and worked with concept artist and film maker Alessandro Bavari to create this standalone scene that involved many full CG shots including the Juggernaught, Mother Tug Ship, Engineers City, thousands of Engineers and a huge amount of FX simulations for the Pathogen and black goo FX that explodes out of the victims."
From interview to Ferran Domenech, VFX supervisor MPC.
"The adult Neomorph was designed to be very flexible and double jointed so it could get into extremely contorted poses. Ridley Scott was inspired by the work of Alessandro Bavari’s ‘Metachaos’ film. He was invited to join the production where he created sketch poses for the Neo, very dramatic extreme profiles where the knees would raise higher than the head. This created a challenge where the hips and elbows would pinch and lose mass. To help with this, Asset Supervisor Dan Zelcs, introduced a set of very specific corrective blendshapes to help the problem areas."