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Friday, 8 May 2020

The amazing aliens of Star Trek Beyond

Star Trek Beyond featured more than fifty different alien species, with multiple unique beings for each race seen among the citizens of Starbase Yorktown, the corridors of the USS Enterprise, and on Altamid. The make-up department lead by Joel Harlow created such an incredible menagerie, that there's an entire book dedicated to their efforts in the production! Harlow and his team have also shared much of their work online, giving us a better chance to get to know many of the only briefly glimpsed species of Beyond. Continue below to check them out:

One of the most exotic designs was known as Shlerm, photos here from Joel Harlow's website show off both the impressive character design and their grand costumes:


We can get an even closer look via images shared by sculptor Mikey Rotella:


Marc Opdycke created the ginormous hands for this being, and shared a view of those too:


Shlerm was designed by Carlos Huante, who came up with many of the more unusual designs in the film. You can see the species' inception here, in an image shared by Hunate on his website, along with a even more unusual tentacle headed alien that alas wasn't realised - In order to use actors most of the background aliens are basically humanoid, even if they do feature some extraordinary heads.


Here are a few more of Huante's more unusual concepts for aliens in the film:








This blue being is "Egghead" (via Joel Harlow):


Egghead was designed and made by Erick Rodriguez, who shared these looks at the creation of the sculpt on his Instagram:





Here's Boggs (via Joel Harlow website and Facebook):



Reporting on the film, Make-Up Artist Magazine shared this fantastic full body photo of Boggs:


Boggs was designed and sculpted by Don Lanning, who shared these photos of the sculpt on Facebook, and painted by Kyle Huculak, who also shared a look at the creature's creation:



Marc Opdycke created the hands to match the head, and also shared a look behind the scenes:




Here we have Snail, with a good example of the variant paint applications some species were given (via Joel Harlow):



Sculptor John Wrightson and painter Kyle Huculak also shared images of their work on the character:


Even better, Huculak shared this video to get a really good feel for it:


Huculak also worked on the hands, and he and Joel Harlow have shared several images, and video, giving a really good look at these:






This three eyed being is Barlowe (via Joel Harlow):


John Wrightson shared an image of his work on the sculpt for this character too:



Here's Crabbie, complete with multiple eyes on stalks (via Joel Harlow):



Here's Russ, in many variants (via Joel Harlow):




One of the Russes keep the company of one of the most unusual designs, the Elephant Slug (via Joel Harlow):




Sculptor Norman Cabrera shared a couple of pictures of his work creating the head for this character:





Another atypical lifeform can be found among Carlos Huante concepts; this octopus like being is delightfully noted as a pianist!



Back with the humanoids, here is Throg (via Joel Harlow):



This googly eyed being is Loleeki (via Joel Harlow):


Here's the sculpt by Lee Joyner, and a delightful glimpse behind the scenes test fitting the mask, from makeup artist Caitlin Groves:


But even more delightful is the gormlessness of Carlos Huante's concept:



This chap with amazing ears and beautiful purple highlights is Jin, you can see further variants below, including the female version known as J-9 (via Joel Harlow):




Sculptor Norman Cabrera shared this look at his sculpt for this species:


I'm not entirely sure, but I suspect these arms by Marc Opdycke are also for this species. They certainly have a similar aesthetic:



Our fishy friend here is Satine. Well he makes me think of some aquatic, but the sculptor, Matt Rose, drew inspiration from a venus fly trap for those spines (via Joel Harlow):



Here we have Deep C-Zer, which was originally designed as a female version of Keenser. When that idea was dropped they gave her a new face so to still use the impressive crest (via Joel Harlow website and Facebook):


Here's a look at the sculpt by Don Lanning:



Here's Ty Vana, another really nice example of how different paints make for gloriously varied characters (via Joel Harlow website and Facebook):




Here we have Pesca (via Joel Harlow):


This was another character sculpted by John Wrightson, who shared this look at his work:



This is Merell (via Joel Harlow):



And then we have two similar but subtly different characters, Marti and Jae. They share the same forehead, but have different different ears, chin, cheeks and colouration (via Joel Harlow):


Actor Christian Sloan gives us an even better look with this video on Instagram:



Here is Sir Olden (via Joel Harlow):


Sculptor Mikey Rotella shared these looks at the creation of this character on his website and Instagram:



Carlos Huante had many concepts for this character, which he originally imagined as one of the bad guys. You can see even with that unusual forehead disc, the final character is quite subdued compared to what he might have been!






This guy wearing an ancient Egyptian style false beard is Boltaan (via Joel Harlow's website and Facebook):



Boltaan was another of Carlos Huante possible villain concepts, which you can really feel in his rather must-have-an-evil-plan costume concept!




Here's Joseph (via Joel Harlow and Make-Up Artist Magazine):



This is another character Carlos Huante conceived, and again you can see he could have gone in some interesting directions!




This Bezos, who was played by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos! (via Joel Harlow and Make-Up Artist Magazine):




This kind of dinosaury chap is Wadjet (via Joel Harlow website and Facebook):




Here we have the giant eyed Coco (via Joel Harlow website and Facebook):




And this old school alien is known simply as Classic (via Joel Harlow and Kyle Huculak):




A slightly creepier feeling bald headed alien here is Brok (via Joel Harlow):



Here we have Jaskell, who was made up of parts of several of the other aliens (via Joel Harlow):




This helmet wearing alien is Akima (via Joel Harlow website and Facebook):





This character looks a lot like a Romulan, because he reuses a forehead, but his distinctive ears make him Ala (via Joel Harlow):



This is Shazeer, who lost his beard by the time he got to screen:


Here's Carlos Huante's concept for the character:



This is Wilbur (via Joel Harlow and Kyle Huculak):




This is Sheldon, another character painted by Kyle Huculak, who shared another video of this sculpt too:






Sil was of course one of the more prominently featured aliens, and featured an elaborate fingered head, vital to the story (via Joel Harlow):




Here's a look at her creation care of the Creative Handbook, which has a really good article giving credit to everyone in the make-up team on the film:



And surely the most extraordinary alien of the film, the amazing Natalia (via Joel Harlow):




Natalia's hands were sculpted by John Wrightson, who shared this look at his work, while Harlow and Creative Handbook shared a looks behind the scenes at the work on Natalia's head:




Even Natalia's teeth, created by Tracy Lai, are amazing:


Here's another set of teeth Lai made for another alien in the film:



Here are a few more Carlos Huante's concepts for aliens I don't think made it in the end:





Now to some of the more prominent aliens: From the start of the film we have the Teenaxi (via Joel Harlow):



And then down on Altamid we meet the scavengers. This first one is Quills (via Joel Harlow):



This was another character Don Lanning designed and sculpted;.he shared these looks at his work, including an earlier maquette with more Walrusy features, while Make-Up Artist Magazine shared a photo of Carolyn Williams hard at work applying all the quills:





Then we've got Reptilicus (via Joel Harlow website and Facebook):




And Zavanko (via Joel Harlow):



The real bad guys on Altamid were of course the bunch led by Krall. His transformation throughout the film means we saw several different versions of the design (via Joel Harlow and Make-Up Artist Magazine):







His hench-people are Kalara (via Joel Harlow):



And Manas (via Joel Harlow website and Facebook):




There are good guys too. Here's Keenser (via Joel Harlow):


The Keenser prosthetics were resculpted for the film by Don Lanning, who designed him originally. He shared this look behind the scenes, and Make-Up Artist Magazine shared another:




And then we have the stunning monotone of Jaylah (via Joel Harlow and Make-Up Artist Magazine):




Finally, some familiar species. Here are Vulcan from Yorktown, played by no less Joel Harlow himself, and his wide Cindy (via Harlow):


And a closer look at the ears by Marc Opdycke:


We also have an Orion (via Joel Harlow):


And from Carlos Huante's concepts, suggestions Andorians and Ferengi were being pondered:



If you've enjoyed all this, you can find out lots more about every alien in the film in the excellent book Star Trek Beyond: The Makeup Artistry of Joel Harlow, which details the story behind each character and the people that made them. You can also find even more behind the scenes images from the film on Joel Harlow's website, and Carlos Huante's website. And you can read about work on the film in articles from Make-Up Artist Magazine and Creative Handbook.

You can also see loads more of the work of the many artists mentioned above (who are just part of the huge team that worked on the film) on their various social media; if you're interested in special effects make-up you'll find way more beyond Star Trek:

For lots more behind the scenes coverage from all of Trek, check out my behind the scenes tag. To keep track of all the latest Kelvin timeline news, have a look back through my Kelvin tag, for previews, behind the scenes, tie-in fiction, and other merchandise updates.




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1 comment:

  1. rocketdave9 May 2020 at 16:58

    I'm going to have to get that book. I do love how much creativity went into a lot of those alien designs, though I can't help wishing they had mixed in more familiar species.

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