2009
10.17

Torso

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Introduction

The back spines are my favourite part of the Alien. I am glad that this kit has the fifth, top spine since many xenosuits do not have this (for good reason, as I found!).

I wanted the spines to hang at a “realistic” height. Many Alien costumes have the spines half way down the back (again, I found a very good reason why people mount the spines so low). It was only when I wore the costume for the first time that I realised that the long head is liable to clash with the 5th spine in particular. This is a particular problem when the Alien assumes a “predatory”, crouched pose.

However, the design of my harness allows the back piece to be adjusted higher or lower. For the NSC “Alien Encounter” event I set the spines particularly low to avoid the possibility of the head clashing with the spines during a show. Lowering the back pulls the front up, making it look a bit untidy (see the Gallery).

Attaching spines to back piece

The five spines were slightly overfilled with foam. Therefore, a slice of foam had to be chopped off so that they fitted nicely on the back piece.

spine_cutting

Short lengths of wooden dowel was inserted into the back piece (as shown below) to strengthen the attachment of the spines. These dowels also served as a mounting point for the harness.

back_dowels

Rough holes where drilled into the spines. The foam-latex and foam-wood joints were stuck using contact adhesive and then the latex edges where trimmed an stuck down with Super Glue.

The major problem was the lower-left spine. When I first stuck it on it was nearly touching the upper spine and looked rather silly. I then spent 2 hours “ungluing” it with a scalpel and re-glued it. It is better, but not perfect. Incidentally, I have had the opportunity to examine a screen-used “Aliens” stunt suit and that also has a slightly wonky lower-left spine. I understand that it is an “organic” creature, but it should be a “Perfect Organism”!

Chest/Ribs

The front part of the torso needs to be cut down the back along the curvy mould lines. If you are particularly skinny, you may need to cut away more latex, but you must take care to preserve the curviness of the edge. This edge meets up with the line at the base of the spines on the back piece. The arm and head holes also need to be cut out.

cutting_ribs
I also slit the chest up the front and inserted a bit of fabric with a zip. This makes the torso easier to put on and also gives an opportunity to make the chest bigger.

torso_join

It takes some care to line up the ribs with the back piece. The ribs are glued on using a combination of contact adhesive and Super Glue.

Harness

The torso needs a harness to make sure that the weight of the back spines don’t pull the front up around ones neck. The harness that I used was a UK army webbing ammo harness.

I mounted the back piece on the harness by screwing a thin sheet of plastic to the dowels ensuring that the screws went through the harness webbing. This gives a study mounting without using glue.

Shoulders

The shoulder “tubes” are hollow latex, so they are prone to flopping over. I put some packing foam into shoulders to make them stand up. This solution isn’t perfect; I plan to fill them with expanding spray foam.