Shooting “Alien: Romulus”

Returning to the roots of the “Alien” franchise by being as much a horror film as a sci-fi, “Alien: Romulus” is set between the events in the first two movies: Ridley Scott’s “Alien” (1979) and James Cameron’s “Aliens” (1986). Directed by Fede Álvarez, it follows a group of young space scavengers including Rain Carradine (Cailee Spaeny) and her adoptive brother Andy (David Jonsson), who make an unpleasant discovery while salvaging fuel and parts from a derelict spaceship. Cinematographer Galo Olivares speaks here about shooting the movie in Budapest with ALEXA 35 cameras and ARRI/Zeiss Master Prime and Ultra Prime lenses supplied by ARRI Rental.

What kind of preparation did you do for the film? To what degree did you want to reference the visual styles of previous “Alien” movies?

I was lucky enough to be part of the process from a very early stage, meeting with our director Fede Álvarez and production designer Naaman Marshall. They were brainstorming every single element of the story and of this universe, from the look of the vehicles to figuring out exactly how and where our characters were supposed to live. And yes, there were a lot of references to the first two “Alien” movies, because this film happens only 20 years after the first one and we wanted to make it fit correctly in time.

Can you describe your working relationship with Fede?

It was funny, I felt like I had known Fede for a long time, but actually I just met him for the first time on this film. Our communication was pretty fluid and we had the chance to have a long prep in Budapest, so there was a lot of back and forth with ideas and what we wanted to achieve with this film.

How did you decide on the ALEXA 35 camera?

I think the ALEXA 35 was relatively new at the time. I had always been a fan of the ALEXA Mini and I love the Super 35 sensor, so I was a bit bummed when I thought that cameras will just keep having larger sensor sizes and never go back to basics. But then ARRI brought out the ALEXA 35 and the sensor is more like a Super 35 size, which made me happy because it means I can use all the old, classic lenses that I love. 

The small size of the ALEXA 35 was extremely helpful because some of our sets were built to be as claustrophobic as possible, but the camera was so compact that we could put it wherever we wanted. And then the wide dynamic range of the ALEXA 35 was just mind-blowing. We had to handle so many different light sources at the same time, but the camera responded beautiful in all of our light conditions, capturing an amazing amount of detail in the highlights and shadows. Sometimes we pushed the ISO setting in low light, but we never felt that we were introducing any noise.

Can you give an example of one of those very claustrophobic sets?

Well, for instance we had the chest burster sequence, and that was a case of trying to make room for everyone involved in the scene – puppeteers, actors, camera operators, sound, focus puller – all in this ultra-cramped space of the cockpit. It was built to be so small on purpose because Fede wanted it to feel like they are in the back of a utility truck, not a luxury spacecraft, so it was pretty uncomfortable for all of us. But it worked out beautiful and is one of my favorite scenes in the film.

What dictated your lens choices?

I started by testing some of my favorites: the classic Zeiss Standard Speeds and Super Speeds, and then I moved on to testing ARRI Rental’s custom-tuned Ultra Primes. Ultimately, I decided to use ARRI/Zeiss Master Primes because they render skin beautifully, they have stunning contrast and great flare handling, and practically no aberrations. I felt that any artefacts would distract from what we wanted to show, and that the Master Primes would be the perfect way to amalgamate the classic “Alien” films with a modern touch. Occasionally we used Ultra Primes if we needed a really small lens, or the wide-angle coverage of the beautiful Ultra Prime 8R.

What was your approach to the lighting and color palette?

One of the key elements of this film was having our wonderful colorist, Mitch Paulson. I have worked with him before and he came in at a really early stage of the process, helping me out with one of his fabulous LUTs, which he tweaked for me after some camera tests. Initially we were trying to reduce the electronic hue in some of the colors because we basically just used LED lights on the whole show. The camera handled them pretty well, but with the custom LUT we ended up with a beautiful look and everything settled into its own world.

There were lights built into all the sets and I think we probably had at least one lighting effect in every single shot of the film. I was lucky enough to collaborate with gaffer Krisztián Paluch and I remember going crazy at times with a small wireless board as we were doing the light effects manually, plus our big board that had its own operator.

Are there any other scenes that you’re particularly proud of?

There are many scenes that I’m really proud of, but as the film was essentially shot chronologically, shooting the characters of Rain and Andy walking on the colony was a big deal for us. It was the very first thing we shot and it was the only real location; the weather was miserable and basically everything there is real. I don’t remember exactly how long we spent prepping it, but I remember going there with Krisztián the gaffer to place some lights and start figuring out how we were going to do it, because it was supposed to be shot in a oner and everything had to work for the whole take. But it ended up great and is one of my favorite moments.