Evolution of the Space Jockey via Giger's Necronomicon

Part of:
Unlocking the design of the Space Jockey

Necronom V

 a) The figure sticking out of the back of the rider in "Necronom V" became the starting point for the pilot of the derelict vessel, that came to be known as the Space Jockey. (whole picture: top right, detail:  second right)

1. Giger (CFX1, p64) "Ridley suggested another one of my Necronom creatures as a guide. They don't look much alike now, but it was a starting point: and the space jockey kind of grew up from there in bits and pieces."
2. FX:  What was the inspiration for the Space Jockey? 
   

   

   Necronom V detail

   
   H R Giger: Ridley Scott pointed to a part on the top of my painting Necronom V and asked me to do something like it. (FX, 7, 1999 (spanish magazine) )

b)At the beginning of Ridley's work on the storyboards, he took the whole torsoe and head of the "motorbike" riding figure in Necronom V as the seat for the "space jockey". (see below)

Ridley's storyboard

1. Ridley Scott: "As they enter the derelict, I wanted them to come up over the edge of something and into this vast chamber that's dominated by a huge chair. In preparing  this frame of the storyboard, I went through Giger's Necronomicon and took this character, whom we call the "space jockey", because I wanted a fossil, almost, one which you'd have a hard time deciding where he leaves off and the chair,  on which he died, begins.
   So here they are with this dead space jockey frozen in death to the weapon he was firing when he died. And he's kind of gargoyle-like and spooky.
   
   Sometimes we got very close to the films visuals in the storyboard"
   (Fantastic Film, number 11 (US), p 28-29)