Alien ergonomics

Are there any movie makers who try to get this right?

In the recent preview for “Cowboys Vs. Aliens” you see the alien hand and fingers which look spindly and, well, like typical movie-alien hands. I’ve seen countless movies involving aliens and their technology, yet none of them seem to take into account that their physiology would have to match the development of their technology. If you have an alien with a claw-like hand, how is that species going to come up with the manufacturing infrastructure to make space ships? I’m NOT saying they can’t, but their end products should not look like something built with human hands. But somehow, all aliens use technology and ergonomics that seem to be based on human development. For example, an alien with a claw-like hand is NOT going to use a gun that looks like it was designed for a human hand–or spaceship controls/joysticks that look like they were designed for human hands. Are there any examples where the tools and technology that aliens use were actually designed and evolved from their species? Think about it, an alien with a claw hand has to be able to put together the machines that put together the tools they use. An alien chair, if they have different body types from humans should not look like a human chair.

If you started thinking rationally about what a life form that developed completely independently from life on Earth and trying to stick to that, you’d run into some very difficult storytelling problems.

We anthropomorphise the hell out of aliens because we have a lot invested in the audience being able to quickly apprehend what they’re doing without an unreasonable amount of exposition.

There is a place for attempts at imagining a plausible xenobiology, but movies aren’t a good fit for this and would (generally) tend to suck pretty hard if you tried to work towards that ideal - which is why we use the little cheats that we do.

Hmm not sure about weapons, but Total Recall, and I believe Tommyknockers had hand activated consoles in the shape of the alien’s hands. BSG had a fairly unique computer interface for the skinjobs involving water.

Larry Mudd, I don’t need an entire manufactured civilization but if an alien is holding a weapon or tool, it should look like it could’ve been manufactured by the species holding it. Couldn’t someone just tell a production designer “hey, this is what the alien looks like, come up with a couple of props that looks like that species would’ve developed them based on their physiology.” You don’t have to interrupt or disturb storytelling for that. It would happen in preproduction where their designing everything.

Perhaps if they moved backward, like if the prop maker made a weapon and said, “now what kind of appendage would hold this or be able to make this?”

In Forbidden Planet the Krell’s doors were like upside down diamonds in shape, to accommodate their apparently Grimace-like figures.

The BSG Cylon controls weren’t really thought out, though, just put in because they looked nifty.

The best example I’ve seen is the weapons the Prawns use in District 9, which are clearly designed to be used by claw-shaped hands (and which also had some sort of DNA sensors or something so they couldn’t be operated by humans at all, but that’s another matter).

What is a “Grimace-like figure”?

A figure shaped like Grimace.

Not ergonomics, but in the 1953 version of War of the Worlds their periscope/remote camera was supposed to be based on (and presumably compatible with) the Martian eyes.

Not a movie, but in the novel Priest Kings of Gor, the author goes to great lengths to explain the tools used by the insectoid race known as Priest Kings. He even discusses how they handle written communication when they communicate through the sense of smell.

Unique and fairly cheap to design. It think Independance Day managed to avoid this problem. What we saw of the controls in the alien spacecraft seemed to fit with their anatomy. Plus it was established that the staff at Area 51 had to make some minor alterations to the craft (like seats) so that humans could pilot it. It’s been awhile since I read the novelization, but I think it even has Dr Okun metioned having to make adjustments to the life support system & gravity control so that humans could even survive the trip up to the Mothership.