Giger's concept art for Dune, which depicted his trademark biomechanical style, made a huge impression on O'Bannon. During this period he also collaborated on director Alejandro Jodorowsky's famously unproduced version of the novel Dune, where he came across the work of Swiss artist H.R. This gave O'Bannon the idea of writing a scary movie based around the concept. The movie followed the aimless misadventures of a crew of astronauts, with one sequence finding Pinback - also played by O'Bannon - chasing a small alien creature through the ship's vents. The idea was first conceived by writer Dan O'Bannon, who collaborated with director John Carpenter ( Halloween) on a low-budget sci-fi comedy called Dark Star in 1974.

Given the lifecycle of the xenomorph itself, its somewhat fitting Alien also had a difficult birth. Giger helped transform the project from a b-movie into a genre classic. The Alien concept art designed by artist H.R.