#HTE

Convincingly Futuristic Designs: How FBFX Tackles Spacesuits for Hollywood

Of all the things you could pursue with a degree in industrial design, working for a place like FBFX has got to be one of the most interesting. This UK-based design and fabrication house, which has access to toys like a 7-axis robotic milling machine, a plastics manufacturing shop and metalworking facilities, is responsible for producing what they call Special Effects Costumes for the film and entertainment industries.

This includes items like fully-articulated space suits for movies like The Martian and Alien: Covenant. You might think that freed from the responsibility of designing a suit that would actually keep one alive in outer space, the designers would be relieved of some pressure. But they do have to actually create something that’s not only visually convincing and suitably futuristic, but that an actor can actually wear and move around in, sometimes for hours, sometimes suspended from cables.

Solving for those three issues requires a fairly fanatical level of attention to detail, ergonomics considerations and mechanical problem solving.

Here Tested’s Adam Savage visits FBFX’s facility, where Project Manager Tom Streatfield-Moore, the company’s head of CAD, goes over some of their incredibly convincing and functional spacesuits from Covenant. It is a shame we didn’t get to see some of these details on-screen: