Post a press release. Monday, August 17, 2026 Los Angeles, CA Zoic Studios has earned a Television Academy Emmy(R) nomination for its visual effects work on FX's "Alien: Earth," with Executive Creative Director Aladino Debert recognized in his role as Zoic's VFX Supervisor on the series as part of the team nominated for Outstanding Special Visual Effects in a Season or a Movie. Working across all eight episodes of the acclaimed sci-fi series, Zoic delivered more than 250 visual effects shots over the course of a 14-month production. Among the studio's contributions were work bringing two of the series' alien species to life, the parasitic Ticks and predatory Orchids, along with screen and UI effects designed to remain faithful to the distinctive retro-futuristic visual language of the "Alien" universe. For the Ticks, officially known as Species 19, Zoic developed four distinct stages of the creature's life cycle, from tiny tadpole-like larvae and burrowing juveniles to full-grown adults and engorged forms swollen with their victims' fluids. Each stage required its own approach to design, modeling, rigging, look development, animation and simulation while remaining biologically connected as a single species. Drawing inspiration from real-world blood-feeding organisms, the team studied how skin stretches, fluid moves and bodies react under pressure to give the creatures an unsettling sense of organic weight and movement. The Orchids presented a different challenge: creating creatures that blended plant and animal anatomy and behavior while balancing apparent beauty with an underlying sense of danger. Zoic treated the Orchid's tentacled "lure" almost as a character in its own right, drawing from tentacled creatures and snake behavior to develop its movement and predatory instincts. For the creature's climactic attack on Siberian, the studio combined match-moving, creature animation, simulation and a digital double to create increasingly complex physical interaction between the performer and the Orchid. In select shots, the actor was replaced entirely with her digital counterpart, allowing the team to create interactions and creature behavior that had not been anticipated during principal photography. Zoic also contributed to the series' screen and UI work, developing visual effects inspired by the distortion created when a strong magnet interferes with an old cathode-ray tube television. Through chromatic aberration, image warping, progressive degradation and subtle environmental reflections across display glass, the team worked to ground the imagery within the 1970s retro-futurist aesthetic that connects "Alien: Earth" to the original 1979 film. "We're incredibly proud to see its work on "Alien: Earth" recognized by the Television Academy with an Emmy(R) nomination for Outstanding Special Visual Effects in a Season or a Movie," said Aladino Debert, Executive Creative Director at Zoic Studios and the studio's VFX Supervisor on the series. "Among the many challenges we had the pleasure of tackling, bringing the series' incredible alien creatures to life was both an exciting creative opportunity and a technical achievement, all within the rich retro-futuristic world that has defined the "Alien" universe for decades. The visual ethos of the original film has had a profound influence on my own career, which made contributing to this universe especially meaningful. It took the passion, talent and dedication of our amazing Zoic team to bring that vision to the screen, and we're honored to have been a part of it." Projects of this scale require extensive collaboration across production and multiple visual effects partners. Debert is nominated in his role as VFX Supervisor (Zoic Studios) alongside Production VFX Supervisor Jonathan Rothbart, Production VFX Producer James Ledwell, Production VFX Production Manager Mitchell Callisch, Production Associate VFX Supervisor Woei Lee, SFX Supervisor David Fletcher, On-Set VFX Supervisor Jeffrey A. Okun, VFX Supervisor Chris Ritvo of Untold Studios, VFX Supervisor Viktor Müller of UPP, VFX Supervisor Will Towle of FIN VFX, VFX Supervisor Ryan Freer of Pixomondo and VFX Supervisor Maksim Došlo of Crafty Apes. The Emmy(R) nomination marks another milestone in Zoic Studios' longstanding history of recognition by the Television Academy and a period of extraordinary creative momentum for the studio. In the past five years alone, Zoic has earned five Emmy(R) nominations, two VES Award nominations, an AICP Award nomination, and a BAFTA Award, building upon a legacy that includes Primetime Emmy(R) award wins for the iconic series "Firefly" and "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation." Today, the studio continues to help shape some of the most ambitious worlds and stories across film and television. Its recent and forthcoming work includes HBO's "House of the Dragon," Apple TV's "Widow's Bay," Prime Video's "Elle," Netflix's "Little House on the Prairie" and "The Hawk," Peacock's "The Miniature Wife," A24's "Backrooms," Hulu's "#Skyking," and director James Gray's highly anticipated new feature film "Paper Tiger." The achievement also coincides with the 20th anniversary of Zoic's Vancouver office, reflecting two decades of seamless creative collaboration across the studio's North American team. The 78th Annual Primetime Creative Arts Emmy(R) Awards will take place September 5 and 6, 2026 in Los Angeles. Contact info. Phone: (310) 461-8866

Zoic Studios, the legendary visual effects studio, has announced Nicole Fina has joined the company as senior executive producer of its advertising arm.