When Cloverfield opened up as the No. 1 film in the country earlier this month, part of the hype surrounding it stemmed from the movie's mysterious monster who ravages New York City. And that monster was made possible, in part, by Penn State alumnus Eric Leven.

Not that Leven, who served as one of the film's visual effects supervisors, and his team are seeing too many royalties from the film's more than $40 million opening weekend.

"In case you're wondering, we have negotiated a zero percent back-end deal," said Leven, who graduated from Penn State with a film and video degree in 1994.

Not that Leven minds; he noted that his studio's boss, Phil Tippett, told him "you work on a good movie once every 10 years," and he said he is enjoying the fact that the film is playing for packed audiences.

"Most of the movies we work on are horrible," Leven said, adding that he was also the visual effects supervisor for The Santa Clause 3.

Leven said that Tippett Studio, where he works, is well-known for creature effects and design, although in this case, the film's producers had already hired a creature designer before contacting Tippett.

One challenge was keeping the film's monster, which is often seen only in brief glimpses, hidden from the audience.

"We're so used to going 'Look, everyone, here's our giant monster, look how cool he looks!' " Leven said. But he said the script intended to keep the monster hidden from the start, and Cloverfield drew inspiration from films like Alien and Jaws in which "it's scarier to not see the thing."

It was also important to make sure the large, lumbering monster didn't look too much like the costumed actors playing monsters seen in older movies.

"The static designs were really interesting, but he had two arms, two legs and a head ... if not treated correctly, he could look like a guy in a suit," Leven said.

The team helped compensate for this by making small features and appendages move faster than the body as a whole.

Leven also used his work on the bugs from Starship Troopers as inspiration for the smaller, faster parasites that drop from the monster, which he described as "little rottweilers or whirling dervishes."

Chuck Ungar, a lecturer in film who taught Leven in his basic film and video production class, said it can be difficult to capture an audience's interest when many films use computer graphics. Ungar compared the film to the trailers for Hellboy II, Iron Man and The Ruins, which he saw before Cloverfield.

"[I thought] 'I hope Cloverfield is more interesting than those, because they all seem the same,' " Ungar said.

He said he ended up impressed by the film, particularly its perspective from a character's handheld camera, which provided a "very heated view of the action."

Ungar said he has kept in touch with Leven since his graduation and remembers him as a talented student. Ungar described how Leven used to move from long shots to close-ups by moving the camera on a platform, instead of simply zooming in.

This method is more difficult and retakes were costly when shooting with film, which the students had to pay for by the reel, but Ungar said Leven never cut corners.

"It's the kind of stuff that gets the attention of a teacher," Ungar said. "He was a detail man, and I guess you have to be for that kind of job."

Ungar also remembered Leven being "very sure of himself," and recalls that his suggestions to Leven for improvement were often met with a response of "that's ridiculous" and arguments about the changes.

It doesn't seem Leven lost that confidence when he began working on major films. In fact, Leven got to offer some to Matt Reeves, the director for Cloverfield. Reeves, who Leven described as having directed "basically episodes of Felicity before this," seemed a little overwhelmed during an intense action sequence, Leven said.

"Look around where we are, Matt," Leven recalled saying. "You have giant tanks with .50-caliber guns, rocket guns, a monster ... you're totally living the dream. What boy would not want to be in this situation?"

After that incident, Leven said a hectic situation would lead to a familiar comment from Reeves: "We're living the dream. Right, Eric?"