Props List used for Alone

Here are some pictures of the props we needed to use when filming our film.

Television

Television Remote

Maddie's Phone

Costumes for Alone

Here are the pictures of Megan's costumes when she plays Maddie.



Pyjama Top

Pyjama Bottoms

Jeans

Hoodie

Changes Made Along the Way

When we were planning our film, editing and also when we were filming, there were some subtle changes that we needed to make. The first change that we made was the brother’s name. He was originally going to be cast as Jack, but we changed the name to Ben so that we could use a door name.

The next change that we made was the poster. As you can see in an older post, we had three different posters to choose from. The first one that we made had a picture of Maddie standing in front of a house. The house was black and white and Maddie was the only thing in colour. The general feedback for this was that Maddie also needed to be in black and white as she looked a little out of place. We made this change and this gave us our second poster. We then showed this off again and people preferred Maddie being in black and white, but they said that she needed to be a bit smaller as she looks out of proportion to the rest of the poster. We also changed this and then we showed off this one. The feedback was very positive and we decided to keep this poster.

Another change we made was to do with the boyfriend. Originally we was going to cast him in towards the end of the film opening but we thought that it would be hard to portray him as the boyfriend and it might leave the audience very confused about who it was. Instead of using this we decided to use a different shot. We thought that when Maddie ran outside, she could see and car and a general pedestrian to disappear to give it more of a dramatic feeling to Maddie and we hope that this was portrayed to the audience.

When editing we made some changes to the sound. When showing off the first draft of Alone. We received feedback from classmates and teachers. Our teacher Mrs Field said that there were too many shots of Maddie walking up and down the stairs. She suggested taking one of them out as it could make the audience lose concentration. She also said that when the title of Alone appears, it looks like there is a light flickering in the background. This is what we wanted to get across. She said that we could put a light bulb flicker to make it more obvious that it is a light.

When we were putting on the titles, one of our classmates had an idea that the title could flicker out like the light in Alone. It would also make them individual and more interesting to look at instead of a boring fade in and out.

Questionaire for Alone

Q1: Did you enjoy the film?

Q2: What was your favourite bit?

Q3: If you were to direct the film, what would you change or do differently?

Q4: Would you be interested in watching the rest of the film?

Q5: Was the music effective and did it portray the genre of the film?

Q6: Was it edited well and what did you think of the editing?

Other comments:

Class Feedback Alone Final

Here is a video of our class giving us some feedback from our final draft.

Teacher Feedback Alone Final

Mrs Field: Our Media Teacher

'I really liked how the blinds on the Film 4 started like how the opening started by looking out of the window.'

Compared to your first draft, the acting vastly improved. Megan looked more scared and gave a better emotion to the audience.

I really liked the outside shot. I liked how she went outside without her shoes as it showed her panic and made it more realistic. I also liked how I could see Megan's breath in the air. I also liked how when the car and boy walked past, they faded later as if to imply that they were coming to help.

On the first draft the 'no contacts' was hard to see and also you could tell that it was an image. I liked how you have edited so that you cannot see that it is an image and it is also a lot clearer to read.

I like the flicker on the titles as it adds more mystery and fits the genre. It also gives it some individuality and is not as boring as a basic fade.

Mr Butcher: An English Teacher

Mr Butcher really liked our film opening. He said that it was 'amazing'. He gave us one thing that we could change and that was the button press when she turns on the television. He said it sounded a little too loud and out of place. We lowered the sound to make it sound more realistic and when we showed him he said it was a lot better.

GBHS Year 8 Reviews of Alone

The one comment that came from most year 8's was that the fade was very cleaver and they also thought that the music was very good. They thought it was very scary and helped to build up suspense. They also said it was very mysterious. With the fade, they thought it was very cleaver how the car faded as well. This also left lots of enigma codes with the children as they did not know why everyone was disappearing.

The things that they said could be improved was the acting and the shocks could be louder. But most responses were very positive and gave good feedback.

Alone Final Draft

Here is the final draft for our production Alone.

Class Feedback for First Draft of Alone

In class we watched all of the rough cuts and gave some feedback to all of our classmates. We then received all of the feedback to help us re shoot or improve some of the titles. The class scored us out of 60 as if it was our real thing.

The average score we received for our production was 45. This is slightly inaccurate as we received some marks a lot higher and lower than the average which brought the average down. We had some very strong points which we should not change but we also had some items that needed changes. Our strong point was our sound. Everyone said that it was really good and it fitted well with the genre. Some people thought that the genre was unclear but some people understood that it was a horror and thriller. People also liked our sound effects. The alarm clock was also a strong positive. People liked the sound and also how loud it was.

The titles we used had some mixed reviews. Some people really liked the font and the colour but some people thought that some of the words were unclear against the windows. There was also a few spelling mistakes and grammatical errors which people picked up on and we have already changed them.

Most of the reviews about the acting were very positive, but they did think that there needed to be some more emotion in the facial expressions towards the end. This was also put to us from our teachers and when we re shoot we will take this into account.

Our class mates were really impressed with the amount of camera angles and different types of shots we used. People also really liked the editing and how that Maddie's family disappears.

First Draft of Alone

Here is the first draft for our film Alone.

Synopsis Planning

The film will open with Maddie waking up and going downstairs and trying to turn the TV on. The TV will have no signal and Maddie will go upstairs to try and find her family but cannot find them upstairs she then checks her phone which has no contacts. She will then begin to panic and run downstairs into the dining room. She will see her family which will then fade away. This will cause Maddie to worry and panic even more. Maddie will then run to the front door and see her boyfriend who will also fade away. At the end Maddie will open the front door and this is where the scene will end with the screen fading to black.

There will be different themes conveyed such as isolation and panic. We will see this through Maddies actions. It will also be conveyed through tense music as Maddie realises that she is alone. People disappearing will make people realise that something is going on.

Official Poster for Alone

 

This is the poster we have chosen to go around the country to help promote our film. We listened to all of the feedback we got from our classmates and teachers and tried to apply all of the changes to make it look even better. The general opinion on Maddie being in colour was not good. Most people thought that she looked better in black and white as it matches the background. We think it looks better like this. Our teacher also said that there was a window behind Maddie’s head that stuck out to her and took her eyes off of the main image we want to portray with the poster. We moved Maddie over to cover the window so all of the viewers’ attention will be on Maddie and not on the background.

Film Posters for Alone

Here we have the three film posters that we have made to promote our film. It shows Maddie standing outside a house on her own. The text is big and bold to stand out. We asked a few of our classmates about our poster to see what we could improve.

Richard: I think that the image of the girl is too big. You could shrink her down a bit to fit the scale of the background.

We chose to do this as we thought it looked better and more realistic.

Miss Brookes: There is a window behind Maddies head which takes the eye off of Maddie, maybe move the picture or colour out the window.

We moved the picture of Maddie over to block off the window.

Below is the three film posters we have made.

Music Research

To research sound I looked at similar films and how they used sound in different scenes. I looked at some of our inspirations such as I am Legend. In I am Legend there isn't much music because the silence is used to show how alone and isolated the character is. A lot of similar films also use silence and the sound of nature to convey that there are no more humans.

I then looked at theme songs for our inspirations and found that they create a very eerie and sounds like slow realisation as the music builds up. In the theme for 28 days later the music builds up and gets more intense. I think we should use something similar as Maddie will get clues of her situation as the beginning of the film progresses. I think this will help the audience understand what Maddie is feeling without her saying anything. We will need to find some similar music to this that is not copyrighted.

I think we could use sound effects to give the feeling of isolation and loneliness. I think using sounds of nature such as birds will create the atmosphere that we want. Putting more emphasis on the sounds Maddie makes will make the audience aware of the silence and make the atmosphere very eerie.