Two recent graduates of the Digital Animation programme at the University of Hertfordshire made it to the final twelve films to be shown at the Virgin Media Shorts awards at the BFI in London on September 29th with their third year film, Alienated. Alienated is a tale of an alien called Al, and his attempts to blend in and be accepted by human society. It mixes humour with an underlying message about the difficulties that people face when they move from one society to an alien one. Alienated was the only student film that made the final shortlist, the rest of the films were from production companies.

The graduates were awarded a 35mm film print copy of their animation, presented to them by Johnny Vaughn and Oscar nominated director Daniel Barber. The Oscar winning Actor and Director Kevin Spacey watched their film as well as many other notable members of the UK’s film and television industry.

Their film will now be shown in 200 Virgin Cinemas across the UK before the main feature of the evening.

Alienated can be viewed online at http://vimeo.com/1032854

In the attached group photo you can see (from left to right) Mohammed Aqeel Ahmed, Daniel Barber, Kristina Josephides and Johnny Vaughn

There is an interview with Aqeel on Virgin’s website where he talks about his experience of creating the film

http://www.virginmediashorts.co.uk/news/74

Alienated has also been shortlisted at Napoli Film Festival, Naples, Italy, HDFEST Film Festival, New York and Los Angeles, USA, Baltimore Women’s Film Festival, USA and Brisbane International Animation Festival, Australia