ESSENTIAL!

NOW FOR THE

2-DISC COLLECTOR'S EDITION 

DVD PACKAGE

Before we get into the nitty gritty of this stunning World Exclusive DELETED 2-Disc Special Limited Collector's Edition of Disney's Dinosaur boasts an absoultly stunning, Exclusive..........

PICTURE & SOUND

WOW!

Disney presents "Dinosaur" in the film's original 1.85:1 Aspect Ratio, and this simply stunning presentation comes directly from the digital source, resulting in a magnificently sharp and clean picture.

This is really about as good as it gets, and I found the film itself to be visually jaw-dropping. Sharpness and detail are nothing less than perfect throughout the movie; the level of detail visible is especially remarkable; some scenes almost take on a three-dimensional feel.

Colours are beautiful throughout the film; lush, deep greens and a wide palette of other colours look natural and vibrant, with no flaws at all.

Speaking of flaws in general, I didn't find any throughout the film; no pixelation, no shimmering or other problems. When it comes to Disney's presentation of "Dinosaur" I just can't find anything to complain about - this is certainly reference quality, no doubt about it.

SIMPLY FLAWLESS!

This Stunning World Exclusive DELETED  2-Disc Special Limited Collector's Edition of Disney's Dinosaur also comes jam-packed with Exclusive Special Features, including:

DISC ONE:

* Commentary by directors Eric Leighton and Ralph Zondag

* Commentary by production team

* Sound Effects Track

* 3 Set-Top Games: "DinoPedia" - Dinosaur Facts; "DinoSearch" - Find hidden pieces and assemble dinosaurs and "Aladar's Adventure" - Virtual Reality game

* 4 "Behind-The-Scenes" featurettes: "Building A Better Dinosaur", "Sound Design", "Special Effects: The Monster Cloud" and "Where In The World Are We?"

* Interactual PC Hyperlink

* TheatreVision
"Active Subtitle Track": - Fossil Icon appearing at selected moments in the film

- 3D Workbook: Opening Sequence

- Lemur Live Action Reference

- Live Action Shoot: The Ritual Tree

- Progression Reel: The Meteor Strikes

- Dinosaur Models

- Deleted Scene: Scavengers

- Scene in A Different Light

- Voice Recording

- Deleted Scene: Eema Gives Up

- Storyboard To Film Comparison

- Deleted Scene: Neera saves the Dinosaurs

- The Cave Miniature Set

- Foley Sound Effects Demonstration

- Alternate Ending

DISC TWO: 

* History And Development

* Original Story Treatment

* 3-D Workbook To Final Film Comparison

* Dinosaur Design Featurettes

* Location Featurette

* Visual Development

* Character Design

* Computer Animation Tests

* Voice Cast Featurette

* Deleted Scenes

* Publicity Materials (Trailers/TV Spots)

* Easter Eggs

Audio Commentary: This is an commentary track from Directors Eric Leighton and Ralph Zondag along with visual effects supervisor Neil Krepela and digital effects supervisor Neil Eskuri.

The group generally focuses on the effects that went into the making of each scene, taking apart the layers that went into each shot of the movie - and in a movie like this one, there's certainly a lot of work that went into each and every shot.

It's not completely "effects-driven" mind, and the rest of it is a talk about elements of the story and some behind-the-scenes details. There's not much at all in the way of pauses, and the 4 are able to talk throughout the film. It's a bit technical at times, but this is a great track and well worth a listen.

Audio Commentary: This is a commentary track hosted by producer Pam Marsden, but containing information given from many different members of the production team. The track is a little more general, focusing on various aspects besides the special effects. Although the effects are discussed at times on this track, I found these talks to be a bit more interesting as the discussion seemed slightly more energetic and went through more topics.

Film Facts Fossil Dig: This feature is accessable from the first disc while watching the movie. There are three ways to watch these behind-the-scenes clips. You can either select to have an icon pop up during the movie, access from their own menu or go to the chapter index, where scenes that have this feature are marked with a logo. These featurettes cover various topics about the production, and even offer some alternate footage, such as an alternate opening that's in rough form. There's also a more detailed look at how some of the effects were completed, as well as footage of the crew out in real-life locations during production. The featurettes are called "3D Workshop Opening Sequence", "Lemur Live Action Reference", "Live Action Shoot: The Ritual Tree", "Progression Reel: The Meteor Strikes", "Dinosaur Models", "Deleted Scene: Scavengers", "Scene In A Different Light", "Voice Recording", "Deleted Scene: Eema Gives Up", "Storyboard To Film Comparison", "Deleted Scene: Neera Saves The Dinosaurs", "The Cave: Miniature Set", "Foley Sound Effects Demonstration" and "Alternate Ending".

Aladar's Adventure: A fairly neat little game, this allows viewers to go through caves in search of other dinosaurs. Very nice animation.

Also On Disc 1: "Dinosearch" Game; "Dinopedia" featurette about the history of dinosaurs and "Sneak Peeks". including trailers for "Snow White", "Disney's California Adventure", the Summer 2001 animated "Atlantis", "Lady and the Tramp 2", "102 Dalmatians", "Hunchback Of Notre Dame 2" and an interactive "Atlantis" prequel game.

Proof Of Concept Test: The first element of the "development" section is this "proof of concept" test, which offers an early look at a scene that's a combination of effects and storyboards.

Live Action Backplate Test: This is an early test of the combination of effects and real backgrounds.

Early Presentation Reel: This is a combination of storyboards and paintings of the characters; generally seems like it was done to give Disney a greater idea of the kind of visual look and scope that the final picture would have.

Presentation Reel: With this reel, there is more shots of completed effects. It's also set-up somewhat like a rough trailer.

Visual Development: This is an additional gallery of images from the development process.

Also On This Menu: If you look in the development menu, there is a little dino logo towards the bottom of the screen. Clicking it brings up an old clip from a Disney documentary talking about the begining of animation.

Designing The Dinosaurs: This is a 7 1/2 minute featurette, which offers interviews with the main animation staff of the film, who discuss some of the technical challenges and obstacles that had to be done in order to design characters and achieve the "look" they wanted the various characters to have.

Building The Dinosaurs: This is an additional 7 1/2 featurette that takes a look at how the characters would work and if their actions and mannerisms would look realistic and natural. We watch the animators slightly fix and re-define the characters through effects and models.

Character Design: Visual galleries for "Aladar Design", "Aladar Turnaround", "Kron Design" and "Kron Turnaround" as well as "Neera Design" and "Neera Turnaround". There are also "design" and "turnaround" sections for "Bruton", "Baylene", "Eema", "Uri", "Carnotaurs" and "Velociraptors". In addition, galleries for "The Herd" and "Unused Character Designs" are available. The "turnarounds" are 360 degree spins around a still image of the character.

Hidden Feature: There's another dino logo in the main menu for Creating The Characters, and clicking on it brings up a reel of "outtakes" - with this kind of animation, there's occasionally some errors that happen (due to the wrong key hit, I suppose) that messes up the animation. Some of the clips are rather interesting to see.

Building The Lemurs: This is a 7 minute featurette that takes the viewer through the conceptual stages of how the lemur characters were going to look - as with Disney, "the cuter the better" was probably the goal.

Also: There is a preliminary lemur design art gallery, along with galleries and "turnarounds" for "Pilo", "Yar", "Zini" and "Suri".

Hidden Feature: In the main menu of the production process section, click on the little dinosaur logo for an old Disney clip about Dinosaurs.

Creating A Prehistoric World: This is a very interesting featurette; where the previous featurettes took a bit more of a general look at the characters, this featurette takes a more in-depth look at the production process, from planning out a scene to capturing the locations to going through the rough sketches and animation. Most fascinating is a tool that the visual effects supervisors can use on the actual location called a "3D workbook" where they can look at the basic animation. There's also other fascinating tools that were brought into the "Dinosaur" production process, with a camera that can race down wires to re-create the look of a dinosaur running. The featurette runs 8 minutes.

The Monster Cloud: This is a featurette that takes a further look at the meteor shower that rains down upon the characters early in the movie. There's a massive amount of effects and layers that went into this scene alone, and the featurette takes the viewer through every detail of the fascinating process that went into this scene alone.

Dino Cam: The visual effects supervisor provides a commentary for this progession demonstration looking at the "Dino Cam" - the camera that can be run down a wire to give the impression of a dinosaur running - and then shows the elements that are added in at every step towards the final scene.

Aladar Joins The Herd: This is a production progession demonstration which allows the viewer to use the "angle" button on the remote to switch from the story reel to the 3d workbook to the final film. Or, comparisons can show the differences between the story reel to the final film and the 3D workbook to final film.

Production Progression: Reels that show the progression between the various steps for "Opening Sequence", "Aladar Meets The Misfits" and "Aladar Finds Water".

Music: This is a featurette that talks about where the filmmakers wanted to take the musical score, from the feel of James Newton Howard's score to how it adds to the film and what role it has in scenes. A shorter featurette, this is only about 3 minutes in length.

Sound Design: Being someone who is very interested in sound, I found this featurette on the film's sound design to be interesting. It talks about how various sounds were captured from actual animals to use throughout "Dinosaur". There is also some interviews with the actors on how they got into the "sounds" of their characters and a look at how the foley artists use other items to create the various creature sounds that the characters make in "Dinosaur". The film's supervising sound editor was Frank Eulner, who has also worked on films such as "The Haunting" and "The Horse Whisperer".

Audio Mix Demonstration: A similar feature was included in the special edition for "Toy Story", where viewers can watch a scene (in this case, "The Monster Cloud" scene) and choose to either watch with "Dialogue", "Music" or "Effects".

Deleted Scenes: There are 6 deleted scenes included; "The River Crossing", "The Grandparents Parish", "Struggle For A Resting Place", "Bruton & Lieutenants Attacked", "Death On The Trail" and "Old Gotoma". These scenes are in rough format, but are interesting to watch to see some of the early story ideas.

Hidden Feature: Clicking on the dino logo in the publicity menu brings up an animated short called "Recycle Rex".

Trailers: 3 Trailers for the movie (trailer 1 & 2 + a "convention" trailer) in Dolby 2.0. It would have been nice if these trailers were presented in Dolby Digital 5.1 audio, as I believe the "trailer 1" had been included on a previous Disney animated disc in Dolby Digital 5.1 audio.

TV Spots: 4 TV Spots.

Publicity Gallery: A still image gallery of the various elements used in the marketing/advertising campaign for "Dinosaur".

DVD-ROM Web-link.

Also: If you click on the "Staff Meeting" post-it note in the bottom corner of the main menu on the second disc, you'll find a complete list of DVD Production Credits.

PHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEW!

WHAT A PACKAGE!

BUT WAIT THAT'S NOT ALL FOLKS

As this World Exclusive DELETED 2-Disc LIMITED Special Collector's Edition of Disney's Dinosaur... comes packing an Exclusive........

5.1

DOLBY DIGITAL

SURROUND SOUND

AUDIO TRACK

!BUT WAIT THERE'S MORE!

Yes as this stunning World Exclusive DELETED 2-Disc LIMITED Special Collector's Edition of Disney's Dinosaur, comes packing a room shaking........

WORLD EXCLUSIVE TO THIS

COLLECTOR'S EDITION

5.1

DTS

SURROUND SOUND

AUDIO SOUNDTRACK

WOW!

The soundtrack is presented in 5.1 Dolby Digital Surround and a WORLD EXCLUSIVE, simply fantastic 5.1 DTS Mix

The film offers an audio presentation that matches it's superb Aduio. The score fills the listening space at every chance it gets, and sounds particularly rich and clear. There are scenes throughout the movie that provide more agressive surround use, especially during the more intense moments. Even during the quieter scenes, there are some subtle uses of the surrounds that proved to be particularly enjoyable.

The rip-roaring DTS Mix is the only way to go and I found it to be a very entertaining, effective Home Theatre expirence. Bass is often strong, and James Newton Howard's score adds to the excitement of some of the film's scenes. Dialogue obviously has been recorded by the actors providing the voices, and sounds clear and easily understood.

A SIMPLY AMAZING DVD PACKAGE!

Disney's Dinosaur is one of the legendary stuidos most expensive film and every single dollar can be seen on the screen in this simply wonderful tale of a time before man.

As for the stunning Collector's Edition DVD Package? The THX image quality is absolutely stunning; the direct-from-digital presentation is flawless. The World Exclusive DTS Mix is a cracker, not to forget there's a whole heap of informative, fun & interesting extras packed onto the 2 DVDs.