Anyone who watches Monday night television in Australia will no doubt be familiar with Channel 10's Sandra Sully Presents, where one hour documentaries are hosted by, you guessed it, Sandra Sully. Being a newsreader, good ol' Sandy herself is totally superfluous to the actual show and is really just an excuse not to drop straight into the featured documentary. One series that featured over many weeks was the Ultimate Guide To... from The Discovery Channel. Many of them have now been released as double feature DVDs, including this, The Ultimate Guide To Elephants and Mastodons.
We've all seen plenty of nature documentaries I am sure and as discerning viewers we have come to expect great quality productions that are both informative and entertaining. The Ultimate Guides deliver on both counts, and even this doco-loving reviewer learned a few things.
Elephants This is the longer of the two presentations at 52:03 minutes and is great viewing from start to finish. It not only covers the usual elephant stuff such as life span, reproduction, nomadic wanderings, and the strong family structure, but takes a more scientific and analytic look at such things as bone and muscle structure, the evolution of the elephant, and a rather graphic look into their reproductive activities. Be warned that any small kiddies in the room are likely to ask, "Why are those elephants trying to give each other piggy back rides?".
The camerawork is rather good, and there is some use of animation when it comes to the scientific analysis of how elephants are built and how they move. It also takes a brief look into man's impact on elephants and the gradual claiming of their pastures, and man's attempts to learn even more about these beautiful and intelligent creatures.
Mastodons This 49:51 minute episode is less about mastodons (plural) and focuses more on one particular mastodon found buried in someone's backyard pond in upstate New York. If follows the dredging of that pond, and the weeks spent searching through the slush in the hope of finding more bones after a femur was uncovered by a back hoe being used to deepen the pond.
As we witness the paleontologists and volunteers hard at it in their 'mush pit', the action cuts to various experts detailing their various findings, and espousing their mastodon evolution and extinction theories. Sadly, as there are no real mastodons left (or if there are they are extremely camera shy), vision of them is thanks to CGI and while it is not as sleek as the BBC's recent Walking With Dinosaurs and Walking With Beasts, it's still fine viewing.
As with the Elephants episode, most aspects of the mastodon's existence is detailed, analysed, and reconstructed for our viewing pleasure. There are a number of interesting facts presented, and my only criticism is that the narrator, Lance Lewman, makes reference to sabre-toothed tigers, and as we know (after watching Walking With Beasts), there was no such thing, as they are referred to as sabre-toothed cats.
Trivia: Mastodons once wandered across most of the world. Mastodons are not the same thing as woolly mammoths. Mastodons tasted good - apparently.
Although the cover says the presentations are full frame, the Elephants episode has an aspect ratio of 1.66:1, but is not 16x9 enhanced. Both, however, are very clean and sharp transfers. Colours are very natural and well contrasted, and there are some fine looking landscape shots. Close up views are well detailed and there is little to no evidence of grain. Shadow detail is very good, though there are not many instances of shadow. The same can be said of black levels that are infrequent, but solid and deep. There is no evidence of noise.
There is little to no evidence of artefacts, and the image is free from dirt, scratches and marks. There is no evidence of a layer change that indicates each episode is assigned its own layer.
As with most "made-for-television" documentaries, these are presented in Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo and this is more than adequate. The sounds of bull elephants bashing heads highlights the deep and rich low-level sounds, which contrast nicely with the high-level frequencies which are clear and bright. While the surround speakers are silent, the right and left front speakers do a good job carrying the ambient bird, insect, and other animal sounds.
There is noticeable sound separation and panning, and it is all well thought out. Also well thought out is the soundtrack. It has a definite African sound and feel, though at times it tends to be a little too electronic. There are no problems with audio synch, and the narrators for both episodes are easy to understand and well paced.
