Anyone watched this yet? Saw the DVD in the shops today and wondered what the colour recovery was like on episode 1.
Invasion of the Dinosaurs DVD release
- Thread starter Candlelight
- Start date
I've ordered it but it isn't likely to be delivered before today at the earliest. Whats more, according to Amazon episode 1 is in black and white 
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http://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-...ef=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1326271731&sr=1-1
Invasion of the Dinosaurs
Starring Jon Pertwee. Returning to London the Doctor and Sarah find a city almost completely devoid of life. The civilian population has been evacuated in the wake of an unimaginable event: somehow Dinosaurs have returned to terrorise the Earth.
DVD Extras
• Commentary
• People, Power and Puppetry - Cast and crew look back on the making of this story
• Billy Smart’s Circus - featuring Jon Pertwee
• Deleted Scenes
• Now and Then Returning to the filmed locations
• Photo Gallery
• Easter Egg - Seek, locate and discover what happens when the Doctor meets the dreaded Floor Manager…
• Production Information
• Subtitles
Coming Soon Trailer
Radio Times Listings
Programme Subtitles
Digitally remastered picture and sound quality with Episode 1 in monochrome, and Episodes 2-6 in colour
.http://www.amazon.co.uk/Doctor-Who-...ef=sr_1_1?s=dvd&ie=UTF8&qid=1326271731&sr=1-1
Invasion of the Dinosaurs
Starring Jon Pertwee. Returning to London the Doctor and Sarah find a city almost completely devoid of life. The civilian population has been evacuated in the wake of an unimaginable event: somehow Dinosaurs have returned to terrorise the Earth.
DVD Extras
• Commentary
• People, Power and Puppetry - Cast and crew look back on the making of this story
• Billy Smart’s Circus - featuring Jon Pertwee
• Deleted Scenes
• Now and Then Returning to the filmed locations
• Photo Gallery
• Easter Egg - Seek, locate and discover what happens when the Doctor meets the dreaded Floor Manager…
• Production Information
• Subtitles
Coming Soon Trailer
Radio Times Listings
Programme Subtitles
Digitally remastered picture and sound quality with Episode 1 in monochrome, and Episodes 2-6 in colour
I've ordered it but it isn't likely to be delivered before today at the earliest. Whats more, according to Amazon episode 1 is in black and white
Both versions are included. The colour version is there as a bonus as it's not considered up to broadcast quality.
I'd no problem with it, but I suspect it'll be one of those things that everone feels differently about.
Yeah, basically with the colour recovery technology they could access the Y (black & white) and V (red and green) but not the full YUV video signal, which meant the blues and yellows (the missing 'U') were absent. Some of the colours apparently look pretty iffy, but good effort all round.
There are quite a few in his series that have both black and white and color episodes in them and the switch from a B&W to a color episode has never jarred me.
Pertwee has usually got you by the throat with his performances, so nothing, not even a color change can distract you.
Pertwee has usually got you by the throat with his performances, so nothing, not even a color change can distract you.
Ambassadors of Death, I loved the fact there were color scenes available to mentally project onto the B/W footage. Didn't jar me a bit.
My mom hated it, said it was hard to follow switching back and forth like that, and woulda preferred it was the original all B/W we saw on PBS in the 1980s
(Of course I realize B/W isn't "The Original", but, it's the original way we saw it)
I believe there's a Dalek Story too, with a B/W episode, but, I think Ambassadors of Death, Invasion of the Dinosaurs, and The Dalek Story are the only mixed ones?)
Planet Of The Daleks was released on tape with two B&W eps. but they were later colorized for the DVD release.
I'm working on this for my website but basically:
The Silurians 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
The Ambassadors of Death 5 (plus 6 with faults, and about 90 minutes of the remaining episodes)
Terror of the Autons 1 2 3 4
The Daemons 1 2 3 5:
Recolourised using a combination of 16mm black & white telerecordings and off-air NTSC colour footage recorded on u-matic (initially betamax) tape.
The Mind of Evil 6 has about 4.5 minutes of colour footage remaining so will be recoloured via alternate means (see below).
Inferno 1 2 3 4 5 6 7
The Claws of Axos 2 3
Colony in Space 1 2 3 4 5 6
The Curse of Peladon 1 2 3 4
The Sea Devils 1 2 3 (and 5 given the original PAL master is damaged)
The Mutants 1 2
The Time Monster 1 2 3 4 5 6 (6 is redundant, see below):
Recolourised using a combination of 16mm black & white telerecordings and colour NTSC 2" quad tape recovered from overseas.
The Time Monster 6
Recolourised using a combination of a black & white PAL 2" quad tape and a colour NTSC 2" quad tape recovered from overseas.
Planet of the Daleks 3
Invasion of the Dinosaurs 1
The Mind of Evil 2 3 4 5 6 (planned presumably, episode 1 has no chromadot information)
The Ambassadors of Death 2 3 4 6 7 (presumably if the 'traditional' attempts to recolour the episodes fail)
Recolourised using a (brilliant) technique whereby colour information is recovered from black & white telerecordings in the form of chromadots embedded in the film print. These chromadots can be use to extrapolate the UV video signal information and rebuild a colour print.
The episodes I have not listed exist in their original PAL 2" form, except for Spearhead from Space which exists on it's original 16mm colour film.
(For the sake of argument, the BBC archived the original masters onto D3 tape format in the 90s, and then when each episode is mastered to DVD it is transferred onto a DigiBeta tape)
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The colour recovery is in places a bit muted and in others a bit garish, but overall a good effort and a good approximation of the original. (I have of course seen episode 1 in its full proper colour back in 1974.) I doubt I'll ever watch the black and white copy again. This is a terrific DVD of one of the very best Doctor Who stories ever.
Update: My DVDs have arrived. well actually they came yesterday when I was out so I had to traipse to my local sorting office this afternoon to collect them. Glad to know that there is a colour version of episode one on there. Depending on the quality of the colourisation I doubt I'll ever even bother withe monochrome episode.
Isn't there a bonus feature called Doctor Who Stories-Elisabeth Sladen on the Invasion of the Dinosaurs DVD?
Considering the color on the original probably wouldn't have been much better, unless the colorization was truly awful (think the colorized Three Stooges movies) I can't see too many people clamoring to stick with the black and white. I imagine there wouldn't have been too many complaints if they'd stuck with the B&W version too. (Similarly, I admire the efforts to restore other Pertwees, but at the end of the day if a cost or timing issue is holding things up, just release the B&W versions. It's not as if any of these will ever be released to Blu-ray anyway!
)Alex
Did they do anything SFX-wise? I remember the dinosaurs looking really awkward in the original.
Yes its from interviews recorded for the Story Of Doctor Who (for its 40th?). Theres another one for Lis and one for Louise to follow.
Its rather unfinished, and not stable across the screen. You get the idea of what it would look like in colour, but its certainly not near broadcast standard - its easy to see why they wouldn't sign it of as the default version.
They did the normal level of defringing, and dewobbling (some where on film), but couldn't replace them for the budget.
So they are better than they've ever been, but thats not saying much
Yeah, hehehe. In one scene it looks as if they just pushed a plastic dinosaur over an edge - which is probably what they did. Too bad they couldn't do anything about the more awkward scenes. Modern SFX would make this story pretty awesome.
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