Russell Coight's All Aussie Adventures-Series 1 & 2 (2002)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy	Featurette-Russell's Bonus Bits x2 Featurette-Russell Coight on GMA Audio Bites-Russell Coight's Favorite Phrases Featurette-Time to Hit the Publicity Road Featurette-Behind the Scenes Interview Gallery-Photo Easter Egg
Rating
Year Of Production	2002
Running Time	293:47 (Case: 326)
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (13:08) Dual Disc Set	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Tom Gleisner
Studio Distributor	Big Crack Production Roadshow Home Entertainment	Starring	Glenn Robbins
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Dual
RPI	$49.95	Music	Liam Bradley

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	Auto Pan & Scan Encoded	English Dolby Digital 2.0 (224Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.78:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English for the Hearing Impaired	Smoking	Yes
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	Yes, Clips and Credits comments

    Russell Coight's All Aussie Adventures is a comedy series about an outback adventurer who travels the countryside visiting scenic locations and highlights native flora and fauna.

    Following in the footsteps of the Leyland Brothers, Troy Dan and Steve Irwin, Russell Coight (Glen Robbins) is the host of a television show set in the Australian outback. During each episode, Russell sets off on an outback tour visiting scenic locations and examining the local fauna and flora along the way. Russell tries to let city slickers know the reality of living in the outback, gives tips on finding bush tucker and lets viewers know about his passion for conservation. Unfortunately, it is not long before something goes wrong and some kind of incident occurs.

    This popular Channel Ten television series was in the top ten programs last year and has recently finished screening its second series. The show was created by a number of people from the Channel Ten talk show program The Panel. It was written by Tom Gleisner with additional material provided by Glen Robbins and Santo Cilauro. During the second series, Rob Sitch also provided additional material. Santo Cilauro was also responsible for the camerawork during both series. This is an entertaining show, despite many of the gags being very predictable, but by the end of the second series it does seem that they have exhausted almost all possible situations.

    Each disc contains a complete series of the show. I have included a very short description for each episode but as these may contain some minor spoilers you may wish to skip directly to the Transfer Quality section.

Series 1

• Red Centre 1 (S1E1) - Russell heads off over 800 miles to help some old mates with their annual cattle muster.
• Red Centre 2 (S1E2) - Continuing his journey, Russell tries to make it in time for the annual cattle muster at a friend's farm near Alice Springs.
• Daintree (S1E3) - On a trip through the Daintree Rainforest, Russell heads right into the heart of the fragile wilderness.
• High Country 1 (S1E4) - A group of inner-city kids head off with Russell on a trip through the southern highlands.
• High Country 2 (S1E5) - The group of city kids continue their journey though the high country.
• Cooktown (S1E6) - Russell travels to Queensland to attend a special wedding 200 miles north of Cooktown.

Series 2

• Muster (S2E1) - Russell heads north to Woodfield Station Western NSW to help some old mates with a cattle muster.
• Tourists 1 (S2E2) - A group of four overseas tourists take a tour of the Australian outback with Russell.
• Tourists 2 (S2E3) - The group of four tourists finish their trip throughout the high country with Russell.
• Explorer 1 (S2E4) - Russell follows in the footsteps of explorers Oscar Forbes and William James Montgomery.
• Explorer 2 (S2E5) - Russell continues his journey to find the last resting place of explorer Oscar Forbes.
• Rare Roo (S2E6) - Russell travels to north Queensland to return a rare kangaroo named Hero to the wild.
• Rogue Croc (S2E7) - Russell heads to FNQ to help out an old mate with a crocodile problem and takes along one of his greatest fans.

Video

    Each episode is presented on the discs as an individual title with no separate chapter points, limiting simple navigation within the episode. A small collection of highlights for each episode is available for the first series but this option is not provided on the second disc.

    Episodes 1 and 2 of Series 1 are presented at an aspect ratio of 1.33:1. All other episodes are presented at an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 and are 16x9 enhanced.

    The transfer is quite sharp throughout and always reveals high levels of detail. During much of the dark footage from the night-time scenes, some low-level noise is present. Examples of this low-level noise may be seen at 8:58 and 10:41 during S1E4 and at 12:21 during S2E3. This low-level noise is inherent in the original source material and is not a fault of the transfer. It is only slightly distracting. The dark sections of the transfer display only an average level of shadow detail with little detail visible in the black backgrounds of the shots. This problem is again inherent in the original source material.

    The colours displayed during the transfer are always highly saturated and constantly appear to be accurately reproduced. As the show is mostly set in the outback, the palette displays a large number of browns and greens.

    Numerous MPEG artefacts may be seen throughout the transfer. Some examples of these artefacts may be seen at 1:11, 4:49, 5:25 and 6:41 in S1E1, at 0:15, 1:14, 2:33 and 11:25 in S1E2, at 14:26 in S1E5 and at 0:05 in S2E5. These artefacts are most obvious during the first two episodes from Season 1 but due to their frequency, they are quite disturbing.

    A number of obvious posterization artefacts may be seen throughout the transfer. Some examples of these artefacts are visible at 7:01 in S1E1, 13:19 and 21:17 in S1E3, 0:01 and 7:46 in S1E5, 11:48 in S1E6 and 1:21 in S2E1. Due to their frequency, these artefacts are moderately troubling.

    A number of aliasing artefacts may also be seen throughout the transfer. Some examples of these artefacts may be seen at 8:55, 9:12, 9:38, 11:51 and 12:37 during S1E1, at 1:32, 2:12, 2:46 and 4:17 during S1E2 and at 2:16, 2:28 and 4:01 during S1E3.

    As the series has been shot on video, no film artefacts are present during the transfer.

    A single set of white English for the Hearing Impaired subtitles are provided for the transfer. I extensively sampled this stream and found it to be easy to read and consistently accurate.

    The layer change on Disc 1 occurs at 13:08 at an advertisement break during Episode 4. On the second disc, the break occurs at 1:15 during Episode 5 at the end of the opening credits.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    The dialogue is always clear and easy to understand. No dropouts or problems with audio sync were detected at any time during the transfer.

    The original musical score by Liam Bradley suits the on-screen action at all times.

    The surround and LFE channels are not utilized at any time during the transfer.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    All extras, unless otherwise stated, are presented with a Dolby Digital 224kbps 2.0 soundtrack at an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 and are 16x9 enhanced.

Menu

    The animated menu is presented at an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 and is 16x9 enhanced.

Disc 1

Russell's Bonus Bits (13:12)

    This is a collection of additional scenes and outtakes from the first series. This segment is presented at an aspect ratio of 1.78:1 but it contains a number of segments that have been distorted from their correct 1.33:1 aspect ratio.

Russell Coight on GMA (7:08)

    This is a segment from the Channel Ten show Good Morning Australia with Russell Coight promoting his first series.

Russell Coight's Favourite Phrases

    This is a collection of five audio clips featuring Russell Coight's favourite phrases.

Disc 2

Russell's Bonus Bits (14:33)

    This is a collection of additional scenes and outtakes from the second series. This segment is presented incorrectly at an aspect ratio of 1.33:1 but should be displayed at an aspect ratio of 1.78:1.

Time to Hit the Publicity Road (5:19)

    This segment contains highlights of Russell on his publicity tour for the second series visiting GMA, working on a Channel Ten network promotion and an appearance on The Panel. This featurette is presented with a single Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack featuring comments from Russell Coight.

Behind the Scenes Interview (5:25)

    This is an interview with Russell Coight discussing various subjects including the origins of his name, coping with fame, who he admires and the women in his life.

Photo Gallery

    This is a collection of 17 stills from the series presented in a small 1.33:1 window in the centre of the 1.78:1 frame.

Easter Egg: Studio Recording (0:57)

    This is a clip of Russell in the studio recording his country song. This clip is presented at an aspect ratio of 1.33:1 and may be accessed by highlighting the Photo Gallery option and pressing the right arrow to highlight the show's logo.

    This disc is not currently available in Region 1.

    Russell Coight's All Aussie Adventures is an enjoyable comedy series that should be enjoyed by any fan of mockumentaries.

    The video transfer displays a number of artefacts throughout but these are most distracting during the first two episodes.

    The Dolby Digital 2.0 soundtrack is suitable for the material presented.

    The collection of extras are entertaining but I would have liked to see some information provided by Glen Robbins (not as Russell Coight) on the making of the series.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall