s you may remember from our previous installments in this Production Diary, Artisan Entertainment was considering to create a special metal packaging for the initial Limited Edition run of the release. After long deliberation, a decision has now been

made and I am glad to tell you that the release will indeed come in a true aluminum case. I know how many of you feverishly hoped that this would be the case and I am glad that I can finally put your minds to rest. But it’s getting even better! Due to the attractive pricing that Artisan Entertainment has been able to get on this metal packaging, the plan is now to ship the entire release - and not only a limited number - in this metal packaging. Plans to number the initial release batch were in discussion but have ultimately been put to rest for practical reasons - I think engraving serial numbers into an aluminum case is just prohibitively expensive as everyone will understand. The distinction between the initial release batch and the second one, which is nothing but a practical result of the production bottlenecks that come with high-volume DVD-18 releases at this point, will therefore go altogether, and there will be only one version of the “Terminator 2: Judgment Day: Ultimate Edition.”

Many of you have also wondered whether the Guns’N Roses video will be part of the DVD, especially since it was part of the laserdisc release and not listed in our previous listing of the features for the DVD. Unfortunately, Artisan Entertainment was not able to obtain clearance for this video due to the licensing costs. Too bad on one hand, but at the same time, there is so much cool and new stuff on the DVD that it shouldn’t really matter.

Today we are finally able to give you a first look at the menus for the “Terminator 2 Ultimate Edition.” As you can see from these images, these menus are very intricate and have a theme that nicely complements the movie.

Here you get a look at the chapter stop menus of the release. As you can see, a nice transition leads to the actual chapter stop display, which consists of an array of still images imprinted on the cubes of the Terminator's neural net processor. Although motion menus were considered for those chapter stops, producer Van Ling tells me that especially with the DTS track on the same disc, there just wasn’t enough room. “We actually had to make the menus on side 1 as minimal as possible,” he tells me, “to allow the most space for the movie, the DTS track and so on. I think the viewers would rather have more bits devoted to making the movie look and sound good than to making the chapter menus move.”

The entire sequence has been modeled from scratch in 3D for this menu. “There was a Japanese model kit available that was created from the original Stan Winston molds of the terminator endoskeleton head. We got one of those model kits and digitized it into a 3D model for these menus. Then we built the entire room around it and made lit the whole scene. You can actually see the room refracting from the metal textures on the head. The whole sequence is a combination of some nice composite work and 3D work. Digital Artist Johnathan Banta, who also worked with me on “The Abyss” and “Independence Day” DVD menus, was once again my lead 3D artist and he modeled, textured, lit and animated the endoskeleton and assembly room sequences I designed, while I built and animated the chip stuff, and did all of the compositing."