Awesome

Walking with Dinosaurs – The Live Experience had its Melbourne premiere on Friday night at the Vodafone arena, and proved a massive success. When narrator Bruce Spence introduced the first dinosaur, a collective gasp went up that echoed throughout the arena, and by the interval, the audiences’ hearts and minds were clearly won over.

A $12 million budget has helped designer Sonny Tilders wrought marvels, with 15 life-size dinosaurs brought to life through a sophisticated combination of puppetry and animatronics, convincingly re-creating everything from the illusion of rippling muscles beneath rugose hides to lashing tails and gleaming eyes.

This epic production is entertainment on a mammoth scale, and while the narrative occasionally bordered on annoying, being clearly written with children in mind, the dinosaurs themselves, coupled with a stunning lighting design, were more than enough to carry the show.

Unfortunately I had to leave at interval to go supervise a photoshoot for MCV, but it was still cool - I mean, there was a life-size Stegasaurus! Sadly I missed the T-Rex and the ptereosaur, but hey, you can't have everything...

Walking with Dinosaurs – The Live Experience runs until April 4.