The image is not as sharp as film, due to the nature of how it was shot. It appears as though the footage was gathered using a hand held camera, but a very high caliber one. The image is very clear, much better than I expected from a hand held. The colors are rich and lush, and no errors crop up at all. Since these shots are of nature, buildings, and such, the colors retain a natural, yet bright, tone.
Shadows play a minor role, but the image is never too dark or overly bright.
There are no compression errors to be found here either, AlphaDVD continues to excel at authoring high quality titles on the format. The audio is presented in your choice of Dolby Digital 5.1 or six channel DTS surround sound. I listened to both for a time, and I have to choose the DTS, as it handles the music much better. While the DDS does a wonderful job, almost always DTS will have the edge on music when properly mastered.