Animation Source Forums

Since I read your comment Wearedoomed, and watched the movie again-I think it is snow.

Sheba

I watched the movie again and it does not look rock, snow or blood. They look like red balls flying in the air. so i tought maybe it is blood and the sun is reflecting trough the blood and making it foggy.

I'd have to say it was blood,because blood has been seen in Watership Down.(just my two cents worth)

It's snow. Producers wouldn't put blood in just one scene to risk the MPAA from kicking up the rating of the entire movie.

Notice the color of the snow in the first image. It's reddish orange from the reflection of the sun. Also note the snow trailing midair behind Balto forepaws.

Compare the color of the snow in both images. Also, blood droplets would not be that large or fall that fast. Especially from a smack in the head that hard.

blood, theres no way balto could have been thrown so hard against the rock, and not be bleeding.

My personal opinion is blood because that was my first reaction; that reaction is what the director was looking for. I saw Balto fly, slam into a rock with his head, and saw stuff fly up from his head. My mind thought blood, which equals pain, which equals drama. To make the scene dramatic, you have to show the hero take a blow and brutally. The problem the creators had was to make a G movie and make people cringe during the fight scene. They can't have Steele tearing open wounds and making Balto bleed all over the place because that's too intense for a G rating. The solution was the little droplets to give that brutal dramatic effect. The droplets of blood was enough in the gray-area to get by with a G rating. That also explains why you don't see the blood after the fact because they had to maintain the G rating. It was added simply for a dramatic effect to add to the movie and frankly, I thought it was beautiful the way they did it.

I think blood to! an to the Images that lennox posted there is snow in the 1st clip but in the second there is no orange snow. And i think if it was ment to be snow they would have put it white for being that close zoomed in like that. I think it is blood for how hard he hit that rock.

Agreed 100%. This is exactly why I think it's blood

First of all kid movie or not, no dog can take the beating that Balto did, and not shed a drop of blood.

I always thought it was snow, but now I'm not sure.

I could be snow because this is a G-rated film, and you can see that some of the snow is colored orange from the sunrise.

Then again, the rock doesn't seem to have any snow on it to be knocked loose.

I'm still going to go with snow, just because I don't think the animators would risk the MPAA giving them a harsher rating.

i think it was just snow. the scene was orangey-red the entre time so the sunlight was definatly making it appear a different color.

Maybe it's not snow or blood at all. Maybe it's a special effect like POW! and WHAM! in comics.

I don't think they would put blood in a children's movie. And if it were blood, wouldn't Balto have cuts on him, wouldn't there be more blood in the movie, wouldn't Steele be gushing after the poor dog nearly fell to his death? Ans if Balto hit his head so hard it started to bleed, wouldn't the snow turn red when he hit the ground?