Walt Disney Mini Classics

Background

Walt Disney Mini Classics was created, due to the success of the "Walt Disney Classics" series, as a brand to release Disney animated featurettes on video. It included special featurettes (both classic and contemporary) such as Ben and Me and Mickey's Christmas Carol, excerpts from the '40s "package" Disney films such as Peter and the Wolf, Mickey and the Beanstalk and The Wind in the Willows, and the four classic Winnie the Pooh featurettes. The label was discontinued in 1993 in favor of a newer series created in early 1994 entitled "Disney's Favorite Stories".

Logo (May 31, 1988-February 26, 1993, 1996)

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Visuals: On a black background, yellow neon lines begin drawing a fancy shield outline, with scrolls and more. As the background turns blue with stars, the words "WALT DiSNEY", in metallic white, zoom out and plaster onto the top of the shield outline, which is still tracing itself onscreen. Then, as the shield is finished "drawing," "M I N I", in gold, appears letter by letter and zooms out onto the shield. Then a gold bar with "CLASSICS" on it, in black, zooms out and plasters itself in the center below "M I N I". Suddenly, the shield outline background fills with rainbow colors as glitter effects fly from the now-completed logo, which "shines".

Variants:

• Some videotapes have the logo staying onscreen for an extra three seconds.
• On the 1989 VHS of Mickey's Christmas Carol, the logo stays onscreen for fifteen seconds after the music is finished, then cuts to black.
• On Latin American releases, "CLASSICS" is replaced with "CLASICOS".

Technique: 2D computer animation.

Audio: A bright, musical synthesizer theme with synth-organ/flute sounds throughout, which matches up with the animation in the logo.

Availability: It's seen on Disney Mini Classics videos from 1988 to 1993, which are in slipcover packaging, and feature the Mini Classics print logo on top. This logo usually followed the 1986 "Sorcerer Mickey" Walt Disney Home Video logo on these videos. It was last used on the 1993 reprints of the four Winnie the Pooh featurettes. Strangely, it shows up on the 1996 "Favorite Stories" VHS of Mickey's Christmas Carol.