Wilco tells fans not to waste $$$ on their Blu Ray

[Wilco75]

really who gives a fuck,it's just a movie,people surely will buy it then just put it in a stack to collect dust like they do everything else anyway lol, besides the way things are going,i might just put it between two pieces of bread(if i have any lol)and eat my copy.

[MattZ]

Basically Jones poorly framed and setup the shots....

 

Gotcha. Thanks for the explanation futureage1. Makes sense.

I guess what I'd say, just from a gut standpoint, is that I probably knew that the film itself was not necessarily "perfect." If pushed I'd probably be able to pinpoint some shots that aren't great or that some handheld shots were too jerky. But I figured that it was part of the charm of the movie. I might have even guessed it was intentional to give the film more of a certain feel. Guess I don't know what I am talking about (which I've never argued otherwise )

Just interesting to me how sometimes knowledge can get in the way... the less one knows about films, the more they'd appreciate this film. The mistakes wouldn't stand out as much.

[Scott Gyrrr]

Wilcoworld dot net has a clarification sort of statement in the news section now

[Golden Smoghead]

Just interesting to me how sometimes knowledge can get in the way... the less one knows about films, the more they'd appreciate this film. The mistakes wouldn't stand out as much.

Ah, but see then, you also don't get the joy of appreciating a GOOD shot either.

 

And I'd point out, the guy you're responding to said he's going to buy the Blu-Ray, so sounds like he enjoyed it just fine!

[mfwahl]

Wilcoworld dot net has a clarification sort of statement in the news section now

http://forums.viachicago.org/index.php?s=&...t&p=1231831

[bigshoulders]

According to blu-ray.com, there is a release date in Canada of 20-Jan-2009

 

http://www.blu-ray.com/movies/movies.php?id=3370

[barbkm]

I'd get it, if it had some extra features -- like Director/Band commentary on the Director/Band commentary:

 

Jeff: Yeah, I remember the day we recorded this commentary, I had a roast beef sandwich for lunch. Today, I had turkey.

 

John: Didn't you say that you wish you had the sandwich on rye instead of wheat bread?

 

Jeff: Yup.

[Blue and Green]

Basically Jones poorly framed and setup the shots. His handheld moves are really bad news. The focus is off for quite a bit of the film too. He also was shooting in low light situations and almost the entire film is slightly underexposed, which is why it is so grainy. Generally you would slightly overexpose if possible to alleviate some of the grain. The framing in the interviews in the film is also horrible. Just watch Jeff explaining being dropped in the hotel room. It is really important what he is saying but there is Jones unable to frame him well and checking focus the whole time and always reframing the shot. Drawing attention to the camera instead of the subject is a big no no in documentary for obvious reasons.

 

 

*Also the camera Jones used was great. In fact it was much higher quality than the Burn to Shine guys who shoot on video. But even with less expensive cameras their work looks much better.

Very good post futureage1. I'm a photographer myself but I took some film classes in school and it was much harder. I agree with many of your points. Nice to read a post from someone who knows what they are writing about.

[mastershake]

Now the other advantage of Blu Ray is uncompressed audio and the band is right it was recorded only in stereo but was still compressed to Dolby Digital 2.0 for the DVD, which is like turning a WAV file into a MP3 so to have uncompressed audio would actually be the biggest upgrade and advantage which the band should care about. I am totally with Wilco on the cost of Blu Rays being a complete rip off because it is. Sony charges so much for the technology which is why the discs are so high but in fact it is just as easy to make a Blu Ray disc as a DVD just different encoding techniques. So if Plexi Film really wants people to purchase this title twice they should price it the same as the 2 disc DVD just like Criterion is doing for their Blu Ray releases.

yeah this was my point, but i didn't know the specifics. one of the best parts about blu-ray is the better audio, but I think you only take advantage of that if you have a Dolby Digital 5.1 surround sound speaker system hooked up to your tv. considering i thought this dvd sounded great as is, i bet it would sound even more amazing on the blu-ray.

[futureage1]

Very good post futureage1. I'm a photographer myself but I took some film classes in school and it was much harder. I agree with many of your points. Nice to read a post from someone who knows what they are writing about.

 

 

Thanks Blue & Green. Haven't checked the board in a few weeks or would have responded sooner. I think it was Scorsese who said the more a viewer knows about the filmmaking process the more they will appreciate good filmmaking. I have always really agreed with that philosophy so it's great people got something out of the posts. It's really just the most basic of explanations.

 

 

Anyways I just checked Amazon here in the US and still don't see a pre-order page for this Blu Ray. I will report back with a review once I get my hands on it and have a chance to watch it. Have a good new year everybody.

[watchtower41]

Anyways I just checked Amazon here in the US and still don't see a pre-order page for this Blu Ray. I will report back with a review once I get my hands on it and have a chance to watch it. Have a good new year everybody.

 

 

Amazon Canada does however still have it scheduled for release on Jan. 20th. Makes me wonder if this is delayed indefinitely for here now in the U.S. At any rate only $27.95 CAN for the Blu Ray version, comes out to $23.69 converted. Not too pricey to import at all, me thinks I will go pre-order a copy now.

 

http://www.amazon.ca/Wilco-Trying-Break-He...9819&sr=8-1

 

 

 

Also, I suppose it goes without saying that the new concert dvd that Wilco is releasing will NOT get the Blu treatment? Tis a shame.

[crowesfan28]

Has anybody picked this up? I'm curious if it is worth it, both video and audio-wise. The listing I saw (can't remember where) just listed Dolby as the sound choice. If it is not an upgraded lossless soundtrack that would really suck. As does not releasing the new disc on Bluray. Wouldn't it have been shot it HD?

 

crowesfan28

[watchtower41]

Has anybody picked this up? I'm curious if it is worth it, both video and audio-wise. The listing I saw (can't remember where) just listed Dolby as the sound choice. If it is not an upgraded lossless soundtrack that would really suck. As does not releasing the new disc on Bluray. Wouldn't have been shot it HD?

 

crowesfan28

 

 

 

Still have a delayed release date on this one...

[Groo]

Basically Jones poorly framed and setup the shots. His handheld moves are really bad news. The focus is off for quite a bit of the film too. He also was shooting in low light situations and almost the entire film is slightly underexposed, which is why it is so grainy. Generally you would slightly overexpose if possible to alleviate some of the grain. The framing in the interviews in the film is also horrible. Just watch Jeff explaining being dropped in the hotel room. It is really important what he is saying but there is Jones unable to frame him well and checking focus the whole time and always reframing the shot. Drawing attention to the camera instead of the subject is a big no no in documentary for obvious reasons.

 

Jones is actually a very famous still photographer in his own right long before making the doc. I know it was his first film but notice it was also his last released? If you don't count the unreleased Vic Show. I know he has gone back to still photography and a friend told me he did all the period photography for the George Clooney movie Leatherheads so he is still working high profile photo gigs. I thought it was generally known here too that critique of the Wilco documentary, which is all Jones not the band.

 

I much prefer the Burn To Shine guys DVDs for Wilco. Just watch a performance from Sunken Treasure and then watch one from IATTBYH and you will see the difference. Those guys know how to shoot handheld. Jones unfortunately should have used a tripod. Jones just did not understand cinematography at all. Still photography is much easier than motion picture. I like his photos for YHF and love the poster for IATTBYH just think the actual film is shot bad but am still glad it was made and will buy the Blu Ray, even with Wilco's warning. And all this is my opinion, but it has been the major critique of the film since the beginning.

 

*Also the camera Jones used was great. In fact it was much higher quality than the Burn to Shine guys who shoot on video. But even with less expensive cameras their work looks much better.

 

I apologize for digging up an old topic, but I just wanted to toss in my two cents.

 

I'm not a cinema geek, but I do have an eye for art. I much prefer Sam Jone's work on IATTBYH to anything I've seen the Burn to Shine guys do. In fact, I'd venture to say that the whole look of IATTBYH is one of my favorite ones (for any other project, it would likely be completely unsuitable, but it fits perfectly here).

 

I'm sure that the BTS stuff is shot a lot more cleanly and properly, but the vibe of IATTBYH is just through the roof. It might be a combination of the music, the story, etc., but IATTBYH does it for me much more than Sunken Treasure, Ashes, etc. (although they are different types of movies). In fact, Sunken Treasure and Ashes leave me kind of flat - the cinematography is boring to me compared to IATTBYH.

 

Anyways, not trying to incite riots, just tossing out a different viewpoint...

[The High Heat]

I usually never post just lurk but had to get involved with this discussion since I am a video editor and in case anyone from the Wilco camp reads this thread. Let me just say that film be it 16mm or 35mm is superior to HD still to this day. There are now some HD cameras available that give almost as good of image quality as 35mm but those cameras are made by Panavision and are for very high budget movies. Watch Zodiac for an example of that camera.

 

16mm has a resolution of about 2k lines of resolution and 35mm has about 4k lines of resolution so even at 1080P the highest standard for video now, you are still only getting half the resolution compared to the theater and a screening from an actual release print. So releasing IATTBYH on Blu Ray would make sense. It's too bad it is such a poorly shot documentary to begin with and is actually notorious for that in filmmaking circles. I sometimes think Tweedy must have heard that which is why he shelved the VIC show Jones shot a couple years back. The clips on the website made sense why they did not choose to release that. Jones is one great photographer but not cinematographer.So I would think in fact that you most likely would just see a lot more grain and more out of focus shots than you probably noticed on DVD.

This post came to my mind last night as I watched the DVD on my brand new tv.

 

After always having an analog tv, I purchased a new flat screen tv a couple of weeks ago. It's a 40", 1080p, 80,000:1 whatevers resolution. I always wanted to watch this DVD on a better tv than the one I've had, so finally last night I popped in it. Man, there are several scenes/shots in the movie that are borderline hideous when viewed on a larger and better digital version of the film. Particularly awful were close-up shots of people being interviewed, such as the Kot and Grier interviews. They aren't just grainy, they're spotty. I was really disappointed because of the anticipation of improvement I had. I still love the movie, but I suppose I'll be more apt to watch on my laptop next time. (I figure the smaller the screen, the better.)

 

It did, however, sound fabulous.

 

And to avoid confusion: I'm referring to the original DVD. There is no Blu Ray.

[Dude]

Particularly awful were close-up shots of people being interviewed, such as the Kot and Grier interviews. They aren't just grainy, they're spotty.

 

I guess I wonder whether those grains / spots would go away with the increased resolution of BluRay. Since the grain is in the film itself, and would exist whether translated to DVD or BluRay, my guess is no. Resolution would come into play if you saw heavy pixelation - i.e. squares, staircases or aliasing - but it sounds it's the grain in the film itself that you have issues with.

[crowesfan28]

What was the player you were playing it on? There is more to a great image on a larger screen than the screen itself. I'm using an HD projector with a screen in the 96" range, and the difference between different DVD players can be quite shocking.

Not that this film is the be-all-end-all in image quality, but getting that 480i image up to 1080p is not as simple as running any DVD player into an HD tv.

[The High Heat]

What was the player you were playing it on? There is more to a great image on a larger screen than the screen itself. I'm using an HD projector with a screen in the 96" range, and the difference between different DVD players can be quite shocking.

Not that this film is the be-all-end-all in image quality, but getting that 480i image up to 1080p is not as simple as running any DVD player into an HD tv.

Both the tv and DVD player are brand new Samsung products. I don't know what particular model the DVD player is, but it's not Blu Ray and it cost $70.

[The High Heat]

Also, I watched Dont Look Back a few nights ago and that 40 year old documentary looked a helluva lot better than Sam Jones' effort.