A little less video, please

At long last, I have no more excuses. I have theorized about the perfect video for years. I hate the garish perfection of video! I want tiny depths of field, thin slivers of attention in soft clouds of dazzle. As my old school meets my new school, I've got it: the lens on the left of this contraption is a 30-year-old Nikkor 180mm designed for railroad model enthusiasts, one of the best lenses ever made. I've also got an 85mm 1.4 that is simply gorgeous, and now both lenses will give me the look I want, lush, lovely, lit. The whole thing is in my trunk, and the mustang is pointing south, to Mardi Gras and Better Than Ezra's Michael Jerome on the drums: I'll get his sticks tickling the rims, sinews smashing cymbals, sweat bombing into spotlights. Sandy and Andy and Alana (and Tad!) from the Wonderbox will help me get the bizarre and the brazen, from Bourbon Street to the outer contours of the bayou, the soft places that barely rustle for visitors no matter how foreign. I have no excuses now, not with this thing in my hands. Dave Adams just hands over the Redrock Micro that joins the Nikkors to the brilliant XDcam, and as I walk out his door he says to me simply, "I thought you'd put it to good use," the words of a teacher, though he's far younger than me, and I'm not going to let him down. This gift will give a lot, I promise, because I will catch exactly what I wish to see: My eye is now a bazooka.