Lake Eola Evening

I'd intended to spend the early afternoon tramping a bit around Orlando, but a problem creating a software repository for my primary project forced me to head back on over to my office and correctly re-create it. I spent three hours of a glorious Saturday afternoon in an office without air conditioning (they turn it off on the weekends to save money). By the time I got out it was 5pm and the sun was headed back down again. In spite of only working three hours, it still felt like a regular working day.

I pulled off into downtown on the way home and headed towards Lake Eola. I haven't been there in well over a year. It's a great place for people to meet. The weather here in Orlando, in January, is high 70s to low 80s during the day, and low 60s at night. It's days like today that remind us why we live in Central Florida. The problem is they are far too few. As good as the weather is now it's a good 10 degrees too warm. I fear we're in for a hot dry spring to fall, and the strong possibility of a very bad fire season because of it. I'm reminded of 1998...

Beautiful weather, soft evening light. Partly cloudy skies tinted golden by the setting sun and reflecting back down onto the city below. Orlando has a compact city center, with a lot of continuous sprawl, unbroken from the urban edges out through the surrounding suburbs. The lake is beautifully kept and provides large grassy areas for families to sit and enjoy the weather. There are a few activities to enjoy the lake itself, such as these pedal powered swan boats.

Unfortunately if I walk around long enough I see where societies little signs have gone up, restricting our movements bit by bit. The seats in front of the bandshell on Lake Eola used to be open. It was nice to go and sit alone, and to think. But you can't do that anymore. I don't know when signs like this went up, but it had to have been since the last time I took any photos around here, sometime after November 2009. Signs like this are all over the bandshell now.

As I walk around I see more and more of this; couples physically together but mentally and emotionally separate. I don't know what they're doing; checking email, tweeting, playing Angry Birds. It doesn't matter. They're in their own separate little bubbles of reality. Welcome to dating in the second decade of the 21st century.

I also see the homeless. They're a lot more common than you realize. You have to look, to pay attention. They've discovered the hidden, little out-of-the-way spots to hang out during the day until the homeless shelters open up in the evening. In an ideal world they would have some small day job to go to, but in reality no one will hire them. So they take their possessions with them, usually in a backpack. They've usually got a book they read, and something cheap to snack on.

Or maybe I'm full of it. Maybe this is a regular tourist, taking a break from walking around Lake Eola. After all, he's got a really nice backpack. Sunglasses. And his t-shirt has "Oh Lord, Forgive Me My Zins." But I think not. I think all that was given to him. One big clue is the fact he's just across the street from Saint George Orthodox Church, where many of the homeless were gathering for the evening. All of them old males with stuffed backpacks. I didn't stick around to find out, it was getting late and I needed to head home.

Technical

Using the E-M5 completely now. Getting used to the camera and its many features as well as its quirks. All photos taken with the M.Zuiko 45mm, except Saint George's, which was taken with the Leica 25mm. All photos used with ISO 200 except the last of the man with his backpack, which "accidentally" was exposed at ISO 1000. I say accidentally because I didn't see any difference until I had them all in Lightroom, and I happened to look over at the ISO setting the camera had automatically chosen. Until then I couldn't tell any difference between any of them. This is the first time that has ever happened with any 4:3rds sensor based camera.

Best feature is its stealthiness. Small, dark, innocuous, especially if held away from the face. Nobody at Lake Eola paid any attention. Super-quiet shutter noise. Super-fast reaction, especially when using the touch-to-photograph feature on the rear LCD. Which leads to the biggest annoyance...

Biggest annoyance is the automatic sensor to switch between the eye-level EVF and the rear LCD. If I try to hold the camera at waist level, with the LCD pulled away from the body and pointed up and next to my body, the LCD goes blank intermittently because the E-M5's EVF sensor thinks it's going up to my eye. I finally configured the E-M5 to disable the automatic switch feature and use the button on the EVF to manually switch back and forth, just like with the older Pens with the VF-2 mounted.