je ne sais quoi

We attended the Easter service this morning at First United in downtown Orlando. This marks the second successive Easter we've attended, and two years of attending First United, on a semi-regular basis. This year I brought the E-M5 with the PL 1.4/25mm attached. I wanted to walk around before the service and see if I could practice candid photography. I had a general idea what I wanted, but I can't say I achieved it.

Regardless, I still like these two out of the group. They won't win any awards, but regardless, I love the light, the color, the interesting expressions and poses of the choristers waiting for the service to start. I opened the 25mm to f/1.4 for a softer, more romantic[1] quality across the frame. I let the E-M5 pick the shutter and the ISO.

They're not particularly sharp, especially if you pixel-peep. And I don't care. There's enough of a hint of sharpness and detail to satisfy the eye as well as the soul of the viewer. More than anything I love the light. Of all the churches I've ever visited, I love the light in First United the best of them all. It has a certain property, a je ne sais quoi that gives everything it touches a bit of visual quality and glow.

I've been blessed with an interesting and powerful collection of µ4:3rds lenses and bodies. I am slowly learning what each lens is capable of producing, under quite varying light conditions and subject matter. Each lens is good at some specific capability, but none of the lenses are any better or any worse than the others. They're like the paints, paint brushes and pastels I used to have when I was in art school nearly four decades ago. I learned to appreciated each one's unique qualities. Oddly enough those insights didn't transfer to my film photography at the time. My photography was too centered around the machine aspect of the cameras and lenses to the exclusion of the artistic aspect, which may explain, in part, why I failed as a working photographer back then.

It seems like I've been given a second chance to learn the artistic side of photography, and I don't want to waste it. I have a Pen camera and one lens with me where-ever I go.

[1] From the Romantic period in art during the 19th century.