My good friend Mune celebrated her birthday Friday night along with some other friends at a club slash private house party in Manhattan. She invited me up and who was I to say no?

First time taking a bus to the city, I usually drive. Wasn’t so bad I guess.

Apparently, even if you put on a private party, you need a flyer to promote it.

And on with the party pictures. This was seriously the must nuts house party I’ve ever been to. Barely any room to move, hot as hell and the floor was moving a good two inches vertically from people jumping.

Home around 4.30am, bed by 5.30am just as the sun was coming up, awake around 1pm. Motley looking crew in the morning.

Leave a camera lying around with a wide angle lens for too long and Emery’s bound to pick it up and start snapping photos.

After some discussion and clean-up time, we decide to head to a Peruvian joint that is supposed to have the most amazing roasted chicken. Turns out, it’s true. If you are in Brooklyn, hit up Luz.

Apparently, we weren’t the only ones who were starting our day late. Luz didn’t open up till 3pm, Andy wasn’t happy.

30 minutes later they open up and Andy is once again happy, drinking something that resembles slime.  He swears it tasted good though.

Pretty table thing things.

Random balls hanging from the ceiling.

You know it’s summer in the hood when someone cracks open a fire hydrant.

Food was great, but we had to bust out and leave Brooklyn, bound once again for PA.  Can you imagine how long it took to tile the Holland Tunnel?

Thank you Mune for the invite and hospitality, shout-out to all the amazing people I was introduced to and met, and everyone who was celebrating a birthday!

Mune hit me up this morning to meet for breakfast slash lunch and we originally intended on going for sushi, but being Sunday every place was closed at noonish when we went.  I grabbed my camera for the outing, having just bought a new 5d, I wanted to start shooting more and figured this would be a great way to do some street photography, something I rarely do anymore.  While waiting for Mune to finish getting ready, I snapped their neighbors front porch slash office setup.

We had heard that there was a Belgian waffle place not far from where we were so we hit that up.  I’m always a bit leery of ordering espresso at new places, but seeing a pair of quality grinders and a for serious espresso machine, I figured it couldn’t be that bad.  I was wrong.  I ordered a double espresso, I didn’t see the chick behind the counter dose from the grinders, so I’m thinking it was pre-ground, but who does that?  I also saw her grab a latte cup, not an espresso cup, even though there were two dozen of them on top of the machine.  Who pulls a double espresso into a latte cup?  It was slightly bitter and the cup wasn’t pre-warmed, so the espresso turned cold about twice as fast as it should have.  This is how it was served to me.

Mune ordered a regular coffee and I also got an Orange Pellegrino, something I usually wouldn’t get but was somehow in the mood. At least Mune seemed to enjoy her drink.

I ordered an egg, cheese and bacon panini sandwich which came on a waffle, I was pleasantly surprised at how good it was, never having a sandwich on a waffle before.

Mune forced me to share waffles and ice cream with her.  Something about it being a sin to be in a waffle place and not order it.  We got butterscotch ice cream with a dark chocolate sauce over a pecan waffle.

Look how happy she is!

YUM!

We decided to do a short lap around the downtown Bethlehem area, feeling guilty about what we just ate.  This gave me a chance to do some street photography and shoot some stock stuff as well.

While walking around we saw a new second hand shop.  Oddly enough, their window display showcases a t-shirt from a South Side Bethlehem skateshop owned by our friend Andy, Homebase.  After all, Homebase is where the heart is!

The following shots of the peeling brick wall I had spotted a few days earlier but did not have my camera with me.  The texture really drew me in and I wanted to show the punch colors off in post processing.  I’ve also started to really appreciate a good vignette on a photo, so added a thick one in around the shots.

It felt good to walk around and just take photos, even if it was a bit muggy outside.  Hopefully I can continue to do this on a more regular basis.  Thanks to Mune for spending the afternoon with me, great company and even better model!

Raindrops and railroad tracks, two things every photographer shoots.  This is a leaf on my dwarf lime tree, it rained last night and caught my eye this morning.

While walking around the Whitehall Parkway doing the shoot with Christy we stopped to admire, the rusting gas pumps from yesteryear.  I don’t know why they were placed here, nor do I know how long they will continue to deteriorate, but the tones, textures and colors were really appealing to me.  While more of my work is leading towards black & white, I felt the strong browns and oranges in these photos needed to be seen by others how I saw them in person.

Met up with Christy today to do some shooting, first at the covered bridge in Orefield and then at the Whitehall Parkway that I scouted out last month.  Overall things went pretty smoothly, hopefully we can work together again soon.

Right at the start of the shoot Christy found a caterpillar that she had to play with, don’t think she saw it long enough to give it a name though.

Two weekends ago I went to a location that I had heard about, seen a few photos, but never actually been to, nor is there any kind of real info, directions or map on the Internet. It is called several things, both names I know of it as are the Whitehall Parkway and the Ironton Rail Trail. I know very little of the history of it, except that it seems to be a place where mountain bike riders, fisherman and nature walkers like to go. There are several old buildings in progressive states of decay and I wanted to go scope it out in hopes of finding another location to do both fashion and fine art nude shoots at.

A friend and I got there fairly late in the afternoon and only had about an hour of good daylight left before it would be too dark to walk further, but from what I’ve seen, it could be a great backdrop for several different kinds of shoots. Below are some simple snapshots showing the area, buildings inside and out and a bonus arty shot at the end.

This long corridor, for lack of better words, seems is between two buildings, neither of which have roofs on them. The texture of the walls and the horizontal metal lines at the rear really drew my eyes in.

Inside one of nearly a dozen buildings, this one appeared to have a fairly solid roof, at least one that light didn’t leak in through, dirty floors and these great open windows that allow light to pour in. On a foggy morning, this could be a great place to shoot.

This roofless structure had a sign on the outside about being a meeting area for some bird watchers group, that may explain the otherwise out of place picnic table.

I can only imagine that this building is fun to shoot in when it’s not raining, but none-the-less, I love the holes in the roof and how light punches through dotting the walls and floors.

There must be four or five dozen of these vintage gas pumps in various states of deterioration, the lighting sucked so I only snapped a few quick photos of this one and one other.

If you are interested in posing at this location and live in the eastern Pennsylvania or western New Jersery area, please contact me.

This Friday February 15th will be a very special evening presented by Audio Dynamiks and Sephora taking place in Allentown at the Silk Lounge, Crush 2008. Giveaways & raffles all night from Sephora and Eskandalo for the ladies, Homebase Skateshop for the men. Spinning the beats you crave are Cap Cee, DJ Sweetlife and DJ Express. $7 cover [21+].

I’ll be capturing moments all night, come say hi and let me snap a few.

Saturday morning Kim, Matt and I set off for a day in New York City, after much thought I decided to bring my larger DSLR camera with me over a smaller digital point and shoot or a 35mm rangefinder.  The compromise also meant that I would not be bringing my short zoom lens, it was too big and heavy to carry on the already heavy full sized camera, so I opted for the good old 50mm f/1.8.  Even with the 1.6x crop factor of my DSLR, this lens can’t be beat for street photography, even if it isn’t as wide as I’d like.

The day was overcast and not as warm as predicted, but Kim still managed to do a damn good job shopping, we met with Metal J and Kari in early afternoon and after some more shopping finally hit a Thai place for some dinner.  For some reason, I always have high hopes of street photography and either I’m not in the right place or the right frame of mind because I always end up a little let down.  At one point during the day I just started to carry my camera in hand, snapping photos as I passed objects I kind of liked.

Random image of a doorway somewhere in the lower east side.

Vespas rule the city, this one is barely in focus as I didn’t bother to stop and actually look through the view finder, but I like the shot anyway.

This bike was painted day glow orange, even with how overcast the day was.  There were a few of these bikes around the city, apparently they are part of an ad campaign for DKNY.  In any event, the orange was so bright that it actually made the sensor in my digital camera act a little wonky.