These photos are pretty punk rock, apparently

I made my third appearance vending at a Trenton Punk Rock Flea Market this weekend. I don’t happen to specialize in any aesthetic that’s particularly punk, though ‘Evil Goat’ here has always been a crowd favorite.

(He’s actually a perfectly nice goat, from the Turtle Back Zoo).

I always keep a log of my vendor show sales, to see what resonated with which crowds. I sold six of Gotey McGoaterson at the last TPRFM, and he got plenty of points and gleeful gasps this weekend, but no one took him home this time.

Here’s what did sell:

One of my closeset friends, Rena Jaffe, has this one hanging on her living room wall. It’s of the Sheep Hill Observatory, nestled in a residential neighborhood of Boonton, New Jersey. It’s run by a wonderfully passionate and knowledgeable volunteer astronomical association. It’s also open to the public often.

This was taken in one of my favorite bookstores, Easton, Pennsylvania’s Quadrant. Great breakfasts and rooms upon rooms of used books to explore. It’s also from the first few months of my journey as a photographer, with (I believe) my old Nex-5T camera and an old Canon FD 50mm lens.

I wrote recently about looking for what’s less obvious. This home isn’t a landmark or an attraction, or anything you’ll find in a travel guide to Iceland. It’s just what was across the way when my good friend Rebecca Missel and I stayed at an AirBnB near the country’s southern coast, just off the Ring Road. I like what my buyer liked — how the home, the road, the puddle and the clouds all lead to the mountain in the distance. It feels like there’s a journey ahead.

I used to process in black and white much more often — maybe I’ll rediscover a passion for it. This is another from my early days as a photographer, back in 2014. It’s from Jockey Hollow, at Morristown National Historical Park, during a winter hike.

This photo was Plan B. I’d shown up to photograph a Manhattanhenge — those few dates per year when the sun lines up perfectly along the center of certain Manhattan streets. It was a bust. The Tudor City Overpass on 42nd Street was a mess of people, all disappointed the sun never broke through the crowds. I’d probably have looked for a more distinct angle, but when they cleared away, I went dead center to capture New York at night.

I tried for ages to get a good print of this image. It wasn’t until I started printing on my own and I went back for a fresh edit from scratch that I was really satisfied. I met up with a Meetup group at 3:30 a.m. to hike Harriman State Park’s Seven Hills, and see the sunrise among them. It was worth the lost sleep.

This isn’t black and white — you can tell if you look closely at the rocks in the distance. The saturation isn’t even muted. It’s from the Reynisfjara black sand beach in southern Iceland, on an awfully grey day. I almost killed my camera getting this shot, resting it on a small tripod atop a rock that kept getting splashed with ocean water. Quick reflexes kept it dry … until they didn’t.

Iceland, again. The place really can be colorful. From the Jokulsarlon glacier lagoon.

Speaking of getting different angles … this wasn’t one. It’s from Yosemite’s famous “tunnel view” lookout, and Google will find you no shortage of images that look somewhat like this. But still, it’s a gobsmackingly beautiful view, and if this picture captures it, I’m calling that a win.

Yosemite again. If you’ve got MacOS Yosemite on your computer, you’ve seen the mountain to the right on your default desktop wallpaper — it’s the famous Half Dome. I saw some of the best sunsets in my life in California, and I’m eager to get back.

What was that about California sunsets? The sky really was that purple and orange and yellow and red at Lands End in San Francisco. This is another image I’ve struggled to get entirely to my satisfaction, but I think I’m getting close.

I’ll have a much shorter commute for my next vending opportunity — at the 49th Annual Mount Airy Day, Saturday, May 4, 2019 on the grounds of Cliveden of the National Trust at 6400 Germantown Avenue, Philadelphia. All this and a lot more will be available.