Camera Thing

2006-07-12T13:31:00.000-07:00

from Talk to the Newsroom: Assistant Managing Editor for Photography Michele McNally Clarification on Photographing Bridges Q. I read what you told a student photographer in your interview on "Talk to the Newsroom." I need to bring you up to speed on the law so that you may tell people their rights to photograph. It is perfectly legal to photograph bridges and tunnels from public areas. Imagine if you couldn't take photos of the Brooklyn Bridge? Port Authority and TBTA have signs up indicating no photography, but where is the law? Test it one day. Second, photography is perfectly legal of bridges and tunnels from areas that are not part of their property. Imagine if you will, that you were in the rest stop at the Verrazano Bridge and took a picture of the bridge. Wouldn't you say that is perfectly legal? Third, you said it is even less legal to take photos on the subways. Let me say that the MTA attempted to pass rules that would have banned photography, but the NY Press Photographers Association, with the help of numerous other organizations fought and won this battle. The MTA lists this on Section 1050.9 Part C of their rules and regulations where it specifically gives the public (not just the press) permission to take photos in the subways. This rule goes for Long Island Railroad, Penn Station, Grand Central and other MTA properties. Further, after winning this battle, the MTA sought to make it illegal anyway. We, with the help of NPPA, ASMP, NJPPA, and the NYCLU threatened to sue and the MTA again backed off with a letter sent to us from Catherine Rinaldi, General Counsel and deputy executive director for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) who conceded to photographers in a letter that there is “no ban on photography in the Long Island Railroad or the Metro North Transit system.” While your advice on dealing with police is probably the best advice that anyone can give, it is important to advise your photographers and any other photographers that it is their constitutional right to take photos in any public place. The NYPD also has their own rules that subject officers to administrative hearings if they violate them. "NYPD Procedure Number 212-40 "In order to cooperate more fully with members of the news media and provide them with access to cover newsworthy events, the following guidelines will be adhered to unless safety interests or proper performance of police duties require otherwise: "To the extent it is feasible to do so, the media’s access to demonstrations on private property will not be impeded by the department. "The media will be given access as close to the activity as possible with a clear line of sight and within hearing range of the incident. "When the incident spill over or occur on private property, members of the media will not be arrested for criminal trespass, unless an owner or representative expressly indicates that the press is not to be permitted to enter or remain on the property. If the ranking offer at the incident determines that press access must be restricted in certain circumstances (i.e. in order for the Department to carry out its law enforcement functions), he retains the discretion to do so." I'm sending you this information because you should be best informed of the rights of your photographers. Your attorneys could confirm all this information and it can be found on-line. We are always with you as your colleagues and your counsel on photography issues is important to all of us. I hope this information is helpful to you and provides you with the ammunition that you and The Times needs to continue to do their jobs unfettered. -- Todd Maisel, Vice President, NY Press Photographers Association

2005-12-04T12:44:00.000-08:00

We all escape our cubicles for a little while, dork out and talk about photo and jump around in the sun...
This is Ricardo, Paul and Marta

2005-10-26T17:58:00.000-07:00

The 25 Most Influential Living Photographers

James' photo is attributed to Antonin Kratochvil/VI -- I wonder if the other Antonin from VII knows about this.

2005-10-21T09:49:00.000-07:00

Is Photojournalism Real Photography?

Ricardo said to read this

2005-10-19T07:30:00.000-07:00

Two for Today

Ireland Ever by Jill Freedman, who took this, one of the most famous pictures of traditional Irish musicians:
And commercial and art photography from David Maisel:

2005-10-17T09:24:00.000-07:00

Wedding Photojournalism

Here's two associations of wedding photographers specializing in the "photojournalist" style. No vaseline on the lens kind of crap with these people. The Wedding Photojournalist Association and The Wedding Bureau.

2005-10-17T08:27:00.000-07:00

Here's some information on a The 25th annual
Northern Short Course in Photojournalism

2005-10-17T06:46:00.000-07:00

I recently shot an amazing wedding that I was really excited to shoot. I had to put off editing because I got carpal tunnel or some sort of thing on my wrist and just got insanely busy, so by the time I realized (it was actually the client who realized) that I was missing some important files I had already returned the rented compact flash cards to the place and had reformatted my card multiple times.... I backed everything up religiously, as is my habit, but the shots didn't even make it to the backups... So I am concluding that the rented card was old, corrupted and didn't transfer everything. I should have checked through everything RIGHT away (see list of lessons learned below). I found a recovery program that I ran all my cards through. Surprisingly, some of the shots (NOT the ones I was missing) showed up!! So I called the rental place, tracked down which cards I rented and I am picking them up today to see if I can get anything off of them... Say a prayer to the the Bit gods for me. The photo guy made it seem totally futile, I guess they run their cards through a thorough cleanup/formatting when they return, but here's the thing, he was like "SOMETIMES they DON'T do that"... so I am going to try... just in case...
Lessons learned:
1) when transfering files from your card to the computer do a double check to make sure everything copied. note the number of images on the card and verify that they all transfered
2) do a look through of the files with the shoot list next to you and check off that everything is there
3) do all of this ASAP, you don't need to edit and spend the time color correcting now, just check that everything is there while there is still time to recover lost files and you haven't formated the cards
4) keep a money jar and collect money to buy extra cards so you don't ever have to rent, and you have spare cards if any of them die on you and you will never have to delete while shooting- which is a horrible thing to have to do. Just like back in film days we always had extra rolls of film shoved in every possible pouch in our camerabags, you should have a card in every pouch as well.
5) Burn backups of everything after you dowload your cards and before editing
6) burn another copy (or if you have a backup drive than copy them there), again, double check that everythig made it
7) now edit (make sure to keep unedited files)
8) also, while shooting, NEVER delete anything, just keep shooting. While you are in the moment and are nervous you are much more likely to make mistakes. This lesson I learned before and now I never delete, only when I have a quiet moment before shoots.
9) if your camera or card malfunctions, shut camera off, take card out, check the battery level, and insert another card (see hint #4). You might be able to fix the card with a recovery program and retrieve the files from the corrupted card later. Not all is lost!

2005-10-13T08:34:00.000-07:00

Two photojournalistic gems, and some wildlife

A Digital Journalist Portfolio from David Burnett and an unpublished portfolio of James Edward Bates' documentary project on the Ku Klux Klan. And here's some articles about wildlife photography from National Geographic photographer Nick Nichols.

2005-10-06T13:23:00.000-07:00

Depth of Field:

Here's a page that links to several good demonstrations of the properties of depth of field, including the infamous Scheimpflug rule for view cameras. There are even some cool quicktime movies.

2005-10-06T11:25:00.000-07:00

From Ricardo:

A number of fantsy pants fashion photographers:
Sasha Dean Biyan
Jon Moe
Guiliano Bekor
Matthew Rolston
Gray Scott
Nick Knight
Steen Evald

Not sure what this is, but Ricardo likes it.
ShowStudio.com

No pictures to link to because they are all flash sites. Not necessarily work safe. Some have music. Search at your own peril.

2005-10-05T08:59:00.000-07:00

Platinum/Ink hybrids:

Dan Burkholder teaches platinum printmaking, including digital negatives. His newest project is combining platinum printing with digital inkjet printer technology to make some amazing platinum/inkjet hybrid prints.

2005-10-04T11:58:00.000-07:00

Here's some Photoshop color management tutorials that I would love to work through if my laptop was functional. (Ricardo found these)

2005-10-04T09:46:00.000-07:00

Ok, it's blue now. I hope you are happy.

A collection of photo.net lighting tutorials
A company providing diy kits for high speed lighting (for the little part of you that wants to blow up a watermelon)
free legal advice from the photo attorney blog
and another blog discussing political theory and photography

2005-10-03T18:29:00.000-07:00

This puke green color has got to go.

a few good things:

my new website
Peter Feresten's work
The Jobo USA website is back up and running.
AZO forum
Friendly Bob Atkins reminding you that Canon starts their rebate program every year after October 15. 16-35mm L for me or bust.

2005-09-23T06:41:00.000-07:00

here is another good one: the Found Object

here is my own partial family photoarchive, most of these I was able to label with the help of my Dad. They are only labeled in Hungarian but soon I am putting English captions on there.

2005-09-22T13:26:00.000-07:00

Found Film:

Here's a bunch of links to weird little glimpses into the past. I found a roll of 35mm black and white film in one of my dad's cameras last year and took it to get developed but it came out blank. These guys got more lucky:

1960's VFW Christmas Party and Head on Collision via an Ansco Rediflex
Time Tales, a collection of found pictures from all over the world
Young African-American family in (I believe) the 1960's
Amazing collection of images from an Argus A (including pictures from WWII Europe)
Some very American shots from a 4x5 camera
Portrait of Rasputin
A chess set, some fancy camera pictures and a portrait of a little girl
Collection of many rolls of found film, where the Argus A and young family pictures above came from
Look at Me, A Collection of Found Photographs

and one more, called by some
"The Greatest Photo Ever"