Citizen Photographers v. The Police?

jaqian

Interesting article on Slashdot regarding people arrested for taking photos http://backslash.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/07/31/195248

It got me thinking.

I was wondering anyone know what are the "rights" here in Ireland regarding taking photos of arrests etc. Under what circumstances if any can the gardaí demand your film, camera etc.

rymus

Oh dear, another case of good old paranoid America? I had in my posession some time ago a copy of the UK photographers rights, many of which are apparently the same as what applies here...

I can only imagine it'd have to be fairly extreme here to get the authorities involved. i.e. taking photos on private property and/or if you have been expressly told to stop taking photos by an authority figure and have not. Anything else should be fair game.

I've only been hassled once or twice in the last few years but that was mainly from regular Joe Soaps on the street. You can get away with practically anything over here anyway... Shur even if you beat someone to death with your camera you'd probably still only get 5/6 years

Fionn

two sites that were mentioned in a previous thread

http://www.popphoto.com/popularphotographyfeatures/2668/the-war-on-photographers.html

http://www.digitalrights.ie/2006/05/09/photographers-rights/

rymus

that digitalrights link is a good one...

Roen

It's almost irrelevant what your rights are when it comes to dealing with the cops, if one of them gets it into his or her head that they don't want you taking photographs, then you won't be taking photographs for much longer.
Getting smart or quoting your rights to some clown fresh from Templemore will only get you a truncheon up the jacksy.

Fenster

I attended a Renaissance faire in Las Vegas and just about everywhere I looked there were signs informing me that photography was forbidden, especially in stalls. I laughed and ignored them, but the trend in America is for people to try and stop you taking photos.

Fionn

perhaps we should go quietly and put away our cameras!!!

CONMIKE12

in the immortal words of maxim , F**k 'em , and their law !!

Fionn

if your stopped......make sure you got a Boards photog badge

rymus

...and a stun gun

DeVore

The day we are afraid of photographing the police is the day we live in a police state.

To add to the quotations: "People shouldn't be afraid of their government, governments should be afraid of their people."

Oh, and buy a telephoto zoom jobbie...

DeV.

Fajitas!

Sigma 800mm 5.6 should do. Get a 2x converter, and you won't have to leave your window!

Borderfox

Roen wrote:

It's almost irrelevant what your rights are when it comes to dealing with the cops, if one of them gets it into his or her head that they don't want you taking photographs, then you won't be taking photographs for much longer.
Getting smart or quoting your rights to some clown fresh from Templemore will only get you a truncheon up the jacksy.

Or one of the new extendable batons fresh from trials on Mayo heads... There have been some good articles written about this subject. I agree with Roen though..

Borderfox

Fajitas! wrote:

Sigma 800mm 5.6 should do. Get a 2x converter, and you won't have to leave your window!

Through buildings too.!!! Like an X-Ray camera

Fajitas!

Yep, those new Hama X34 filters are amazing.