A glimpse of attitudes to photography of many city security guards:
Video & text from the London Street Photography Festival.
On Tuesday 21 June 2011 six photographers were assigned different areas of the City to photograph. Some used tripods, some went hand held, one set up a 5 x 4.
All were instructed to keep to public land and photograph the area as they would on a normal day. The event aimed to test the policing of public and private space by private security firms and their reaction to photographers.
All six photographers were stopped on at least one occasion. Three encounters led to police intervention.
This is what happened.
Directed and Produced by Hannah White for the London Street Photography Festival
Edited by Stuart York
Many thanks to:
Tim Bowditch
Leona Chaliha
Ana Galanou
Michael Grieve
David Hoffman
Chris Ogilvie
Pennie Quinton
Liam Ricketts
Toby Smith
Grant Smith
Camilla Webster
Philip Wolmuth
Stuart York
Posted by julesmattsson
Tags: city, freedom, guards, London, Metropolitan Police, National Union of Journalists, Photographer, Photographers Rights, Police, press, Press Freedom, security, Terrorism Act 2000
Filed under: Featured, Security Guard / Other
Really nice to see a bit of common sense and pragmatism from the Met Police. Well done to them on this occasion.
Good to see the police know the laws, now we need to get the private security firms to understand the law and not make it up as they go along.
Common sense approach by the police. None of the security people acted aggressively which is also to be commended. A bit of education and clarification is all that is needed on all sides – police, security and photographers.
I was researching the requirement for shooting photos in public and stumbled across this article and film.
Not surprised the security acted the way they did however common sense is required in these situations. Making a judgment call is not normally allowed for these guys they Re told do this or we will get someone who will.
I find the best approach to this type of situation is creating a positive dialogue with the person and actually finding out what is going on not simply saying ‘stop that and, get off my land’.