I'd make a better guess that there are far more than 200 parents in Huddersfield and I'll further guess that a large number of them have "abduction" at or near the top of their lists of things that they fear may happen to their children, there is a large scale paranoia of "stranger danger" whereas the truth is that "in-family danger" is a far more appropriate fear to have.





This is quite a good article if you aren't fully aware of the sort of problems that photographers have been facing, indeed there is a thread on here from a couple of months ago about taking photos at rugby club childrens games if you know how to search properly (I don't) [urlhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/photoblog/2009/12/in_the_eyes_of_the_law.html[/url

My street photography is fortunately limited to reference snaps for paintings and so I don't really need to take ages setting up a photo like a dedicated photographer might, indeed in recent years I've found my phone camera to be just as good at reaching into my pocket, raising it to eye level and snapping, 5 seconds max - they usually turn out ok for my needs and if they don't then there is always Google Earth



A few years ago though when one of my daughters was working in a shop in Leeds city centre she mentioned to her manager that I was in town taking photos and her manager told her to tell me that you needed a licence from the council to do that.

This is plainly incorrect, you don't need a licence to photograph property from a public place, in fact your supermarket manager only had the right to ask to you move from their boundary, you could have photographed his crappy shop from across the street on a public pavement for instance - but despite this it is often a public perception that no-one has the right to photograph in city centres, even the police were misguided into thinking this (although they say they are not now), and some will get very uptight about anyone photographing their children in a public place even if they are accidentally included in general shots.

See El Barbudo's post.

And see my post that I illustrated with pictures that were taken, if not from 'behind the curtains', but certainly candidly, of an adult and of a child.

You are entirely welcome to explain why one is okay and the other is "different".

All the more reason not to be taking pictures of kids then and simply getting on the phone and reporting the vandalism to police.



Which I agree with.

This was my opening point: [iFirst of all. Even if this guy had a previous conviction for offences against kids it still doesn't give people any right whatsoever to murder him. But IMO way too many people in Britain would be celebrating his death if the newspapers were reporting of genuine suspicions of him being a paedophile.[/i

I caught the discussion about this on the Jeremy Vine show yesterday and there is no need for a witch hunt based on what I heard. The [ipolice[/i behaviour was appallingly bad and blame is definitely at their door.

Having hauled him in, found there was nothing wrong they just sent him home. When he contacted them about further harassment they told him to simply not go out! Offices have been suspended pending an inquiry and quite right that they have been.

As to taking photos of kids there was also a caller to the show who related a very similar scenario. There was scaffolding up at rented houses next door and kids were repeatedly climbing on it. Fearful of them getting injured the woman of the household first tried telling them not to do it then started taking photos when they ignored her saying she was going to show them to the police and owners of the properties. This was at the suggestion of a neighbour by the way. After doing this numerous times she got fed up and sent her husband out to take the photos. Trouble was it was girls doing the climbing this time and with 20 minutes the police were at the door asking why a man was taking photos of girls. IIRC they had been called by these people already about the kids climbing the scaffolding previously and had not attended.

The couple were immediately fearful of the damage to her husband's reputation.

Also when you say you wouldn't take photos but would just tell the kids off there are several problems with that. First of all you may be intimidating enough and confident enough to do so. Many aren't especially older people. I'd also say these days with the advent of digital cameras and phones with cameras people see it as routine to take photos of just about everything. It's almost second nature to some to take a photo of virtually anything so it doesn't surprise me people would document vandalism to their property or photograph such behaviour as described above.

The solution seems fairly obvious to me. If anyone is reported for taking photos and it turns out to be for a genuine reason then its the duty of those checking them out to make sure that not only are the people involved exonerated but they they publicise this at the merest hint of a backlash. A call to the police from someone facing this issue should be treated as seriously as they clearly treat calls informing them of the photos being taken in the first place. Would this involve a heck of a lot of work going round an entire neighbourhood door to door making sure everyone was on-side? Of course but if we want [ithe luxury of paranoia[/i that is the price you have to pay and is why given they didn't do this, the police clearly failed on the case in point where the chap was murdered.

The age difference really is irrelevant. In your first attempt at this point I could see what you possibly meant by if it was the difference between obviously intentional vandalism of or just being in the vicinity of the flowers, but I really don't see what difference it should make if the youths (also, youths is what the piece says. That usually implies teens, FWIW) were 15 or 8. It doesn't make any difference whatsoever to how likely somebody is to be a paedophile in what from available evidence is an isolated incident.

I'm tempted to suggest that, until such time as photography is outlawed, anyone reporting somebody for taking photographs should be bloody well laughed at.

So a guy sitting in a park and taking photographs of teen and pre teen girls is okay?

In this paranoid era, probably not, a couple of decades ago not many would have noticed.

On the other hand this imaginary bloke of yours could be taking pictures of the landscape, or trees, or the cloud formations, or trying out his new zoom lens or wide angle lens, or just practicing his hobby, or he may just think that pictures of children playing in a park make very good compositions.

As I mentioned previously, we look at pictures of children playing in parks from the 1960s now and regard them with nostalgia and would certainly count them as being a valuable social commentary and worth archiving.

Why does your imaginary bloke sitting in a park taking pictures of girls (and why do you pick just girls as an example) trouble you so ?

Why not?

And why not a woman taking pictures of lads? And all the points Jerry has made above.

You've already made up your mind that anyone taking pictures of people in public spaces is obviously dodgy. – or at least if they fit your profiling.

And you still haven't answered my earlier question about the two pictures that I posted.

Just like no one noticed Jimmy Saville was screwing everything he could get his hands on.

I'm 40. When I was in primary school a kid from our school was murdered about half a mile from our house. It was post Sutcliffe (my dad was questioned my cops down south simply because he was a truck driver with a northern accent). It was post Brady and Hindley.

I don't recognise those times as innocent times. The difference between then and now is the instant availability of digital cameras which mean that virtually anyone could have access to pictures. Back in the 80s the pictures would have needed to have been developed. I'm pretty much certain than anyone going to Boots to develop a roll of pictures of random kids that seem to have been taken without their knowledge would have been talking to a cop about those pictures. But I doubt it would have happened often simply because no one would have dared taking those pics to Boots to develop.



If AP is taking his pictures of his favourite clouds then that is going to be quite evident. And if someone thinks he's taking pictures of their kids they can just get him to show him the cloud pictures.



And I'd say that most of the pictures that were taken were done with the knowledge and permission of the people involved. Just because someone is in a public place doesn't give you the right to make them your photographic subject.



It was just an example that quickly sprung to mind.

I also think a bloke walking down a high street and taking pics of random people without their permission would also be challenged. But if he was taking pics of kids he'd be challenged 10 times quicker.

Not necessarily, you don't have to be pointing your camera directly upwards in order to take photos of the sky - and what about landscapes ?



You'd probably be wrong then.

I can't remember the name of the bloke but in recent years there was an archive of photos taken in Leeds in the 1960s by a French photographer who went on to become quite famous, the Leeds photos were done while he was studying here, all of his photos were of a photo-journalism style where he just wanted to document the terraced streets and the people who lived there, he simply wandered around taking photos of whatever and whoever took his fancy, didn't ask for permission because he didn;t speak much English and he certainly didn't get anyone to sign a disclaimer - was he a pervert ?

If I remember his name I'll post a link.


If a person is on a public place. lets say wandering down Briggate in Leeds on a Saturday afternoon, and you are in Briggate taking photos of, lets say Harvey Nicholls, and that person is walking out of Harvey Nichs at the same time as you press your shutter, then should you instantly rush across and apologise and get them to sign a disclaimer, or show them the photo and promise to delete it, or just think "bollax, that cow just ruined my photo of the Burmantofts terracotta frieze on that beautiful building"

Then, as expected, you're talking crap.

I suggest you acquaint yourself with Henri Cartier Bresson, the father of street photography, then you might actually begin to understand what candid photography can gain.