£300/illegal to take photos on the Tube?

[bluestreak]

They did not explain it to me, the people who they told were given an explanation for it.

It's been going for about 2 1/2 years now... it is nothing new in the world of the btp.

what a great job. nothing like having to undermine the police in the eyes of the public cos someone's trying to create a sense of fear.

 

[andrewdroid]

when I went out ith the BTP we had to move a few people off of the station for filming/taking photogphs because of the terrorism threat.

how on earth is tourists or amatur photo peeps taking photos a terrorist threat ? I would have thought if terrorists want photos you lot wont ever see them doing it

 

[cybertect]

That's the thing I never understand either.

My Sony k750i phone has a better camera than the (somewhat crap, but cheap) HP digicam I bought as a taster of digital photography four years ago. These kinds of policies are going to become impossible to enforce and any self-respecting terrorist is never going to draw attention to himself by using anything like a hulking great Canon 1Ds or a Hasselblad, unless you're going to argue that he would do that as a double-bluff, which beginning to enter the arena of the absurd

 

[LM17]

Just before Christmas myself and a few mates won the national finals of a student quiz in London and decided to have our photos taken with the big presentation cheque at some of the major tourist sites.

After standing in front of the gates of Downing Street for five minutes messing around with the camera, we held up the cheque for our snap and were immediately descended on by the police, who thought we were some kind of protesters holding up a placard.

Apparently you need permission for photographs of that nature and we didn't have it, so we were threatened with arrest, but fortunately they didn't demand that we deleted the photos.

 

[cybertect]

An even better story about the weird logic of Downing Street security on DP Review posted in response to a thread I started there:

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1018&message=14609457

Loitering with a notebook would have got you arrested outside an RAF station here in the UK. Last year I sat with an easel doing some watercolour work for two consecutive days and made loads of sketches also. When I got out my camera to take some reference shots for building positions - the police were on me like a swarm of locusts; the location?... the end of Downing Street. So if you're a terrorist, take an easel and hang around as long as you like ;O)

 

[DJ Bigga]

You'll be arrested under section 4(?) of the public order act for abucsive language. Or further intimidated by the security guards. (give em a uniform they think they're hitler )

Plus they'll try under HRA legisaltion to say it's a breach of the right to privacy.

Wanna start a revolution?

That's a bit of a generalisation is it not? I myself wear a uniform for work and would not consider myself a 'jobsworth' nor Hitler-like. Thank you.

 

[jellyellie]

...the reason given being that a flashbulb going off in a driver's eyes wouldn't be wonderful for safety...

Just a snippet of info for you, I learnt that another reason flash photography is prohibited on the Underground was that the flashes could set off fire-detecting equipment.

 

[pk]

The thing that drives them bonkers is tripods... they won't let you put a tripod up for love nor money.

I used to think it was a crowd safety issue, well, it is, last thing you want in an evacuation is to have to move around a huge set of metal legs, but one day on a railway station near Wimbledon with a crew of people shooting some short film, a full size Velbon tripod fell onto the railway tracks.

There was a humming sound that seemed to get louder and everyone was looking at each other nervously, then suddenly there was a big blue flash and a thundercrack sound and the tripod got flung seven feet in the air and landed in a bush, with a section of one of its legs completely melted.

I guess that's another good reason they don't like tripods.

 

[this way up]

Getting moved on is getting ridiculous.

Recent instances include Citypoint tower (you can't take a picture on the pavement but you can standing five feet away in the road) and most ridiculously Canary Wharf. Here I was taking a picture of the top of the tower from the main plaza and was quickly introduced to three security guards. Now I can maybe understand why they would be sensitive about me if I was taking a picture of the door entrance systems etc. but the top of the tower? I could have stood anywhere for miles around and taken that. If you don't want to be noticed I would suggest not building Britain's tallest tower....

I asked the same guards if it was OK to take a picture of the clear blue sky without the tower in it. It seemed to blow their minds and I left them radioing back to base "he wants to take a picture of the sky from our property, is this allowed, over"