Photo Journalism
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A Bad Experiment
I had to cover “in emergency” a date of the musical Notre-Dame de Paris and found myself “unarmed” (no camera available whatsoever), so I have been forced to fall back on my mobile. While, at the end of the day and with great difficulty, I have been able to shoot something vaguely useful, this experience blew away any possible plan to use a mobile’s camera to handle an assignment. Simply put, mobile’s cameras suck, unless you go for (very)close or cheap shots. This should have been pretty obvious without the need of looking for hard evidence. Nevertheless, out of necessity, I have been able to test and learn on my…
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Italy, Street-Photography and The Law – A Real Case
Last July, members of the Polizia municipale of Rome seized the camera of a British-Brazilian street-photographer, Simon Griffee, while he was documenting the way they dealt with an immigrant. As Simon’s lawyer I’ve filed an appeal and a week ago the Court of Rome revoked the seizure. The battle is not over, yet, but hopefully Simon’s camera will be back on his hands pretty soon. As soon as possible I will release a thorough analysis of the case matched with what the law says, in theory.
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The Street Photographer Rights In Italy. The Leaflet
Here is an easy-to-carry A4 leaflet to be used in case you are confronted by a law enforcement agent of officer that question your Street Photography activity. Legal issues apart, please remember to always be polite and to help the officer not to look goofy or ignorant (as he actually would) in front of the public. Q. Does taking people’s photography in public spaces infringes sec. 615 bis of the criminal code? A. NO. Under the Corte di cassazione ruling n. 47165/2010 outdoor there is no reasonable privacy expectation, as there is no reasonable privacy expectation in case of tacit – while non equivocal – withdrawal of this right, as…
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Italy, Street-Photography and the Law
Update – 2 On July 2014 the Polizia Municipale of Rome seized a street-photographer ‘s camera, but the Court bashed the seizure. Update – 1 Here is an A4 leaflet useful to stand your ground if your street-photography work is questioned by somebody else. Introduction* As there are few texts in English dealing with (street) photography and Italian laws, I’ve decided to put my lawyer‘s hat and sketch some toughts on the two main topics involving the Street-Photography: shooting candid and publishing them online. To cut a long story short, Italian law follows a similar approach to other Western jurisdictions and – in particular – of Articles 8 and 10…
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The Photo I Didn’t Shoot
Every amateur photographer (and maybe a few professionals) has a shot he chose not to fire. In my case it is a brutal knock-out on a Mixed Martial Arts match. As official photographer of the event I was allowed to wander around the venue with no restriction (but jumping on the ring). During the second round I sensed that something was going to happen: the fighters started trading heavy punches at close distance and the temperature of the match raised suddenly hot. The crowd went mad, inciting the two men to hit harder and harder. All of a sudden, a hook at the jaw shut down the light of one…
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Photography and the dangers of ethics
Starting from my usual visit at Yanick Delacroix website, yanidel.net, and Eric Kim blog link after link, I’ve stumbled upon a post by Joerg Colberg discussing the always-hot topic of ethics vs law in (street-)photography. The usual way to handle this problem is by expressing it in terms of “freedom-of-expression-vs-personal-privacy” and by raising questions like “would you have shot this picture?”, “how do you feel photographing homelesses, bums and freaks?”, “Is this photo ethical?” and invariably concluding without giving a clear (though non necessary correct) answer. So, for what it worth, here are my two pence. To put it short, the Colberg (proposed) Doctrine says (verbatim quotation) it might be…
