Tourist or Terrorist?

According to this article from The Memphis Flyer be weary of taking photos in Memphis. You just might be a terrorist.

A man walking through Tom Lee Park pauses to snap a photo of the iconic Hernando DeSoto Bridge. Another man shoots pictures of numerous downtown buildings.

Many would assume the men are tourists taking in the city's sights, but law enforcement officials say they could be terrorists staking out possible targets.

The scenarios were described at an anti-terrorism town hall meeting last week hosted by the Shelby County Sheriff's Office. The meeting, held at Cordova's First Assembly of God Church, was one of four public meetings that occurred in conjunction with Operation Sudden Impact, a new local anti-terrorism initiative.

"You may think a guy is just shooting pictures, but if you report it to us, we'll send it on to the FBI and they may have four or five other reports of the same thing," said Richard Pillsbury with the Tennessee Fusion Center, a collaboration between the Department of Safety and the Department of Homeland Security.

Shelby County sergeant Larry Allen warned attendees at the meeting to look for people who appear to be doing surveillance outside public buildings, such as shopping malls.

I'm glad I got my photos of Graceland a few years ago.

The War on Photography: NYC

I've  been reading more and more stories about police and government warring on photographers who are well within their rights to do what they're doing. As a photographer myself I'm starting to get a little nervous. Until now I've failed to post much about this issue but that stops here. I can't not share this video.

via Boing Boing

Recent reuse of my photos

Thing #9: Searching for feeds

I'm trying to play along, honest, but really, do I need to go looking for feeds to add to my aggregator? That answer is simply no. Not because I feel that I have too many feeds, or even enough feeds, but instead it's because feeds find me not the other way around. Here's an example:

I was just catching up on some of my Library-related blog feeds when I saw a link to a new blog named Photography Friendly. Here's the first post:

Welcome to Photography Friendly

I have heard stories of photographers who have gone to a location, such as a park, to do personal photography. They would end up being told by an employee at that location that photography is not allowed or requires an application and a fee to take photos, even if they are just personal photos. I have also heard that some locations will consider you a professional photographer if you are using a tripod!

Finding information on photography restrictions for various locations can be difficult, if not impossible. I am hoping that this site will become a location for photographers, whether they just take photos for special occasions, as a hobby, or professionally, to look up information on how photography friendly a location is - no restrictions, some restrictions, application and fee required, or no photography allowed at all!

Your participation will help make this site successful. It can just be sharing your experience at a site. Better yet, link to an official policy or extract the text from an email from that location that gives their policy. To do so, leave a comment. All comments go through moderation. Site your source and how you would like to be credited. The more detailed the information, the better.

Well, that sounds interesting so a few clicks later I'm that blog's first subscriber in Bloglines. I don't know how long I'll keep it but I'm interested in photography-related legal issues so I'm giving it a shot. If it becomes not worth my time I can always unsubscribe.

Lunar Eclipse

I braved 20 degree weather and a wind chill in the single digits last night to get some shots of last night's lunar eclipse. Here's the one that I think came out the best. A set of the best 15 can be found on flickr.

Cemetery Dance

I've been having some fun with a tripod and image-editing software. Here's the best result so far. (Others are available via flickr.)

07-07-07

Did you take any photos today? If so, you have until 07/16 to submit them to the 07_07_07 flickr photo pool. All my photos from today can be found in my 7-7-7 set.

Amazing Rainbows

There was a reasonably-sized thunder storm in town this evening and I was sitting in my garage watching the end of the storm when I looked up and saw the most amazing rainbow. You could see it from almost a full 180 degrees at at some times, at either end, you could see a second one. Here's just one of the better photos. Click on it to see the rest of the set.

Digital Photo Wallet Still Has Obnoxious Pictures of the Kiddos - Gizmodo

Here's one from Gizmodo: "This $50 wallet comes with a small digital photo frame that can hold up to 55 pictures."

Twin Lakes, CO

After several attempts, one of my photos of Twin Lakes, CO was finally deemed worth of acceptance into the Wallpaper Web site InterfaceLIFT. Check it out. There are 13 different resolutions available ranging from 2560x1600 to one small enough for your iPod.

Microsoft Photo Info

Here's one for the metadata librarians: The Microsoft Photo Info download allows you to "Easily view and change 'metadata' properties in digital photographs from within Windows Explorer."

Vista Upgrade Photos

The photos have been uploaded and are available in a flickr set. I'll see what I can do about putting titles on all of them sometime in the next few days.

Contribution #1000

I missed highlighting this blog's 3000th post but I was watching for my 1000th contribution to the Hot Plates pool in flickr. Here is is: