There are two sides to every story, but in the case of Ohio copy machine repairman and aerial videography hobbyist Kele Stanley, his side is drastically different from that of the police who arrested him for flying his camera drone over the site of a car crash.
If you're going to illegally climb tall buildings and other structures, and then do backflips while you're up there, expect to attract some attention of the police variety. But here comes the pro tip: when you do get caught, telling them you were taking 'panoramic photos' won't get you out of trouble if they saw the backflips.
The folks over at PDN recently sat down with National Press Photographers Association attorney Mickey Osterreicher to talk about photographers' rights, police intimidation and how to handle yourself around cops who don't understand what you are and are not allowed to photograph.
Collecting vintage equipment isn't an uncommon hobby among photography and camera enthusiasts, but it is one that has apparently gotten one Ukrainian man in trouble with the law. A well-known collector and dealer named Alexandr Komarov (seen above) was recently arrested for possessing decades-old Soviet spy cameras, and now faces up to 7 years in prison for the offense.
Photographer George Steinmetz has made a name for himself by taking spectacular aerial images from his paraglider. But a recent flight over Finney County, Kansas landed him not in the pages of National Geographic, but in jail.
Photographer, blogger, and photographers rights' activist Carlos Miller has made headlines quite a few times over the past few years with his legal rumbles with authorities over photography in public places. Miller, who often instigates the disputes for the purpose of bringing photographers' rights into the spotlight, recently had another big confrontation with authorities in Miami (it's not the first time it has happened).
The video above is Miller's documentation of the incident. He says he was "attacked, choked, suffocated and handcuffed by 50 State security guards" for shooting photos and video on the Miami-Dade Metro rail this past Sunday night.
Well, if you thought the drawn-out drama of the notorious Olympus accounting scandal was over -- we definitely did -- you were wrong. It seems that white collar criminals not included in the original seven people arrested in the case shouldn't take the yacht out of the marina just yet (or maybe they should), because, as former bank executive Chan Ming Fon learned yesterday, the FBI is still looking for you.
A 16-year-old aspiring journalist named Jakub Markiewicz was arrested last month at the shopping mall Metropolis at Metrotown, the 2nd largest mall in Canada. After photographing security guards arresting a man, he was unable to comply with multiple demands to delete the photographs he had taken... from a film camera.
Some people who find themselves on hard times try to have themselves arrested so that they can eat for free in prison. It turns out that people in Southern California can do the same thing for a free studio-style headshot. Cat Cora, a chef on the Food Network show Iron Chef, recently got booked for a DUI after drinking three beers and getting behind the wheel. Her mugshot wasn't taken until 11 days after her arrest, so Cora had time to have her hair and makeup done in order to pose for a picture-perfect mugshot. When the photo made its way onto the Internet, websites began to comment on how it looks more like a studio portrait than a police station mugshot.
It's standard procedure for photo labs around the world to contact authorities if illegal activity is discovered in pictures, but what constitutes "illegal activity" can different widely from place to place. Case in point: three French tourists were recently given jail terms in Sri Lanka for photographs they took containing Buddha statues.
An update to the financial scandal over at Olympus, which has quieted down quite a bit in …
Three years ago, an Illinois man named Michael Allison was arrested for videotaping …
There was a minor hoopla yesterday after Boing Boing shared that mugshot photos of arrested Occupy Portland protesters were being uploaded by the Portland Police Department to Facebook.
A 19-year-old man in the UK has been sentenced to two months in prison for snapping a courtroom photo.
Regardless of how bad photographers’ rights seem to be in your country, here’s a story that will definitely make …
Freelance news photographer Phil Datz was recording the conclusion of a police chase from the opposite sidewalk last Friday …
Yesterday we shared a disconcerting art project by Kyle McDonald in …
Update: We hear that all charges against Rhonda Hollander have been dropped after a judge found the testimony “not credible.” …