andrew_somerset1

<p>Questions of the usefulness of an illusion aside, if I have a viewfinder display that says "DOF 10 ft," am I really going to be able to make use of this information? Can I judge that distance accurately, through the viewfinder?</p>

<p>I don't think so.</p>

<p>All camera bags suffer from the same set of problems: either the bag is too small to carry the stuff you need, or it is too heavy.<br>

I went through several shoulder bags before settling on a Domke F2. I might get a Domke F6 for a slightly smaller bag, but I'm happy with the Domke as it is.<br>

I have only one backpack, a Lowepro, and I'm happy with it.</p>

<p>Anyone know if hypo eliminator goes bad in the bottle? I know that at working strength, it has a life of a few months, but I'm looking at an old bottle of Edwal 4+1 and wondering if I should use it or dump it. Nothing on the bottle or in the doc I found at Edwal mentions any kind of shelf life.<br>

How old? Well, 2004. Yes, I know the safe choice would be to replace it. But I'm curious if it's still usable.</p>

<p>I'd say that, except where circumstances require a longer lens, wide-angle lenses are favoured, for a couple of reasons:<br>

- wide-angle lenses include the context; long lenses exclude it<br>

- shooting on the fly, you can always crop what you don't need, but you can't add what the frame cropped out<br>

And there are certainly more that I'm too lazy to consider right now.</p>

<p><em>Most photographers are just catching up to understanding/accepting Modernism, just as Post-Modernism is coming (or has come) to an end.</em><br>

That's a pretty bold statement, and hard to substantiate, I think.</p>

<p>Okay: I'm opposed to this unpaid internship thing, in general. If you're doing work of value, you deserve to be compensated for it. And internships have the effect of closing doors to people based on their finances -- not, I think, a healthy thing in media.<br>

Still, the Nachtwey bashing is ridiculous. Opposed to unpaid internships or not, they're a feature of the landscape. Nachtwey didn't invent 'em. He's getting slammed for being Nachtwey more than anything else. Debating whether interns in general should be paid is fair; slamming Nachtwey for following widespread practice is not.<br>

I've seen comments on this accusing Nachtwey of creating the same suffering he documents, by starving his poor interns. The people making those comments have a sadly twisted notion of reality.</p>

This is pretty similar to the debate around the use of staged B-roll in television news -- all those shots of the subject of the story walking down the hall, sitting down to read the paper, and so on. This stuff is all staged.

The people who do it defend it on the basis that the subject really does do these things, which confuses the real motivation: they aren't trying to show how the subject lives (we all walk down the hall at some point), but to avoic having a visually boring talking head in place of action.

Some time ago, Poynter.org ran a good article criticizing the practice, but I can't find it now. Their point was that the staged scenes are being shot not for the benefit of the viewer, but for the benefit of the team doing the report -- simply to make their report look better.

Similarly, what we're talking about here is recreating scenes not to communicate information to an audience, but to make the photographer look better. The aim is to have a pleasing picture, more than it is to have an informative picture. Ultimately, you would be setting up the shot to make yourself look better.

Poynter.org's suggestion was that the ethical question surrounded the motivation (and btw, they felt there was no excuse for staging.)

What amazes me is that some people respond to this by saying, hey, it's private property, they can do what they want.

Understand the renta-cop thought process:

1 - that kid looks like he's up to no good.

2 - therefore that kid is up to no good.

3 - look -- he's taking a picture of that girl. And we know what that's all about! (And she's cute, too ... maybe I can get her number...)

4 - uh, she gave permission? how embarrassing (guess I won't be getting that number after all....)

5 - that smartass kid is smirking at me. time to teach him a lesson. it's okay, he's just a kid so I can pretty much do what I want. I'll scare the pants off him....

You can bet that they never would have pulled a stunt like this on an adult.

The most serious thing they could do would be to charge you with trespassing, but I personally doubt they could make that stick.

As for followup, let's be honest and admit that nobody's going to sue here. Get your parents on your side and go after the mall management.

Trevor gets to the real question here, which is whether nature photography as practiced by most North American photographers is honest at all. The problem isn't with what you do in PS, or with what you do with a leaf or twig, it's with the thought process that leads to the picture in the first place.

The divide between North American and European perceptions of nature has already been discussed on this forum. In short, European "nature" is as Trevor has shown it, fully bearing the human footprint. North Americans, on the other hand, are caught up in ideas of wilderness which underly the idea that nature must be "natural" and that nature photos can't show any sign of human interference. This leads directly to the notion that moving a pine needle is unethical because it alters that "natural" scene.

The irony, of course, is that much of this nature photography is done in national parks and other managed settings, in which photographers stick to (or fail to stick to, to the disgust of the folks on the nature forum) designated paths and shoot from designated positions. Shooting the "natural" landscape involves a conscious effort to exclude signs, paths, people, jet contrails, hydro lines, and so on.

This means, of course, that the landscape is no longer "natural" at all, but constructed. It's simply another expression of the North American wilderness myth, and had the photographer stepped back five paces and used a wider lens, the falsity of that myth would be revealed.

"Why go to school, try to self-educate one's self...."

Why, indeed? That would just be redundant.

I've seen it, but I don't know that it's online anywhere.

Now the irony: if the girl launches a lawsuit over a photo, doesn't the photo become newsworthy, thus making future publication permissible sans release?

Patrice, you are failing to distinguish between the court's majority ruling and the dissenting opinion, and as a result, your interpretation is incorrect. Following that interpretation could get someone into trouble.<p>

<i>"A few excerpts from the first link Andew provided: 'Accordingly, even though she relies on a certain right to her image, the plaintiff respondent must prove that a fault committed by the appellants caused her prejudice.' And then: 'We should be reluctant to view fault as amounting to a violation of rights alone.' 'The Quebec law of civil liability requires proof of prejudice resulting from the fault.'"</i><p>

These are excerpts from the <i>dissenting</i> opinion, not from the court's ruling. The dissenting justices held that the girl had suffered no harm and that therefore there was no infringement of her rights, but <i>the majority disagreed</i>. This is extremely important, as the court ruled that having a few friends laugh at her was sufficient to find the photographer at fault.<p>

The only things you really need to understand about this case are: 1) the photographer LOST, and 2) the court set the bar very low for future complaints.<p>

This is not in the least similar to US law on the matter, or to law in the rest of Canada. Having a few friends laugh at you does not make a photo defamatory. Defamation takes you into the territory of libel, which is a very different matter.<p>

The bottom line is that one can always snap to one's heart's content, but publishing a photo in any way, in Quebec, requires the permission of the subject unless the photo is a hard news photo, or the subject is a celebrity, or the photo somehow serves the public interest in some way that will outweigh (in the eyes of a court; got money for a lawyer?) the rights of the subject.<p>

Please, don't go giving advice based on some half-assed reading of the court decision. Several articles have been written on this subject (by lawyers, I might add), and the CP style guide also reflects the need to get permission in Quebec.<p>

In fact, the CP style guide and several other cautious sources advise getting permission outside Quebec, as a court would consider the Quebec decision in a complaint outside Quebec. Whether you think that's worth your while is up to you.<p>

Here are some links that provide additional info related to the case:<p>

<a href="http://www.masthead.ca/law15.htm">Consenting to an interview is tantamount to giving permission to be photographed</a><p>

<a href="http://www.robic.ca/publications/Pdf/173.08.pdf">Article on the case (PDF)</a>. <a href="http://www.robic.ca/publications/Pdf/142.090.pdf">And another, from the same source.</a><p>

<a href="http://www.blakes.ca/english/publications/brip/article.asp?A_ID=117&DB=blakesProperty">A brief discussion from the perspective of Ontario.</a><p>

John, the law in question is specific to Quebec, so it's not really a matter of Canadian law. It's a matter of Quebec law. Outside Quebec, Canadian law re photography, releases, etc. is essentially similar to US law.

But I'd go with your interpretation. If they live in Quebec and the picture is published in Quebec then you would need their permission.

I'd be leery of giving you any specific advice about Quebec, because I wouldn't want to be responsible for steering you wrong.<p>

<a href="http://www.canlii.org/ca/cas/scc/1998/1998scc31.html">Here is the Supreme Court Decision</a>, which spells out the exceptions. I don't know what has happened since to clarify exceptions, etc.<p>

<a href="http://www.canlii.org/qc/jug/qccq/2003/2003qccq18308.html">Here is the Gazette case</a> I mentioned, but in French. I couldn't find you an English version, so I hope you read French.<p>

The best I can tell you is to err on the side of caution.

Substantially the same as in the US. You are covered by consitutional guarantees of free expression, but commercial uses require releases as in the US.

The substantial difference is in the area of privacy. In Quebec, the human rights code guarantees an individual the right to control of his own image. The Supreme Court has ruled that this means permission is necessary for editorial use except if the individual is a celebrity or if the photo is a hard news photo. If a person is in a news photo, however, they have to be the subject of the news, or their permission is required.

In one recent case, a lawyer sued the Montreal Gazette after it ran a photo of the front of a hotel, in which he was visible leaving the hotel carrying a bag. His secretary saw the photo and jokingly asked why he was leaving the hotel in the middle of the day, the implication being he'd been there with a woman. The Gazette argued that the photo was a news photo. They lost. (Note that although his complaint was harm to his reputation, he could not have won this as a libel case.)

So you have to be careful in Quebec.