Overzealous Security

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NPUK

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Had my first experience of overzealous security yesterday morning. I may have overreacted.

No Photography Here#1 by NPUK, on Flickr

No Photography Here#2 by NPUK, on Flickr

Luckily I’d already got a half decent shot from across the road earlier in the morning…

Streets of Leeds - Whitehall Road by NPUK, on Flickr

Full drawn out story below if the photos grabbed your curiosity….

I'd been out for a walk around Leeds and just before I left I went to a much photographed office development, part of which I suspect is owned by the local council. Just after I entered I spotted a man sat having a coffee and a cigarette. I was going to take a photo but decided against it as we had made brief eye contact and I didn't want to disturb his peace so I carried on past. I then stopped to take a photo upwards of the building and nice cloudy sky (which ended up rubbish anyway). At this point it turned out the man in question was a security guard and walked to me and asked if I had permission to take photos there. I said no and that I didn't realise it was private property but agreed to his request for me to stop.
As I walked off it bugged me that I felt he was a bit overly quick to be on my case given that I'd only taken one photo, didn't have a tripod or even a DSLR. I then walked to the adjacent public pavement and pointed to the ground, gave him a thumbs up and took his photo. He clearly wasn't happy and came marching over to me and said I wasn't allowed to take photos of him or the building because they were on private property. We got into the whole discussion of photographing anything was allowed from public property, including him.... So I fired off another couple of shots at which point he started putting his hands up towards the camera so I had to warn him not to touch the camera. I suggested to him that if he hadn't been so hard and fast with the rules then I wouldn't have been either, which would have meant he wouldn't have had his photo taken against his wishes.
I then walked off, with him and another security colleague following me. I turned back towards them thinking they were going to try insisting on deleting my images but in the end he just said... "Enjoy the rest of your day" and I responded with "You too", but it really put a dampener on my enjoyment from then on. Luckily I was about to go home anyway but I was surprised how much it changed my enjoyment.

Not sure if I overreacted but if he had used a bit of selective judgement he would have gotten a better result for him, and maybe a lesser result for me.
 
Interesting tale. Maybe it was just his boredom, maybe it was under-fulfilled ego (jobsworthness), or just being a bit thick, but it sounds like to dealt with him in the right way.
The portraits/ street are good and rather interesting, the built environment a bit under-exposed (unsurprisingly with not much time to think about the shot).
 
NPUK said:
Had my first experience of overzealous security yesterday morning. I may have overreacted.

Full drawn out story below if the photos grabbed your curiosity….

I'd been out for a walk around Leeds and just before I left I went to a much photographed office development, part of which I suspect is owned by the local council. Just after I entered I spotted a man sat having a coffee and a cigarette. I was going to take a photo but decided against it as we had made brief eye contact and I didn't want to disturb his peace so I carried on past. I then stopped to take a photo upwards of the building and nice cloudy sky (which ended up rubbish anyway). At this point it turned out the man in question was a security guard and walked to me and asked if I had permission to take photos there. I said no and that I didn't realise it was private property but agreed to his request for me to stop.
As I walked off it bugged me that I felt he was a bit overly quick to be on my case given that I'd only taken one photo, didn't have a tripod or even a DSLR. I then walked to the adjacent public pavement and pointed to the ground, gave him a thumbs up and took his photo. He clearly wasn't happy and came marching over to me and said I wasn't allowed to take photos of him or the building because they were on private property. We got into the whole discussion of photographing anything was allowed from public property, including him.... So I fired off another couple of shots at which point he started putting his hands up towards the camera so I had to warn him not to touch the camera. I suggested to him that if he hadn't been so hard and fast with the rules then I wouldn't have been either, which would have meant he wouldn't have had his photo taken against his wishes.
I then walked off, with him and another security colleague following me. I turned back towards them thinking they were going to try insisting on deleting my images but in the end he just said... "Enjoy the rest of your day" and I responded with "You too", but it really put a dampener on my enjoyment from then on. Luckily I was about to go home anyway but I was surprised how much it changed my enjoyment.

Not sure if I overreacted but if he had used a bit of selective judgement he would have gotten a better result for him, and maybe a lesser result for me.
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Six of one, half a dozen of the other. It seems to me that you proved him by behaving like a prat. Some photographers are their own worst enemy.
 
lindsay said:
the built environment a bit under-exposed (unsurprisingly with not much time to think about the shot).
Click to expand...
The building shot was taken a couple of hours before, but I've been struggling with getting right exposure levels recently so maybe I'll revisit that one.
 
Eucris said:
Six of one, half a dozen of the other. It seems to me that you proved him by behaving like a prat. Some photographers are their own worst enemy.
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I wouldn't go as far as to say I behaved like a prat.... Which part do you think is prat like..? Taking a photo of him from a public place..? Given that I'd already given him the benefit of the doubt and left him alone.. until he decided to be a stickler for rules that I'm sure weren't put in place to protect from people doing what I was doing.
 
Personal opinion as a 'street' photographer myself.

Taking one photo from the private property that he is 'responsible for' is enough to elicit a response ... that's part of what he is employed to do.
By taking more photos of him (even though 'entitled' to do so from 'public' space) you seemed to have managed to antagonise two security personnel for what seems to me to be no good reason.
How will they react to other photographers in the future?
How much better would it have been to thank him for pointing out the issue, maybe strike up a conversation with him and leave with a handshake?
 
Problem with these encounters regardless of who is ‘right’ is that you lose energy to them and that 100% affects your photography.

I’ve been harassed by a security guard before whilst on public property and whilst I was technically right the whole encounter left me fed up and not wanting to photograph further.
 
gramps said:
By taking more photos of him (even though 'entitled' to do so from 'public' space) you seemed to have managed to antagonise two security personnel for what seems to me to be no good reason.
How will they react to other photographers in the future?
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I respect your opinion Gramps but it's not like he can react any less favourably than he already had done with me. If nothing else, at least he might refrain from telling people they can't take photos of the buildings even from public space which is what he was telling me.
If he's only doing his job (which is fair enough) then he needs to get his facts right first, or else expect to be corrected.
Surely it's more beneficial for other photographers that I enlightened him to the finer points of the rules that he's enforcing.
But given your comment, if I see him again I might approach him and have a calmer discussion about exactly where the physical boundaries are because I'm sure a small part of that site is council owned.
 
I'd question what kind of 'security' he was? He doesn't appear to be wearing an SIA Card visible as they are required to.
Edit just zoomed in as much as I can and that might be an SIA card around his neck, but usually they are worn on the arm. I suspect he was just miffed you caught him with a cigarette in his hand, a lot of places don't like security smoking on the job.
 
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If I'm on private land making pictures and asked to leave, then I just leave - perhaps a little grumble but their land / their rules.. it's not worth getting upset about.

I'm normally well aware of what's private and what is not - although it's getter harder to tell with publicly open private spaces. So, if I think I'm on public land I will bite back a little bit, I can only think of one example of this in Bath and this was with COVID wardens, remember them haha
 
Eucris said:
Six of one, half a dozen of the other. It seems to me that you proved him by behaving like a prat. Some photographers are their own worst enemy.
Click to expand...
I agree, creating confrontation without necessity is silly.

I catch a certain amount of flak from some street photographers here, because I advocate candid photography, to achieve my aims of recording the people and places around me. However, "what the eye don't see, the heart won't grieve over", is very good advice.

If you want to get pictures of people in their natural environment, you don't need to "be sneaky" as some have characterised my approach. You just need to show respect for their feelings by not drawing attention to yourself.
 
Heading for image

"Eastern European mafia boss hiding in plain sight as a Leeds security guard"

or not
 
Interestingly I had a confrontation this morning with a member of Network Rail staff at the local station.
Having just taken a portrait of one staff member (see below) I went around the other side of the platform and was taking a rear view of a staff member with a train passing in front of him when I was approached by a female staff member who asked, quite abruptly, what I was doing.
I politely explained and showed her the photo on the LCD screen and she then told me that I couldn't photograph people or signs, only trains as in 'train-spotting' ... neither could I upload any photos onto any form of social media etc. It was apparently her job to ensure these things weren't breached.
Although I knew she was wrong and I explained that I had been granted access many times, I didn't argue further.
However I went away and looked up the Network Rail "Guidelines for taking photos at stations" ... interesting read, which explains that I shouldn't photograph "security related equipment, such as CCTV cameras", I shouldn't use flash as "it could distract train drivers" and that I should avoid tripods "where possible". Commercial photography is not permitted without permission. Otherwise I was welcome to take photographs or to film on Network Rail stations.
I popped back to the platform, found the female staff member and politely enlightened her of the guidelines.



On Platform 11 by Bristol Streets, on Flickr
 
gramps said:
Interestingly I had a confrontation this morning with a member of Network Rail staff at the local station.
Having just taken a portrait of one staff member (see below) I went around the other side of the platform and was taking a rear view of a staff member with a train passing in front of him when I was approached by a female staff member who asked, quite abruptly, what I was doing.
I politely explained and showed her the photo on the LCD screen and she then told me that I couldn't photograph people or signs, only trains as in 'train-spotting' ... neither could I upload any photos onto any form of social media etc. It was apparently her job to ensure these things weren't breached.
Although I knew she was wrong and I explained that I had been granted access many times, I didn't argue further.
However I went away and looked up the Network Rail "Guidelines for taking photos at stations" ... interesting read, which explains that I shouldn't photograph "security related equipment, such as CCTV cameras", I shouldn't use flash as "it could distract train drivers" and that I should avoid tripods "where possible". Commercial photography is not permitted without permission. Otherwise I was welcome to take photographs or to film on Network Rail stations.
I popped back to the platform, found the female staff member and politely enlightened her of the guidelines.



On Platform 11 by Bristol Streets, on Flickr
Click to expand...
A few years ago I looked into the policy of photography at Leeds Central Station and if I remember correctly it mentioned that as long as no tripods or disturbing other users it was encouraged, I think partly as an added security measure. I haven't done much at busy train stations though because I expect the reality would be quite different.
 
Seeing as this thread seems to have been resurrected slightly, a few days after the incident I messaged the official Facebook page of the site in question and was told that non-commercial photography is fine and to feel free to tag us into any images you upload to social media. Quite different to the security guard's view on it.
 
AndrewFlannigan said:
I agree, creating confrontation without necessity is silly.

I catch a certain amount of flak from some street photographers here, because I advocate candid photography, to achieve my aims of recording the people and places around me. However, "what the eye don't see, the heart won't grieve over", is very good advice.

If you want to get pictures of people in their natural environment, you don't need to "be sneaky" as some have characterised my approach. You just need to show respect for their feelings by not drawing attention to yourself.
Click to expand...
I can't find that shot you took of the two girls kissing, can you remember where you posted it?
 
I always remember my encounter with security at a local shopping mall when I lived in West London. I was on a job, a local estate agent wanted some photos of the area to display in their office, and the mall was right next door to Uxbridge underground station. So I took some shots of the mall, the station, and both, with a slowish speed to enhance the people movement. Suddenly I'm greeted with "You can't photograph this building". The normal debate ensues.... "Yes I can, as long as I'm on public property." Another 2 security people turn up. I tell them That I'm happy to stand here all day, and they'll have to go and do some proper work at some point. They then decide to call the police.

This has escalated out of all proportion, but I was determined to hold my ground and make my point. Police arrive (the station is only 100 metres away). I explain, I'm on public property, and I'm not doing anything illegal or dangerous. The female sergeant asks if she can see what I've shot. I show her, she then tells the security guards that they are in the wrong and I'm free to continue. The original security guy then says "I'll just stand in his way then". To which the coppers advise him he's at risk of arrest for being a public nuisance :ROFLMAO:

If the original guy had politely asked "May I ask what you are doing?" it could of all been so much easier.
 
NPUK said:
Seeing as this thread seems to have been resurrected slightly, a few days after the incident I messaged the official Facebook page of the site in question and was told that non-commercial photography is fine and to feel free to tag us into any images you upload to social media. Quite different to the security guard's view on it.
Click to expand...
Underlining the fact that he probably didn't want to be caught having a fag while working.
 
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Jelster said:
Underlining the fact that he probably didn't want to be caught having a fag while working.
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I hadn't photographed him when he first approached me. I was just taking a shot up towards the top of building / sky.
 
gramps said:
Commercial photography is not permitted without permission. Otherwise I was welcome to take photographs or to film on Network Rail stations.
Click to expand...
On those occassions when I was a regular commuter, I never had the slightest trouble taking pictures at stations.

Mind you, I always used small cameras. I can imagine that using something like a Canon 1Ds with a 200mm lens might attract some attention, as in this case at Reading, during the rebuild...

Costruction workers at Reading station TZ40 1000335.jpg
 
NPUK said:
A few years ago I looked into the policy of photography at Leeds Central Station...
Click to expand...

Blimey, you must be very very old, Leeds Central Station was demolished in 1967. No prizes for guessing where it was.
 
Eucris said:
Blimey, you must be very very old, Leeds Central Station was demolished in 1967. No prizes for guessing where it was.
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Ha Ha.... Yes, you're right. Don't know what I was thinking. But as you suggest, it was actually on the development in question. I guess you must be quite familiar with the area if you picked up on that.
 
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