Terror photographers use mobile phones - video evidence emerges!

Further to my suggestion a couple of posts ago that terrorists do not carry around cameras with large lenses on tripods to carry out 'hostile reconnaissance' but are far more likely to use a mobile phone, it's good to see that the police already know this and have just published footage of a 'suspected terror cell' in action. I just hope that the same footage will now be used in police training.

See BBC article on terror cell photographers in action.

Aside from the size of the camera I would also suggest that the longer a photographer loiters with a camera in a location fiddling knobs, aligning tripod legs and generally doing things that seem a complete waste of time the more likely the person is likely to be a photographer. A terrorist would be someone who moves into position, whips out the camera phone, takes a quick shot and then moves off.

Hopefully such points are made in training because to the extent they are not, or not acted on in the field, it means that police (and just as worryingly) security people are getting distracted and simply missing the correct targets. One day it may cost lives.

Christ Church, Greyfriars, London

Went out shooting on the streets today. I could not resist taking photos of this magnificent church (by Wren) but this ugly bank building was in the way.

Panic on the streets of London

Just got myself a little Canon G11 and I'm going to hit the streets of London tomorrow to test it out. It's going to be nice not having to lug the heavy DSLR gear around but will it produce images that will be acceptable to the various image libraries to which I contribute photos?

We'll find out.

But many of the images I get will fit firmly in the 'arty street photography' category and because I will not have a 'big camera' I'm unlikely to attract anybody's attention.

The Guardian are picking up a story today of the photographer Grant Smith being descended upon by no less than seven police officers in four vehicles after daring to take pictures of a church that happened to be adjacent to the London offices of Bank of America / Merrill Lynch. The story also has been dealt with in the online edition of the British Journal of Photography, here and here.

What never ceases to amaze me is that IF terrorists wanted images of this American bank then would they not choose to get them surreptitiously using LITTLE cameras or more likely MOBILE PHONES knowing that security staff incredibly only seem to pick on people with BIG cameras.

In fact they really need not even visit the street at all when there are already hundreds of photos of Bank of America London on sites like Flickr and Alamy!

So what really is in the head of the security people? It was the bank's security who called the police, wasting their time when the police could have been pursuing bank robbers or real terrorists even. My feeling is that security people are bored and want to push their weight around. And from his own account of events, Grant Smith was having none of that.