Jetman Yves Rossy lands, who is the photographer?

Matt reminded my wife that the National Geographic Channel were showing the Jetman documentary last weekend. Yves Rossy flew across the English Channel from France to the UK last week while strapped to a rocket powered wing. I finally got to watch it last night and enjoyed it immensely. It’s a great achievement. Slightly mad perhaps, and very risky, but I have one question though.


Who is this photographer who managed to get snapshots of Yves seconds after he landed? I’d say it’s a compact camera he has in his hand so he’s not a pro, and the commentator was heard to say something like, “close friends are running up to..”

Jetman
Seconds later, a security guard rushed up and pushed the photographer away and that was the last we saw of him. Was he arrested?

The next scene was a crowd of press photographers, with DSLRs and video cameras pushing around Yves. I bet they’d have given anything to get a close up shot of the Jetman landing..

More details and a video can be found in this Times article.

Aperture ƒ/2.8
Camera N73
Focal length 5.6mm
ISO 125
Shutter speed 1/53s

The state of street photography in the UK

Scary. I blogged previously about photographer’s rights in Ireland but it appears that UK Police are ignorant of those rights which are similar to Ireland’s. I have never been stopped by Gardai (the Irish Police Force) taking photos on the street, but in the UK it seems to be a growing problem for photographers. Have you ever been stopped shooting photographs in a public place?

Make sure to read Photographer’s Rights from Digital Rights Ireland to find out more about your rights as a street photographer in Ireland. If you travel you should always be aware of local laws as they’re liable to change in every jurisdiction. (via dslrblog.com)

London Eye

The London Eye (or Millenium Wheel as it is also called) is clearly visible in this shot of London City Center taken last weekend as my plane banked on approach to Heathrow Airport.

We arrived around 7am when it was still dark. Thankfully I had my camera in a small bag at hand because I had missed some great shots of Tuscon, Arizona because my camera had been tucked away in the overhead bins.

Sorry for the large file size. It’s a noisy image, and Jpeg compression isn’t that great with random noise.

Aperture ƒ/3.5
Camera Canon EOS 20D
Focal length 18mm
ISO 3200
Shutter speed 1/20s