Would you have stopped?

wchadders

wchadders

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Paul
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One evening this week I had gone out with my camera to try get some "golden hour " shots. On rout I drove past a very bad road traffic accident where a car was upside down into a wall. A paramedic was on scene but i think the driver and any passengers may have still been in the car, given the state of the car I would not be surprised if it was a fatel accident.
Now as I drove past I had a notion to stoop and get the camera out and start snapping, I did pull in to a lay-by a little up the road but decided not to go back as it would have seemed pretty insensitive.
What would you have done and whats the correct etiquette in these situations, or do just need to be thick skinned?
 
Emergency personnel and vehicles need room to work and access.
Why get in the way of people doing their work for a few cheap shots?
 
Taking photos would have been very poor taste indeed and if I'd been the para there (as i have in other similar incidents) then I'd have been livid. I'd as a layperson offer to assist if they deemed it safe or desireable (for things such as managing the patients head, but it doesn't sound like a safe scene that I'd ask or want joe public coming into.
 
I think stopping and immediately getting the camera out would be a disgusting thing to do. If I stopped the first thing I'd do is establish whether there was anything I could do to help, if not I doubt I'd get the camera out. As much as I love photojournalism I don't think it would be appropriate to take photos of such an incident, I'm not really sure why anyone would want to either to be honest unless they were in the media and reporting it.
 
If the first thought you had was to stop and take shots and not to help then you need to take a serious look at yourself. That's quite disgraceful.
 
BRASH said:
If the first thought you had was to stop and take shots and not to help then you need to take a serious look at yourself. That's quite disgraceful.
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Totally agree with this. Stop and help, or drive on and give the emergency services space to do their job. Taking shots of such a situation is is beneath reproach. These situations are not spectator sport.
 
BRASH said:
If the first thought you had was to stop and take shots and not to help then you need to take a serious look at yourself. That's quite disgraceful.
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Don't get me wrong getting out to take photo's wasn't my first reaction and as I said paramedics were on scene.
 
:wideyed:

Seriously?

:eek:

I can't even begin to imagine how i would approach a RTA with the view of taking pics of it or indeed why i would want to. What was attracting you to take pictures? What was you hoping to get out of it? If you don't know why you are taking the shots then imo you shouldn't really be taking the pics in the first place.

My first instinct would be to offer help but if there were official personnel on the scene then i doubt i would have done that as the last thing they want is some numpty like me with no medical training at all milling around.

Takes all sorts though i suppose. o_O
 
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Nick Ut was there to shoot just that, scenes of war. He's have been a pretty crap photojournalist if he had spent all his time getting involved and none of his time shooting photos.
 
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Given the fact that it could have been fatal and you thought about taking pictures is just horrible and disrespectful in my opinion. Even if your first thought was to offer help that's still no excuse for wanting to take pictures of such a thing.

If I had some family die in a crash and I found out someone was finding joy out of taking pictures of them in their last moments then I'm sorry to say I'd make sure the photographer will be in the same state as the crash victims.
 
People have a fascination with trauma and war. Look at all the program's on TV about emergency response and dealing with people I bad accidents. I would say what's wrong with photographing it
 
Its ok because hes getting paid then! Because its his profession makes it acceptable.
My point is the gentleman here considered taking a photo and didnt but now hes being made out to be some kind of ogre and thats wrong
 
With paramedics on site? No, unless I thought there was some way I could help (unlikely).

If I was a news photographer and I thought that the accident was noteworthy, possibly if I could do so without taking anything 'offensive' ... maybe images after the casualties had been removed.
 
minnnt said:
:wideyed:

Seriously?

:eek:

I can't even begin to imagine how i would approach a RTA with the view of taking pics of it or indeed why i would want to. What was attracting you to take pictures? What was you hoping to get out of it? If you don't know why you are taking the shots then imo you shouldn't really be taking the pics in the first place.

My first instinct would be to offer help but if there were official personnel on the scene then i doubt i would have done that as the last thing they want is some numpty like me with no medical training at all milling around.

Takes all sorts though i suppose. o_O
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It's called an RTC now because they replaced the word accident with collision. I got lectured about calling it an RTA a while back by my mate who's a fireman lol.
 
Comparing this to images of war is utterly ridiculous. People taking photos such as the one by Nick Ut are doing so to tell the rest of the world what's going on, it's a totally different situation to grabbing a few shots of a car crash. Absolutely, utterly, completely different.
 
PMN said:
Comparing this to images of war is utterly ridiculous. People taking photos such as the one by Nick Ut are doing so to tell the rest of the world what's going on, it's a totally different situation to grabbing a few shots of a car crash. Absolutely, utterly, completely different.
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Principle is the same, another human being in need of help
 
It is not even close to the same principle.

And he took her to hospital himself.
 
Caroline Charles said:
Its ok because hes getting paid then! Because its his profession makes it acceptable.
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Pretty much yeah.

One of the core tenets of photojournalism is that you do not get involved, once you get involved it stops being impartial. You're supposed to be there as a neutral figure, if you're seen to be helping one side or another then it can put you in serious jeopardy.
 
I don't think it makes any difference if someone is a "news" or "press" photographer or not - it does not give them any more of an excuse to act intensitively than any other member of the public as being a "news" or "press" photographer does not give someone any sort of immunity to causing offence. If I was injured in an accident I would not think "oh that's fine snap away as you are from the press"
 
He got involved after he had got the shot so where does that leave your argument?

robhooley167 said:
Pretty much yeah.

One of the core tenets of photojournalism is that you do not get involved, once you get involved it stops being impartial. You're supposed to be there as a neutral figure, if you're seen to be helping one side or another then it can put you in serious jeopardy.
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boliston said:
I don't think it makes any difference if someone is a "news" or "press" photographer or not - it does not give them any more of an excuse to act intensitively than any other member of the public as being a "news" or "press" photographer does not give someone any sort of immunity to causing offence. If I was injured in an accident I would not think "oh that's fine snap away as you are from the press"
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I couldnt agree more!
 
Caroline Charles said:
He got involved after he had got the shot so where does that leave your argument?
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Unless he can travel though time, his interfering after the shot was taken will hardly affect the shot itself.
 
boliston said:
I don't think it makes any difference if someone is a "news" or "press" photographer or not - it does not give them any more of an excuse to act intensitively than any other member of the public as being a "news" or "press" photographer does not give someone any sort of immunity to causing offence. If I was injured in an accident I would not think "oh that's fine snap away as you are from the press"
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You're missing the point, no-one's saying being press gives you an excuse to behave insensitively so I'm not quite sure why you've brought that up. The point is the OP was talking about stopping at a random possibly fatal car crash to get photos purely for his own personal use which is a vastly different situation from people like Nick Ut, Don McCullin, Steve McCurry, etc, being in the middle of a war zone trying to let the rest of the world know what's going on.

The motives for taking photos in those two situations couldn't be further apart.
 
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Let's make sure we don't get into logical fallacies here.

In the case of a car accident in the UK, I agree - it would be crass for anyone, hobbyist or professional photo-journalist to snap away.

A war photographer doing what they are there for is an entirely different matter. Comparisons are ridiculous.

Ut did get involved. Professionally he probably shouldn't have. Fortunately, he did the decent human thing.

That does not undermine Rob' argument in the slightest. To presume it does is another logical fallacy.
 
I'm a little surprised by the overwhelming negativity...and just how "negative" it is. A freelance journalist would be all over this...

But if you have no reason to be taking the pictures; just a possible hope of some side money, then it seems a lot like being an "ambulance chasing lawyer" to me. But "despicable?" Not necessarily...
 
tbh no i would keep moving, if it was just one bike para and there was a few people id prob stop and offer any help i could would i take photos no i could not live with the guilt i had taken photos of a dead person for what £40-£60 per photo ,if it was a well known building on fire and no one was in it etc then yes prob i would .as of nick ut photo that was his job he was there to take photos and document it that is what he was getting paid for
 
sk66 said:
I'm a little surprised by the overwhelming negativity...and just how "negative" it is. A freelance journalist would be all over this...

But if you have no reason to be taking the pictures; just a possible hope of some side money, then it seems a lot like being an "ambulance chasing lawyer" to me. But "despicable?" Not necessarily...
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Just to be clear Steve, from my point of view, I agree people have been a little harsh on the OP.

It is the comparison with war photography I find troublesome.
 
sk66 said:
I'm a little surprised by the overwhelming negativity...and just how "negative" it is. A freelance journalist would be all over this...

But if you have no reason to be taking the pictures; just a possible hope of some side money, then it seems a lot like being an "ambulance chasing lawyer" to me. But "despicable?" Not necessarily...
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Being a "freelance journalist" certainly gives no extra right to behave insensitively - these days everyone is a "journalist" if they capture what they see, even if they don't do it to make money. Just because you are a "pro" journalist gives you absolutely no more "right" to photograph an accident as anyone who is not a "pro".
 
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