Toronto Photography Meetup Group

Hopefully only warm water.

A local photographer and librarian at Ryerson University took pictures from his office of the strippers on their breaks at the Zanzibar. They were on the roof in their work outfits. I guess they didn't realize that they could be seen with all the new construction in the area. Brian Cameron is pretty talented. There's a link to his flickr in the article.

http://www.thestar.com/news/article/897 ... ivacy?bn=1

Did they have an expectation of privacy or not? Of course the general public thinks so, but I'm not so sure.

I've worked at Ryerson for more than 12 years now and the new construction isn't an issue. The library building was built in 1974. It has windows on all 4 sides of its 11 stories. It wasn't a year I'd been here, before I saw students looking out the windows toward Zanzibar, where the strippers were sunbathing.

They're in downtown Toronto with several high buildings, including a couple of new condo towers, within a fairly short distance. You'd need a long lens to shoot them from the condos. The Ryerson library is close enough that a $100 point&shoot would do. Privacy? I don't think so, but I would never have thought of taking pictures of them.

I don't know about the legal rights but:

The Zanzibar rooftop is not a public place and where he took the photos from was not a public space. This comment touches on the legality: <a href="http://torontoist.com/2010/11/zanzibar_women_roof_photos.php#comment-2749612" rel="nofollow">torontoist.com/2010/11/zanzibar_women_roof_photos.php#com...</a> which is just a quote from this more comprehensive article: <a href="http://ambientlight.ca/laws.php" rel="nofollow">ambientlight.ca/laws.php</a>

Here's Brian Cameron's view from his place of work.:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/saturation/134939337/

Clearly he used a telephoto lens to capture the detail in the shots in the article and both places were not public. Personally if I was him I would worry about a police investigation as he might be close to the line between legal and illegal maybe enough on a very slow day for a judge to issue a search warrant to see what else he is shooting.

He has a right to be at Ryerson since he works there. Not trespassing so I don't see legal trouble there. However, Ryerson could ask him to stop taking photos I guess, but then they'd have to tell every person at Ryerson with a camera that they can't take photos. I'm sure they aren't happy about being put in the middle.

To me the roof is the question. No it's not public space, but they are exposed. If I'm at a rooftop party and someone photographs me from another building, do I really have the right to complain if they aren't actually trespassing? Some of the comments in the torontist article indicated that they knew they could be seen, so its not cut and dry whether they had an expectation of privacy or not. An investigation could go either way.

I think they were being kind of naive not realizing that a picture could be taken. Not a fun way to find out. Ouch.

The shot that you linked from his Flickr account appears to have been shot with somewhere between a wide and normal lens. The pictures in Torontoist appear to be VERY tight crops. It also doesn't appear that the shot from Torontoist is from the same angle as the linked shot (lower angle; maybe 2nd or 3rd floor of the library building).

Trust me, you wouldn't need more than maybe 100mm equivalent, at absolute most, to get those shots.

I went to Ryerson for 4 years and nobody told me about this?

Taking the photographs are not in anyway illegal but under the 2006 Canadian voyeurism law first taking them and then putting them in the public domain may be questionable because of the nudity. Canada is still pretty puritanical.

You must have actually been paying attention in class

The guy that took the pic might have a good meeting with his boss about this but I don't think he'll come out any worse than he is today.

One clarification, working there does not mean you have automatic rights to be there in the sense of rights as we know it from a day-to-day perspective as an individual. You are there to work for you employer. Two different things.

Actually I avoided the Library because the reference materials were less than desired.

True, which is why you don't see a whole lot of shots from Ryerson on my site.

I went to Ryerson too -- and I don't ever remember Zanzibar watching as a hobby.... would have given a whole new dimmension to the library, and its collection of 1960's books.

with regards to invasion of privacy... ya, its a tricky one. I could see a roof top being considered a private place, but given its vacinity to taller buildings -- that trumps the idea of privacy.

I have a rooftop deck, and when I'm on it I have NO expectation of privacy and dress appropriately. When you're outside you should expect the same privacy anywhere else outside, even when you're on private property!

As for shooting from the library, I don't know how many times I've taken pictures from somewhere I'm visiting when it has an interesting view, including shots that has other people's rooftops in the pictures...if there's someone on a rooftop doing something they shouldn't, well they are in "public view" as I'm not looking through their windows.

Exactly. I have a largish balcony/patio in a downtown condo and I live on a lower floor. Obviously, when I'm out there it's very easy for someone to see me from the street. As such I adjust my expectations and behaviour accordingly when I'm enjoying the patio.

I think you might be over estimating the importance of expectation of privacy in the section of the law. Really need a criminal lawyer but maybe 162 subsection (1) b or (1)c and combined with 162 (4) of the Canadian Criminal Code might be useful to the police if they wanted to make life difficult for Brian and other photographers. But I hope they have more important things to do.

This whole think stinks of what is wrong with society IMO

Women can go topless, yet scream if somebody takes their photo

You can't have it both ways.

Once outside the walls of a building you are in the public view and have no expectations of privacy.

It is really that simple.

I was under the impression when on private property you are not allowed to take photos of other private properties, but if you are taking the photos from a public place.

However, from an employer's perspective, I would probably heavily warn this employee if not fire them. Is he at the office working? If yes, then he is stealing company time. If no, then he should not be in his property. Technically it could be argued that since he has taken the photos from his office, then that becomes the property of Ryerson. I've gone through this with a past company and a logo idea that I drew on piece of paper at my desk, but on my lunch break. A manager at the company liked my design and wanted it for a marketing initiative, but I had designed it for a friend's personal business (which was a non competing product/service, thus unrelated industry). The whole argument was that I did something while on my employer's property so that it became their property, and any use that I had required their permission.

how is library not a public place?

Ryerson is private property.

Regardless whether taking the photographs was legal or not, publishing them without the consent of the subjects was not legal.

In that case one couldn't post any photos as an event photographer until they had recieved permission from anyone who had been photographed.

And journalists couldn't publish any photos without consent of every identifiable person in the photo.

I think in the end, both sides have learned something. The employer at Zanzibar will need to do something to protect their employee's privacy during their break, which means, stay indoors pretty well. The guy at Ryerson, regardless if you're a well known photog or not, will need to understand, you're working there on Ryerson's dime. Like any employee, you need to be fully aware of what you do on company time and the consequences of your actions.

Because its not a PUBLIC library.

Right, and most images on Flickr would be illegal, as would all images on our candid shots and street photography threads on this forum.

I think what Bosscat is referring to is if you're an actual event photographer. So this is different - you're hired to shoot an event. And sometimes there are strings attached on what you can do with the images. For example - you may or may not be able to post them on your site to share with others, or maybe you can but you cannot sell the images to anybody else unless you have written permission from the organizers.

It use to be illegal to expose yourself in public, whether or not you are in a private place. I wonder when that law was overturned? It seems at least public opinion has gone the other way.

Not all libraries are public. The library I work at isn't public. You have to work at my institution to use it. Over the years we've had to ask a few people to leave who where under that misapprehension.

Just as an FYI Ryerson has said they will not do anything as they have no policy against employees taking photographs.

Just because the public can go there, does not make it a public place...shopping malls are not public places as you have to follow their rules when on their property, same with public schools.