Quote:
Originally Posted by fdooby
Less and less what you might call serious photographers put their WNBR images online these days. Many that do deliberately resize them right down. You also have to take into account things like the big lens paranoia - especially prevalent in Brighton. The better lenses tend to be the big telephotos - this year I barely used mine in Brighton and image quality suffered as a result.
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And a new one this year in Brighton - marshals actively discouraging riders from posing for pictures. Absolute nonsense given that the whole point is supposed to be positive publicity for the causes.
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I believe the problem in Brighton is the well known naturist beach and marshals coming from that background trying to enforce naturist etiquette and forgetting WNBR is a completely different thing. For a beach where people want to go with their whole family and have a good time without anyone disturbing them they know a proper and reasonable set of rules. They don't expect to see professional photographers there and anyone with big lens camera even far away obviously means a pervert wanting to zoom between legs. That's why they can't think of any other use of big lens. People on the beach don't protest anything, they don't have a message to send, they don't expect coverage, they mostly just want some undisturbed fun in the nature.
Now WNBR is all about protesting and showing yourself. There is a reason why people put messages on their bodies, they want them to be read and their protest would mean nothing if nobody knew about it and nobody covered it with good quality photos. And on top of that it's public nudity, not some secluded beach. Most people participating in WNBRs in other cities know that very well and have no problem with photographers unless someone really crosses the boundary of intimacy. But that comes rather from other participants of the ride, often fully clothed, like that dark skinned guy on a bike looking like he just stole from some kid and trying to follow girls with his phone camera without even pretending he's there for some WNBR goals.