the portland ride is not anti-photographer. there are plenty of ways you can film the crowd without getting harassed. personally i would suggest bringing a bike and taking your clothes off - be a part of the party and you're just another person having fun documenting the experience. many, if not most, of the riders are taking pics of themselves and other people throughout the event. you can walk around with your phone out (get an app that turns your screen black while recording and you can be pretty DL about this), you can attach a go-pro to your bike and walk it through the crowd or just chain it up somewhere with a lot of foot traffic.
what if you want to keep your clothes on, and bring a camera with a huge lens? well, maybe some people will give you a hard time... but if you are taking people's pictures with a camera like that, while not being vulnerable yourself, and not taking part in the event, and not asking for permission, i can see why people would take exception - let's say you're at the park one day, fully clothed, just hanging out with friends. do you want some random stranger with professional camera equipment following you around and taking your picture without permission? it's easy to imagine that you wouldn't want that (i sure wouldn't), even if you were wearing all your clothes. add nudity to the equation and i think it's only fair that people expect a little bit of common courtesy.
the solution is simple - before shoving your zoom lens in somebody's genitals, ASK for permission. i mean, duh. "can i take your picture?" the worst they can do is say no. this is just common sense. this is literally the way that antwone gets most of his pics. he walks up to a hot girl or group of girls, and he asks them. if they say no, he moves on.
another easy solution for people with huge cameras, is to use the zoom from far enough away from the crowd that you aren't bothering them. i've seen new cameras that can zoom in on shit from like a mile away. keep your distance and nobody will care. i've seen plenty of guys taking pics this way. i would expect people here know better than to bring a zoom lens to the nude beach and walk directly up to people and start taking their pictures from 10 feet away without permission. which is essentially what these dudes are doing at WNBR. it's just rude behavior (even though i appreciate the results).
ALL OF THAT SAID, i would not expect a huge bounty from this year's ride. usually the pre-party starts at 5 or 6, this year it started at 8. it also happened at the end of july instead of right after the solstice, meaning the sun set earlier that day. by the time the crowd started getting large, it was already dark enough that getting good pics with cheap equipment was pretty tough. also, antwone wasn't there, and he always had the best pics.
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