LIGHTS, CAMERA.... WAIT, NO CAMERAS

The college kids from Tri C took over Ely Square downtown today to shoot portions of their school film project. TMC NEWS headed down to the square to get the scoop for our loyal readers on the production; however our camera was not met with open arms.

While trying to take photographs in Ely Square this morning a production assistant approached me and said that I was not allowed to take photographs of them. When I explained that they were in a city park and I was on public property he said he didn’t care and that no photographs were to be taken today, maybe tomorrow. Still not agreeing with the Tri C college student he asked if I wanted him to get the Police involved, agreeing that would be a good idea we conferred with the city Park Ranger who said that I was able to shoot from the sidewalks surrounding the park but not inside because they have that reserved. So I stood on the sidewalk. The college student chose to stand one foot in front of me, moving where ever I would go in an attempt to block my shot, even blowing smoke from his cigarette in my camera and face along the way. Finally another college student pulled him away from his “Stop the Picture Taking” detail.

Around 3 p.m. when the production felt it was a good time to close down Broad Street traffic in both directions I began taking more photos of the backed up traffic. Once again I was being told not to take photos by two other production people. They also went to an Elyria Police Officer to try and get him to make me stop; realizing that wasn’t going to work one of them approached me and again asked me to stop taking pictures. When I asked him why they were so concerned about people taking pictures he replied; “We don’t want our script ideas getting out to people, someone might steal our ideas. It’s like if you were building a house, would you want everyone to see the blue prints?” I told him I thought that was a silly comparison and he left.

I will say that during the first and second incident another production assistant named Chris came over and apologized both times, even offering to fire the first guy who blew smoke in my camera. Not necessary. Chris was very level headed and very professional with me and offered to speak to the group at the end of the day so the same problems don’t occur over the next three days of production.

During our last conversation another of the production people chose to film us talking from Ely Square, I hope I make the final cut of the film!

To see more photos: CLICK HERE